A beautiful film, but I regret leaving it till this late to see it.

Rating: 8/10 (26 April 2011)

I only saw this recently (mid 2011) and I really wish I hadn't have left it this late. To give this context, I had already seen the second and third films first and had otherwise been told about the story from my friends who all had seen it too many times in its year of release; I hadn't enjoyed the latter films because I had no idea what was going on and I was very young so my attention span was appalling. In addition I watched the extended edition instead of the theatrical one, so my review of this film is going to be incredibly skewed compared to the majority of Lord of the Rings fans.
To be brief, gorgeous cinematography, good acting and great action but none of it felt original or fresh simply because I've seen pretty much every scene either referenced or parodied so many times it just made me laugh most of the time. Also, to someone who already knows what's going to happen, how it's going to happen and when, I found it difficult to endure over 3 hours of needless exposition that I already knew and I'd already heard being quoted hundreds of times over the course of about 10 years.
However, I adored the scene in the mines, the special effects and the very few moments that DID surprise me, though they are few and far between. Though I'm definitely going on to watch the other two again and am now looking forward to The Hobbit upon its release.