The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring

The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (2001)

Runtime: 208 minuets (Extended Edition)

Directed by: Peter Jackson

Starring: Elijah Wood, Sean Astin, Viggo Mortensen, Ian McKellen

From: New Line Cinema

Would you believe that I had never seen this film before… or any of the Lord of the Rings movies? I haven’t read the book either. I just had never given a damn. And that’s with hearing about how good the book was from some older people I knew and hung out with at the time (back before the films came out) and I had seen clips from all three movies before. It still never interested me. Then, recently I found out that on the 14th, 21st, and 28th of this month, some AMC Theatres across the country are doing a special deal where on those days, they’d screen a LOTR movie, with this one being first, the second on the 21st, and the last on the 28th. I figured I would roll the dice and give the first one a shot, despite its length.

The only unique thing I saw about this screening (I bounced after the end credits began) was that it opened with a short introduction from the director, who thanked everyone for coming out, mentioned that he was shocked he was able to make the movies in the first place, and despite how long it took to make the three movies, he was proud of how they turned out. I don’t think I need to mention what the series of movies is about (I mean, even I generally knew what it was about), so I’ll get to my thoughts on this movie itself.

Me… it’s not for me. I know, some people will get mad at that statement, and people will think I’m being “different”, a “contrarian”, or what have you. That’s not the case; I just wasn’t convinced that I was wrong in ignoring this whole franchise. Sure, that film looked and sounded great, and what an expansive world it was (I enjoyed the New Zealand scenery). I just thought that everything was overblown, overwrought (especially the score at times), confused, and just too damn long. It’s the longest movie I’ve ever seen on the big screen, so there’s that, but I couldn’t understand what powers the “all-powerful” wizards had or didn’t have and when they do or don’t use those powers, and trying to understand what the characters do and don’t at certain times… I guess I just don’t care for the novel and its plot then.

I’m not saying this is a terrible movie by any means; it’s just not my thing. Besides the praise I’ve already given to how it looked and sounded, there were definitely some interesting creatures and the action is entertaining-enough. It’s just that if I do decide to ever see the other two films, it’ll be on disk instead of the big screen… or maybe I’ll just read the synopsis of those movies on Wikipedia. It’d save a lot of time.

I’ll be back Sunday night and what I do then will definitely be less controversial than this.