"We Cannot Linger!" (-Legolas/Peter Jackson when wrighting the script)

Rating: 1/10 (14 November 2004)

The expectations that were built up by the first film, and the second (allthough slowed down), really plunged down into the lava of Mnt Doom with this one. It really makes you nauseous thinking about everything that is wrong in this film (I'm not talking about the extended version, that one is a lot better - but still far from perfect) and how everything could have been.
Where should I start?...
... It's overly sentimental. I mean really. And I like that s*** usually - I'm a sentimental guy. But here it's really out of proportion, and out of timing. Oh, it's really sad when Faramir rides to meet the orcs when he has no chance of winning, while Pippin is singing som silly song like he's castrated and then breaks out and cries just like that. Bu-hu, this is a mythological-style heroic fantasy-tale, not... Titanic! Everybody are so overly emotional. And I don't even wanna talk about Sam and his constant speeches about bravery and not giving in, with the hand on the chest, looking out over the horizon, with the orchestra at full volume (the only thing missing is the American flag bellowing in slowmotion behind him), and Frodo and his constant twisting-your-head-like-a-puppy-and-looking-with-big-eyes-and-a-"OH-I-love-you-so-much"-smile at Sam every time he saves him or helps him to keep going... OK I'm getting carried away....
I liked Braveheart for example, even though it has some major flaws. And people think THAT one is overly sentimental. But that one is at least down to earth-sentimental. RotK is up in the sky, almost gone out to space, like (I thought I'd never say this, but), it seems they (producers, crew and actors) really take the film TOO serious. Really. It's a Saga! Not true. It's a 20th-century, made up mythology-history about an IMAGINARY land. It's NOT a record of the Holocaust for Christ's sake!...
I understand how they needed to cut some scenes, to save up time. but, well... First of all, they didn't succeed enough with that, the films are 2-3h long and still it feels you're rushing from one place to the next, like you're on a Middleearth-8hour-safari or... cinematic tourbus. Maybe they should've cut it even more, so we could at least get the feel of BEING someplace and not just passing by? But what's really unacceptable is when he wastes all that preciously gathered time on exploring uninteresting or unimportant scenes and scenes that don't even belong in the story! Completely made up-scenes, for no logical reason!
*The ugly made-up bull/rhinoceros-beasts pulling orc-wagons (whatta F--- is up with that? I don't even know if George Lucas would accept such a badly designed creature in the Star Wars universe!)... *The really AWFUL orc liutenant/chief-guy, who's by the way made up out of thin air, who doesn't even look like an orc but more like the aliens from Peter Jackson's early lowbudget cult-films (Mr. Jackson, this is NOT the time and place to have cameos, or draw funny parallells to your Bad Taste-films, that's really... bad taste... disrespectful to the Tolkien-fans)... *The Mûmaks are really cool, but really too big, I mean, they're not dinosaurs-beasts - hey're just big elephants! *All the small details, costumes and armour etc. are really beautiful, really more than you could ever ask for. But the White Dwarf-miniature-esthetics of Minas Tirith is really bad, cause it gives a whole synthetic-comic-book/computer-game-look to Middleearth. Where are the beautiful, classical and authentic designs of Edoras and Rivendell? And no catapult can throw rocks as big as whole houses! That too is just corny and childish like in computergames. All this, and the excessive use and naive belief in CGI-technology, turns the Battle of Pelenoor Fields, which should be the total culmination and action-peak of the film into a foney uninteresting StarWars/Warhammer40000-mess, it's nothing compared to the battle of helm's deep - and that's not right.
And this CGI-trend seems to be a virus infecting everybody in the film-business. It's really sad, these films will be outdated in 10 years. But maybe that's a good thing?
RotK isn't the worst of the three, technically. But with the expectations you have from the first two, the books (if you know what's gonna happen), the demands should be pretty high; and, in my opinion too, especially after the hint in 2towers that the trilogy was going downhill (just like the matrix), this is the film that disappoints the most. RotK is the greatest and heaviest of the films, the first two would completely crumble under it's weight if it didn't hold, but they could also rise with it if it really grew as strong as it could've, and that is what it should have. Anything else is unacceptable to me, and this is also why I hate it. Cause it really doesn't live up to it's potential, it doesn't even outdo the 2towers and it doesn't live up to the old exited expectations you had from the first film.
I can't understand how a New Zeelander, who used to make underground films could turn this old British tale into shimmering Hollywood-cheese. It's too pretty, too pompous and sentimental and all the computer graphics gives it lika a fake sugarcoated shine or crust.
It's like food, add too many ingredients and spices and they'll take out each other and the dish'll just taste bland... It's just too much of everything, and the whole film falls flat. It's still stunning, but rather tasteless, and the only profound experience you might get from it comes soely from the overwhelming magnitude of the whole thing.
I still wanna congratulate P.Jackson on successfully bringing this gigantic project home. Thank him, even if he's made me more irritated than delighted, cuz I'm still glad that I'm able to watch these films. He didn't deserve all those Oscars, but he definitely deserved a few, maybe not for directing, but for Best Film - for the production. But this film should NOT be ranked as the best fantasy-film of all time! /Sebastian