A theatrical miracle, nothing less

Rating: 8/10 (25 April 2019)

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring is the daunting first chapter in an action epic undertaking so daunting that it is almost a miracle that Peter Jackson managed to turn it into one of the greatest films of all time. Adapting J.R.R. Tolkien's extensive fantasy universe to the screen was a task that few could have succeeded at, let alone quite so thoroughly.
The Fellowship of the Ring in particular was left with the incredible challenge of orientating the audience to Tolkien's vast folklore - a task which Tolkien himself dedicated several chapters of the novels to. There were many characters, languages, places, myths and legends to be explained without losing the audience to pure exposition, and Jackson managed to do so with such elegance that, even in its significant runtime, the film is action-packed and engaging from end to end.
The casting of this trilogy should also go down in history as some of the best. Ian McKellen, Elijah Wood, Viggo Mortensen, Orlando Bloom, Christopher Lee, Sean Bean and John Rhys-Davies are all perfectly cast and backed up by a supporting cast of such proven names as Cate Blanchett and Hugo Weaving.
The film itself is two and a half hours of eye-popping special effects, intense and perfectly-choreographed fight scenes and the wonder and tension of Jackson at his finest. As a reader of the novels myself, almost every character was exactly as I would have imagined, and the film became simply an exact visualisation of the first novel. One could almost forget that it was an adaptation and not the work of Tolkien himself.
While I have never been a fan of hard fantasy, and find world-building in films often time-consuming and tiresome, The Lord of the Rings found the perfect balance to build such an extensive world full of depth and folklore while still maintaining an action-packed pace and establishing itself as one of the greatest action-adventure trilogies in history.
All credit goes to Jackson for managing to transform Tolkien's often dense material into a film, and eventually a trilogy, that flows so beautifully from moment to moment. And credit in this instance to the wonderful performances of McKellen, Bean, Mortensen and Wood. Even for someone who strays from fantasy, The Lord of the Rings is a must-see and a personal favourite to return to from time to time.