An amazing achievement

Rating: 10/10 (19 December 2002)

The Two Towers is an excellent movie. The special effects, in particular, are extremely well done. You really get a great sense of the massive amounts of people/orcs involved in the battles. That sense of a huge crowd/army is something that The Two Towers achieves, that no other film has ever come close to matching.
Gollum/Smeagol is such an amazing character in the book and I was very happy to see him become what is destined to be, a classic movie character. At times, he seemed a little bit too bright, which gave him away as a CG character. But, there were also times where he looked so incredibly real, that you cannot help but view him and watch him as you would a regular, "human", character. Andy Serkis deserves a nomination for the character he helped create, and The Two Towers should win the Academy Award for Best Special Effects because of what has been achieved with Gollum/Smeagol alone.
Seeing the continued battle between Gandalf and the Balrog was so good, it had me wishing that I had my DVD remote with me so I could watch it again and again. It opens the movie with a bang and it resonates so strongly, it's kind of difficult for the other things in the beginning of the movie to feel as important.
That feeling of "importance" is not as apparent in The Two Towers as it was in The Fellowship of the Ring. Of course, it IS a "middle" movie, and that important feeling is going to be somewhat missing, regardless of what happens. But I think it's more the pacing and flow of The Fellowship that makes it seem like a more "important" movie.
Scripting and filming HUGE battle scenes is extremely difficult. But Peter Jackson set the bar so high with Fellowship, I was expecting even more this time. Unfortunately, we don't get as many "bad-ass" moments in Two Towers, as we did in Fellowship. As I already stated, being able to witness a battle that has so many characters fighting against each other is absolutely incredible. But, I was hoping to see more examples of how Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas are superior warriors to the rest of the masses. In the first movie, I was blow away by how calm Legolas was while he stabbed an orc in the eye with an arrow, then shot the same arrow at another Orc. I wanted to see more of that sort of thing. I wanted to see more of Gimli as a fearless and accomplished warrior, and less of him being the comic relief. But, perhaps those are just things that I selfishly wanted to see on the screen. As things are, I really can't complain. It's incredible and it needs to be seen.
The two worst parts (and these are VERY minor) of the movie are: 1)The Aragorn/Arwen love story 2)Legolas on a skateboard
I understand the use of Aragorn/Arwen love story, but I feel that it interrupts the natural flow of the movie. Basically, it doesn't fit and takes WAY too long.
During the battle of Helm's Deep, Legolas slides down a stone staircase on an arm shield. This feels totally contrived and remember thinking, "What movie is this? Is this Two Towers (xXx Remix)?" It was just weird and out of place.
But whatever. I'm being over critical.
The movie is very, very good. It's not quite as good as the first one, but it's still very good. If you liked the book, you will love this movie. If like huge battle scenes, you will love this movie. If you loved the first movie, you HAVE to see this movie.