Well, for a moment there I thought it was not going to see this movie since finding a baby sitter was becoming more and more difficult. However thanks to Cathy and my cousin, we managed to make it. Thanks guys!
Yes, this is yet another review of a highly overrated film. To start off I'd like to say that I haven't read any of the LOTR books. I come into this movie without any bias or misguided devotion to a book and NO I am not a follower of the Tolkien faith. However from what I read on the internet it has a growing following which is now said to rival Christianity in it's scope. This movie is just that, a movie, and nothing more. It is just a medium that allows producers, actors, directors and various supporting crew members to generate income, pay bills and live their life (albeit slightly better than ours). It is also something that we pay money for to be entertained or enlightened...
This movie definitely falls in the entertainment category. To summarize the plot, the enemy is Saruman (Christopher Lee), who commands a vast army of Uruk-Hai warriors against the fortress of Theoden (Bernard Hill). Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen )joins bravely in the fight. As you can tell this is a huge storyline which must not be constrained to traditional formulaic timing of 2 hours. It must stretch for at least 3 agonizing hours.
I found it interesting that they didn’t bother to do a recap at the beginning of the movie on what happened in part one. I wouldn’t mind, what’s another 5 minutes? In any case the film opens with a brief reprise of the great battle between Gandalf (Ian McKellen) and Balrog, the monster made of fire and smoke. This reminds us of movie serials of the past. In the first movie we see him fall, obviously to his death, in the second we see him survive the fall and as Gandalf extinguishes the creature he becomes in the process Gandalf the White. I wish someone can explain how the battle moves from an underground pool of water to atop a mountain peek of ice and snow?
We are glad however that Gandalf has survived since he is a key player in every turning point in the movie. He is there when Merry and Pippin will be squashed by tree creatures. He is there when Theoden needs an exorcist to rid him of a demon that has made him paralyzed. He is also there in the end to bring in a backup army to defeat the Uruk-Hai warriors. It must be nice to have a wizard around to patch up plot holes and save the movie from certain doom. If he was so powerful then why didn’t he stay in the fortress from the start and blow away all the Uruk-Hai?
It’s hard to nail down the predominant characters. The fellowship is split up in this film as we follow multiple plot threads. One character that blew me away was Gollum. I can’t stress enough how shocked and pleased I was to find that I was moved by the performance of this CGI character. Compared to the other cardboard characters, Gollum has real emotions of obsession, greed, fear and even a split personality. One riveting scene has his internal dark side conversing with himself, arguing if you will. If it was legally possible I would like to see this character nominated for an oscar. Actually there was a real actor used in the process to assist in overlaying the CGI graphics. This allowed Frodo (Elijah Wood) and Sam (Sean Astin) to stare into the eyes of a real person rather than a broomstick. By the way, aren’t we all sick of hearing Sam say “Mr. Frodo” and stumbling over every rock in his path?
The hobbits in general don’t play a pivotal role in the movie. Merry and Pippin can be seen throughout the whole movie sitting on top of a tree (Treebeard ) that walks through the forest very slowly. They are trying to convince the tree to organize against Saruman but the trees refuse. So the hobbits use an old and tried trick, they take the tree to an open stretch of clear cutting where only tree stumps remain.
The Elven kind are shown briefly in the move as well. By the way, whenever I say briefly, it translates to 15 minutes of screen time here. One scene I liked was when Arwen (Liv Tyler) visualizes her life with Aragorn if she decides to marry him. I mean it’s not impressive but I like it when a director shows us what he means rather than telling us. The narrator here is Elrond (Hugo Weaving). It’s too bad that he was so good in the Matrix because that’s all I could see him as. I mean he had the same look and eyebrows. I kept waiting for him to say “Hello, Mr. Anderson”
At this point I’d like to make a statement about the beauty of Liv Tyler. She is increadibly beautiful. It’s hard to believe she’s the daughter of that hideous creature called Steven Tyler. God works in mysterious ways. Another thing, all the elven have pointed ears much like vulcans, however do they also have pierced ears? I wonder why the makeup department didn’t patch up Liv’s earlobe. I would think it would be better to hide it just to show the purity of the culture. By the way I loved the way Aragorn stroked Liv’s pointed ears… erotic.
Ok, now down to the hard criticism. I didn’t like this movie as a whole. Yes there were nice scenes here and there but overall it lacked emotion. I didn’t feel for any of the characters (except maybe for Gollum). The first movie had me saddened and teary eyed at the death of Gandalf. It was an emotional climax, which is a good thing to have. This movie had no sense of danger. Somehow I knew that the fortress would hold. I knew that Theoden would not get a single arrow shot into him when he charged through the gates and I also knew Aragorn would survive his fall into the river… after all, it’s a movie. When my mind works like that while I’m watching a movie then it’s all over. The director’s lost me. I just sit back and watch a visual effects masterpiece but not an emotionally engrossing edge of your seat thrill ride.
Why is it that storylines are so afraid to kill people? None of the characters in this movie were ever at peril. Since the movie starts off by blowing away our previous notion of Gandalf’s death so why should we think otherwise of all the characters. We are cruising along with the premise that everything will be alright. The original novels are to blame for the plot not the movie. If that’s the case then maybe they shouldn’t have made these films. They should have instead made something better. What ever happened to character building, real dialog and smart plot twists?
In conclusion I can say that this movie is a masterpiece of special effects but a flat 2D drawing of emotional exploration. I’ll get my hanky ready for part 3, maybe I’ll feel something then.
