Brilliant and Intelligent

Rating: 10/10 (9 August 2005)

For those of you like myself who are fans of the books of the same name,you will not be disappointed by this movie. Unlike the animated versions that have previously been made where much of the story was condensed either for budgetary constraints or time limits, the Fellowship of the Ring while it does take a few shortcuts, there are very few. It is very exciting getting to see places that up until now have been purely figments of my imagination portrayed by someones elses imagination on the silver screen. I felt myself holding my breath waiting to see the various locations of middle earth and how others have dreamed of them. The movie does a breathtaking job in transporting the viewer to this other world and does so with magic good enough to be from the hand of Gandalf himself. Yes, there are places where for dramatic reasons or to prevent a lengthy historical context that certain events from the book were either shortened, modified or changed. These changes however do not change the storyline itself and makes for a very entertaining movie. I do feel however that if you are one of the uninitiated, it would serve you to either read the book before going, or immediately after the film pick up a copy and read it as it will provide more breadth to the story than what an almost three hour film can portray. In addition, there are several scenes in the book that while not central to the main story, add more to the lore of middle earth and help to explain some of the history leading up to the time of the story. The characterizations in the film were very well done and the choices of the actors to play the hobbits were perfect. While I was somewhat anxious to have Elijah Wood as Frodo and Sean Astin as Samwise, after seeing how well they were portrayed on film left me no doubt that these actors did a very admirable job bringing the characters to life. The majority of the cast has some English accent which was my main concern. Both the principle American actors portrayed a passable English type accent themselves which helped prevent them standing out on their own. How the filmmakers made several average height men such as Wood and Astin, and probably more so John Rhys Davies as Gimli appear much smaller than their Elvish or human companions is spellbinding. Special effects in this movie while at first don't really seem to be that obvious eventually take on a more obvious tone as the fellowship moves further into the adventure. As one would expect from a magical world, many things which we take for granted from reading the books are very difficult to accurately portray in a live action presentation. The filmmakers not only did a good job, they surpassed by far my expectations and truly made the experience an enjoyable and fulfilling one. As with any film where there will be sequels coming out, the ending left me longing for December 2002 to follow our adventurers further on their quest.
I will caution parents who are thinking of taking their children to see this movie that it is not a movie made or intended for children. Much Parental Guidance and forethought should be taken before taking children under 12 to this film. Aside from a film which lasts almost three hours in length where much of the dialogue while important to the story is not well suited to entertain small children. In addition, several of the creatures created for the film will probably terrify younger audiences. If you want to take your children to see this film, I might caution you to view it without them first and then decide to take them on your own judgement. Hey, if you do see it first without them, you can see it again right? I plan on seeing it more than once anyway. All in all, this is a well developed motion picture where a great deal of thought went into it's development and execution. I am thankful to the filmmakers for having the courage to tackle such a well known, well loved story with an audience that has a very well organized preconceived notion of how they view the world of Tolkien. The filmmakers did the book justice and that is the bottom line unlike Bakshi's version of 1978 which was a disappointment at best and unfinished as it's final release turned out to be.