I've just seen 'Lord Of The Rings' (minor spoilers)

[Sharklady]

What can I say about it? Well...

For starters, I've *never* seen any movie do a better job of living up to it's hype. They did almost everything well- the acting, the high-quality and appropriate special effects (that Balrog is particularly impressive- don't show it to the littler kids!), and the New Zealand scenery is worth the admission price all by itself. The sets were generally great, too- my only complaint is Lothlorien's closed-in look (save it for Fangorn, guys!) The screenwriters did do a bit of tinkering with the plot, mostly for purposes of tightening it up, but none of them violate the spirit of Tolkien's epic. I consider it a definite improvement, that Arwen now has more to do than look beautiful and sew banners.

This is the best movie I've seen this year.

This is one of the best movies I've *ever* seen.

Major Kudos to everybody involved!

IT'S GONNA DRIVE ME CRAZY, HAVING TO WAIT A WHOLE YEAR BEFORE I CAN WATCH PART 2 !!!!!



What more can I say?

[robert]

As I said in my return post yesterday, I am a bit surprised that it appears a movie has violated the theory{stated also at the end of "Lethal Intellect"}that a movie with mega hype is usually no good. However, it appears it will not make the big money "Harry Potter" did it's first week thanks to it's 3 hour length, and who knows if it will outgross that film overall, hopefully word of mouth helps it like it did Titanic, the all time money king. But as a telling sign of content, LotR got 4 Golden Globe nominations, one for best drama, and Potter got no nominations.
I myself never read the books, but the buzz over the movie has excited me, so I'll see it sometime soon. P.S, one of the very few negative reviews of the film came from my own Philly Inquirer, if it means anything, likely not, but I needed something to close this post.

[The Mad Hatter]

I saw it too, and I was mightily impressed. It did a wonderful job of creating a sense of wonder and of some true peril (even though I've read the books, more than once I was convinced everyone was about to die) without beating you over the head with CGI for its own sake. It was 3 hours long, but I could have easily sat through another 6 hours of that.

[Sharklady]

> It was 3 hours long, but I could have easily sat through another 6 hours of that. <

You just may get your chance.

They've already shot the footage for the next two movies- 'The Two Towers' and 'Return of the King'- and once they're out of post-production, they'll probably be of similar length.

It seems likely that, once all three are out, some theaters will have special LOTR marathons where they show all of 'em in a row- over nine hours of movie viewing! There's not many authors besides Tolkien who could make that sound appealing.

I'm most looking forward to 'Return of the King', 'cause I want to see Eowyn on the big screen. If they do her any justice at all, she ought to silence that New York Times reviewer who so stupidly claimed that "Tolkien's work includes examples of female monstrosity... but not of female heroism."

The paper really ought to print a retraction.