Overrated ...

Rating: 8/10 (20 January 2004)

Cliches, cliches, cliches and more cliches. Melodramatic, sappy, hokey, childish... I felt like I was watching Harry Potter all over again. But at least HP was TARGETED at 10 year olds. This movie was supposed to be an epic; a finale. Hardly. There was nothing different between this film and either I or II, save for the fact that they finally let Frodo put the biscuit in the basket, uh, I mean the ring into the fire. Nearly 11 hours of the same build-up, movie after movie. The battle scenes were, of course, incredible but c'mon, computer-enhanced imagery and trickery has become redundant. There is no suspense, no fright, when you know the outcome. Maybe the D&D geeks amongst us get off on this computer fantasia bull but I don't. Really now, was there any great difference between LOTR II and III when it came to the battles, save for the bad guys were now on elephants instead of ugly, giants Orgs? Nobody can argue that Tolkien's story is incredible - you could strip all 3 of these films of all the special effects (overkill) and the story would still be fantastic - but when you keep laying on all the pre-battle buildups and then drone on about the unconquerable power of the ring, well, after a while, I just wanna' hit the pause button so I can see what else is on.