Strong on background & scenery, weak on hobbits

Rating: 8/10 (12 January 2002)

The cinematography of this film is magnificent, and the full-size characters quite engaging (wizards, elves and humans). But we never quite see this story from the viewpoint, and action-point, of the hobbits, who should be most central to the experience. Rather, the hobbits are played mostly as happless pawns in some grand scheme, when in fact the original novel has the hobbits as the doers and actors that affect the world around them. Lastly, a comment is needed on the make-up effects in this movie -- sadly, a few of the creatures' faces in this movie are not as original as they should have or could have been; the first place we saw such similar faces was way back in "The Lost Boys", and ever-so-recently about every week for the past few years in T.V.'s "Buffy The Vampire Slayer" (check out the vampire foreheads, noses and eyes!!!!).