They could make one a year ad infinitum

Rating: 10/10 (24 December 2004)

I had trouble with ROTK in the theatrical release, and once again the DVD Extended Edition soothes my irritation with additional footage. In this case about 50 minutes of added footage, so you're looking at 250 minute commitment of time just for the movie, and if you want to see significant chunks of the extras, you'd better call in sick or forget the ball game, and order pizza. Its worth it, and if you pay attention you'll see Peter Jackson take an arrow from Legolas. It may play longer but a smoother flowing movie seems like a faster movie. Just don't pay attention to the clock.
The EE doesn't fix the problem with the big battle at Pelennor Fields aka Siege of Gondor. As soon as the ghost army arrives everyone else may as well take up making mayonnaise, because the ghosts spank the bad guys' collective ass. They should've figured out something else to keep the battle edgy. Up to that point it was exciting to see the Riders of Rohan charge and a realistically terrified Eowyn stick it to the Witch King.
The Frodo/Sam/Gollum segment is the strongest half of ROTK. If Frodo had any Spidey Sense it would've been tingling around about Chapter 38, but he was not himself anymore. Lugging The One Ring around has taken its toll. Sam is the hero and Middle Earth's Last Best Hope is saved by a gardener, which is better odds than being saved by a politician. Sam would've dived into a dragon's throat to rescue Frodo, and he does something just as hard and much ickier. The film doesn't quite get it across that Shelob is sentient, but it scores high on making her big, smelly and icky, although I was slightly disappointed that she didn't bleed very much green or yellow goo.
There's also a lot of finality in the 2 extra discs from the ROTK extended edition. End of Principle Photography, End of Pickup shooting, Last Oscar party, etc... They finished the movies almost 4 years ago and did some touchup pickup shots for it in the summer of 2003. There's more CGI in ROTK than in the previous 2 films combined. The WETA workshop must've wound up with a helluva server farm for all that rendering. It was nice that some of the actors bought the horses they rode on in the films, and there were some other touching 'end of' things happening.
This is the best group of movies ever made IMHO. If they never do anything else, the cast and crew have already done enough. Years from now, when they're old or gone, The Lord of the Rings will remain on the short list of serious movie fans, a point of reference to what great movies are. I've imagined lots of stories they could tell with the remaining Hobbits, and Legolas and Gimli were supposedly inseparable so they could've gone on to more adventures, like leading a bunch of dwarfs into Moria. One movie a year would be good.