Extremely Satisfying

Rating: 10/10 (20 January 2004)

In this final, extremely satisfying installment of `The Lord Of The Rings' trilogy, Peter Jackson confirms himself as the Cecil B. DeMille of our time, a master purveyor of entertainment and showmanship with superior storytelling skills. Jackson throughout has set out to make his own movies and not become a slave to J.R.R. Tolkien's books (awful as they are--I couldn't make it through the last one) and this episode particularly benefits from his cinematic vision and the refitting by the writers (who, in addition to Jackson, include Fran Walsh and Phillipa Boyens) of major plot points and the deepening of the character motivation so sorely lacking in Tolkien's prose; there's a lot of emotion on display and it's frequently overwhelming. Jackson gives the audience what it wants and gives himself the pleasure of having created a work of art that is deeply personal as well, embodying, as it does, notions of chivalry and honor that go all the way back to `Heavenly Creatures'. In order to bring the massive story to closure, Jackson is forced to concentrate more on plot and battle (the film's centerpiece, the oversized battle at Pelennor Fields, is enthralling, with plenty of swaggering action drawn from the Warner Bros. swashbucklers of the thirties) and have his cast shoulder the responsibility of maintaining interest in the characters--but fortunately everyone is up to the challenge, with Sean Astin (as Sam, for whom the story is ultimately about) and Elijah Wood (as Frodo, sensitively handling the supporting role to which he has been relegated) being the moral centers. Jackson and production designer Grant Major, for the finale, have combined the best design schemes of the previous two films, the warm, colorful textures of the `The Fellowship Of The Ring' with the rocky monochromatic landscapes of `The Two Towers' and the result is a breathtaking, moving cinematic experience that delivers the trilogy into movie legend; the fact that it's now over means that audiences will feel an acute loss at Christmastime from hereon in.