B-list material disguised as an "A" movie

Rating: 4/10 (22 January 2004)

It's the movie event of the century...and I am completely unmoved! I didn't like the first two entries in the series, and I don't like this one. Right around the middle of the film, when I saw the tenth shot of a CGI soldier falling off of battlements and screaming, I realized that I was watching a farce - a big overblown video game more concerned with mindless action than telling a proper story. The character development is thin and far too sentimental, and even some of the effects are strangely flat - I didn't think Sauron really worked as an enormous spotlight, and Gollum should've been played by an actor in make-up (impressive as he is, he still looks unreal). The battle sequence is practically a re-hash of the fight from "Two Towers," and the Liv Tyler scenes are distinctly repetitive, too. Any of the dialogue that wasn't from the books stuck out like a sore thumb - the wince-inducing Gimli jokes, for example. Suffice to say, I'm looking forward to the day when the special effects in these films are surpassed, and everyone has to look deeper at their dramatic content - which is sadly lacking.