Lord of the BoRing

Rating: 6/10 (31 March 2002)

Seen as a illustration of the book, I guess this movie has some merit. The scenery is amazing, the make up astonishing, the music is just perfect... but behind the perfect production, something is lacking.

For some reason, the movie fails to captivate the viewer. After the intro, it all ends up in a series of "Aaaargh, something is coming, let's run". And some set of characters run, pursued by some set of monsters either riding or on foot. And then the same thing again. And again. And again. And maybe some conflict over the ring, but then it is time to run (and maybe kick a little orch butt) again. And then it ends, and we need to suffer another two movies of three hours before the hobbits have defeated evil, saved the world, and they can stop running and walk home.
Seen as a movie, WITHOUT considering the background in a world famous seried of fantasy books, it is just to shallow. THe characters are never given time to develop, they are basically paper dolls of known types paraded before the camera. The evil is too pitch black without nuance, and the good guys (especially the elves) are too boringly good. It is nice to see that they do have the guts to kill of a few heroes, but even this does not really create any real suspense.
Even action movies should manage to grip the audience for more than half an hour, but this movie does not.
I'm looking forward to the promise of some big battle scenes in the next part, and might see it because of the visuals, but as a whole the ring series does not merit much excitement.