Crowning Achievement (no pun intended)!

Rating: 10/10 (18 December 2003)

I had a tremendous headache yesterday, but was not about to miss a movie I had waited two years to see! Hard to describe without overused words. By far the most moving of the three. If Sean Astin does not get Best Supporting Actor they should close the Academy, they don't know what they are doing! His fantastic portrayal of loyal Sam, faithful, self-sacrificing Sam contrasts strikingly with the treacherous, scheming Gollum.

The scenery is, of course, spectacular! The sets, especially Minas Tirith make it easy to forget you are looking at a model! Unbelievable battle sequences, tops even Helm's Deep! The Paths of the Dead sequences were very well done, also.
Would have liked to see the Saruman scenes that were cut, and more development of the friendship between Legolas and Gimli, one of the best sub-plots in the books.
Some (many) will complain about the length. Allow yourself to be drawn into the story, believe in its message, and it's not long enough! Tolkein speaks to real world truths: Good will triumph over evil, but not without cost; Evil will win if good men merely do nothing; good cannot overcome evil by using the same weapons, evil has only the power to destroy, it cannot create, only pervert. ROTK does not have the memorable lines that FOTR & TTT had: Gandalf & Frodo in the Mines; Sam's epilogue to TTT; Frodo to Faramir outside Osgiliath; but it features some of the most memorable visuals of the trilogy.
I had never read Tolkein before FOTR, but the day after the movie, I bought the trilogy and started reading TTT because I could not wait to find out what happened next. I have become a true fan, having read through the Silmarillion, went back to the Hobbit through FOTR, and am now halfway through Unfinished Tales.
Especially at the end, the goodbye scenes take a while, but I think Jackson gave fans a glimpse of what the actors themselves have said. After filming for four years, they really didn't want to say goodbye. And neither did I.