Evokes David Lean

Rating: Null/10 (9 November 2007)

When I first saw TFOTR I was in Korea stationed there in the military. The theater was a converted military quonset hut with bad sound and an amateur projectionist. But what struck me about it was one word: Verisimilitude. It's a word that basically means realism. Not one user on here has mentioned that word. That is why all three films work. They created a sense of time and place. I was struck by the first film in that it was unlike any fantasy film i'd ever seen. Middle Earth was more than just a place it became a character in the story. The movies didn't seem like a fantasy. They were completely real in the same way that Star Wars was 30 years ago. The costumes were weathered and look lived in as did the locations. The sets even when constructed never looked constructed. The effects in the first film some were somewhat weak but that added to the effect. Effects don't have to be real to be effective. The films evoke David Lean in their sweep and Lean was arguably the greatest epic filmmaker of all time. The extended versions are better because of small moments like the scene in the Two Towers when Aragorn tells Eowen his age. It is a lovely moment of character development. They make the entire trilogy better. The best films transport you to another time and place and the Lord of the Rings films do more than that they make it seem like the story we are being told is a historical tale rather than a fantasy. That is the highest praise I can give these 3 films.