Category: The Lord Of The Rings

So, I have finally watched all three LOTR movies completely… and I still like the first one the best. (And I still haven’t read the books. I have tried. But I just can’t get past the first 50 pages.)

I remember when I watched The Two Towers for the first time, I was in a bad mood and watched it to get in better mood. It didn’t work – I thought the movie was a waste of my time. And after that, I never made it through The Return Of The King, because I got bored at the long battle scenes. And I’ve always been sort of embarrased about not making it all through them because you know, scifi/fantasy fan *head desk*

So now when I got the Extended Editions on Bluray, I promised myself, I’d watch them – in order, in one sitting, and all the way through. This past week, I did.

I like The Fellowship Of The Ring the best, because I care only about the Elf and Man parts of the movies and practically all scenes contain either. Hobbits more or less bore me – well, really just Frodo but I don’t really care for the other Hobbits either (they’re too much like children and I don’t really enjoy movies where children having big parts; children in movies/tv shows are more of a necessary evil in my eyes) although I think the actors did great job portraying them, and I couldn’t care less about Gollum or the Ents. Also, Saruman gave information dumps instead of real speaking 🙁 And I felt like every word Treebeard said was Peter Jackson’s words about how humanity exploits forests and the planet in general – I don’t know if they were or whether that part was just being faithfull to the books. And FOTR has Sean Bean, Arwen, Galadriel and Elrond. And Rivendell. So it wins hands down 🙂

I did like all the parts of The Two Towers that didn’t feature Frodo and Sam or Gollum/Smeagol, and also the bits with Frodo and Sam and Faramir and his people. And Eowyn and the Rohan people. I still can’t find anything particular to say about it. Other than it looks so pretty on Bluray and I couldn’t remember which scenes were missing from the theatrical cut but I think I like this version better. I still did feel a little like everything showed happening with and to Frodo, Sam and Gollum was a waste of time. Of course, they needed to bring Faramir into the story, but that could’ve easily been accomplished without involving Frodo etc. because of the scope of the events taking place. But propably that was just being faithfull to the books, and my disinterest in Frodo’s journey makes me that this way. And I suppose this movie is supposed to be showing how it affects Frodo to carry the ring, but I didn’t feel it – I thought from start to finish, he was a blank and bland. Not sure what happened to Elijah Wood’s acting chops, but I think he was missing them like 99% of the trilogy and Frodo being the integral part of the story, it would ruin the movies for me if it weren’t for the production values and other actors. I’ve seen him do better work in other things.

The Return Of The King… what I remember about this one are all the seemingly endless battles. I fared well about half way through, but the last three or so main battles, I started to get bored and itched to speed forward. Just like before. Only I couldn’t – the promise! One thing stands out: I wanted to see full-body/long shots of Eowyn fighting; all her fight scenes were shot in such a way that I couldn’t see it completely – close-ups etc. 🙁 Another thing that stands out: I LOVE Minas Tirith and the Gondor architechture 😀 Awesome.

All in all, I don’t have a whole lot to say about these movies, except that they look amazingly beautiful in HD, the productions values and the workmanship in set construction and everything else, are all amazing. I did totally believe in the world. It’s that last that makes me glad I (re)watched all of them, despite not really getting into it. It’d been a shame to not see all of that. And now I’m glad it’s all done and over with! 🙂 Whew.

Oh! There is one more thing – I had not recognized the guy who played Haldir as the same actor who later played Darken Rahl and Ilithyia’s husband in Spartacus. How utterly embarrashing *head desk* Especially considering that Haldir was the only character I got into for a while and read smutty Haldir fanfic back when I first watched the three movies. I don’t think I ever read any other LOTR fic at all.