The End of All Movies

Rating: 10/10 (29 December 2003)

Peter Jacksons' Lord of the Rings trilogy is likely to be the movie event of my lifetime. I may never see anything to equal its combined ambition, scope and cinematic invention in my days on this earth. People who carp at and critizise little individual facets of The Return of the King are surely missing the boat - it's like looking at the Statue of Liberty and saying 'Oooh, see there, I think there's a flaw on her elbow.....' For heaven's sake - these film-makers took on a vast, multi-plotted fantasy that defied being told on a screen. The fact that they didn't turn out a stinker is credit enough - that they told the entire story coherently and well, with every moment brimming with drama and visual imagination beggars belief. The project is the cinematic phenomenon of our time and anyone who doesn't see that, whether or not the genre of which it's a part floats their particular boat, just isn't looking.
Having said all that, the Extended Editions of these movies are, for me, the definitive versions, so I await with huge anticipation the Return of the King box-set, where the sub-plots can be leisurely played out in all their glory. Maybe I'll post a full-scale review then.....