A newbie's perspective on "The Return of the King"

Rating: Null/10 (27 April 2005)

I haven't read the J.R.R. Tolkien books or seen the first two movies in this series, so I won't waste your time with a formal review. Here are some miscellaneous thoughts from the perspective of a Middle Earth neophyte:
If you're wondering if you can understand this movie without having seen the first two, you can. I didn't realize I was watching the third installment until the end when I saw there couldn't possibly be any more story. I had a little trouble here and there, but the movie never really lost me.
Roger Ebert complained that characterization in these movies is given short shrift. Maybe so, but I thought Mr. Frodo and Sam – and the love they had for each other – were very moving. For me, they were the heart of this movie. I was roused into anger when Gollum framed Sam and temporarily split the two men – are Hobbits men? – apart.
Everyone says it, and everyone's right. Gollum is a great villain; it's a great performance by Andy Serkis and the CGI craftsmen who jointly created him. I loved to hate Gollum.
Is that woman who chafes at not being able to fight alongside the men a character from Tolkien's books? She's such a tedious action movie cliché – or would be if the actress playing her weren't so convincing and charming. She even ends up a genuine threat to a character who cannot die by any man, because of a technicality: she's not a man. That reminded me of the dreary moment in "Jurassic Park" when Helen Hunt cracks on Jeff Goldblum for talking about Man as if the term somehow excluded women. (Genesis: "And God created Man, male and female.")
I was very impressed with the special effects. Yes, they were awesome in themselves. But it's also impressive that they existed to tell the story – a rare feat these days when the story usually exists to service the effects. Still, the effects – while never overwhelming the story – sometimes overwhelmed themselves. Ebert gave special praise to the giant spider, but by the time it arrived I was already so sated with CGI monsters that this one didn't seem inordinately frightening. (Incidentally, Ebert says the spider scenes marked the best movie battle between giant insect and man, but these scenes – good as they are – don't replace the much lower-tech "Them!")
I'm not in love with Peter Jackson's directing style. His camera is always sweeping around the scenery, which is almost invariably SFX-laden, as if to say, "Nothing up my sleeve!"
Viggo Mortensen is supposed to be a major star of this series, but he makes little impression on someone watching just this entry. Elijah Wood – with his enormous eyes and beguiling presence – feels like the protagonist. Orlando Bloom also has little to do, but unlike Mortensen he makes a bad impression. When we see him in closeup the only thought that seems to be roaming his mind is: "Aren't I pretty?"
What is it about some of these great old men of the theater – men like Derek Jacobi, Richard Harris – and here, Ian McKellan? One of them can just stand on screen for five seconds and even if you've never seen him before, you think, "Wow, what a great actor."
Someone made a terrific comment on the message board for this movie, and it deserves to be read:
"When anything becomes a 'craze' it tends to annoy those of us who enjoyed the material quietly and non-fanatically before it was a fad. When I was a young teen I actually had kind of a love-hate thing with George Lucas because when 'Star Wars' became popular it was suddenly 'cool' to like science fiction, and those of us who had liked it all along were assumed to be part of that herd.
"I first read 'The Lord of the Rings' in my freshman year of high school (25 years ago now) and I have liked it ever since. I was glad to see the movies done, enjoyed them well, and plan to watch them again throughout the years. And though I suppose the advertising hype was necessary so the producers' gamble could pay off, I am glad it's over. Now the fad-of-the-month club people can move on to something else, and let me enjoy something I like in peace."
She was deriding both the people who obsessively love and abuse the movie. If the craze really is over, this might be a good time for a newbie to visit these movies. I saw this one, and despite my minor complaints, I loved it.