unrealistic of course, but uplifting nonetheless

Rating: 9/10 (18 December 2003)

First things first. The movie is completely unrealistic. There is no way the power of good, alone, can do what it did in this movie. The dwarf and elf alone killed over hundred's of the most evil, strong and heavily armoured warriors without breaking a sweat. This implies that fighting evil is easy work, which it most certainly is not.
Jackson shows us the creation of these warriors of evil and how strong they are, and they are felled one by one by a drawf's ax?!
Ok, that being said, the movie is nonetheless uplifting. Good can defeat evil. What is required is resolve to do what is right, no matter what the cost, even your own life.
The special effects need no comment aside from saying they were the best special effects I have ever seen and the battles were the most incredible I have ever seen. This movie will win several oscars, including best director and best picture.
It will not win best actor for there were far too many good actors in this movie, and they all supported the others.
Without giving away the ending, which we can already guess at anyways, I was very dissapointed in one scene near the end where our hero Frodo turns to the dark side, for a moment. While it brings home the point that evil can tempt us all, no matter how good we are, I think it says that no man can resist it. There are great men and women who can resist evil at every challenge and Frodo would certainly qualify as that type of man/hobbit.
The giant killer spider was just stupid. The dwarf was just so funny. And why in the world did the audience when I saw the movie cheer when the insane king fell to his death is beyond me. We hate evil. we cheer when evil is defeated. But we shouldn't be cheering when an insane king meets with his death. After all, insanity is not the fault of the insane.
good job Peter Jackson. Good job to the entire cast. this movie will be on top of IMDB for a long long time. I guess godfather and shawshank redemption will have to be happy with # 2 and #3.