Thanks to a tweet from Chris Hardwick this afternoon, I now know that “The Lord of the Rings” is being broadcast in Iran in an attempt to calm ongoing political protests. According to an anonymous account published on Time’s Web site, American and European movies typically hit Iranian airwaves a couple of times a week. That’s changed in the wake of the recent post-election protests. Blockbuster movies are a lot more frequent, and among them is a “Lord of the Rings” marathon on Channel Two.

The Time report makes some good points about whether the trilogy is really the best choice to distract people from protesting against a government, especially in this context. After all, there’s a whole lot of rising up against injustice in those nine-plus hours of movie (and thousand-and-some-odd pages of book). And in the end, the underdogs win.

But speaking as someone who has sat through marathon showings of the whole trilogy, I wonder if its length undermines the goal of keeping people inside. Watching the whole thing in one go isn’t necessarily something people do on a whim. I love me some hobbits, but sitting through the whole saga required both planning and the right mindset.

What do you think — are movies enough to keep protesters in their living rooms and out of the streets?

More on the world of protests at HowStuffWorks.com:
How Protests Work
How Riot Control Works
What was the largest protest in history?