Excellent, of course, but bothered by some changes

Rating: Null/10 (19 December 2002)

As everyone knows, this movie is excellent. Eveyone will see it and say so, and it's true. So I'll stick to only the few things I didn't like and not the many, many more things I did: 1) The effect of Pippin and Merry riding Treebeard looked bad, very bad. 2) The "everyone thinks Aragorn is dead" subplot was an unnecessary departure from the text. 3) Like some earlier reviewers, I felt that the change to Faramir on a fundamental level was a very poor decision. This is a guy who the audience is supposed to like, who is supposed to represent the good in Gondor. Now all the audience will have is him, Boromir and later Denethor to show them what Gondorians are like, and the picture won't be pretty. I mean, why should we root for Gondor when all their representatives are greedy, ill-mannered and sometimes insane men?
Anyway, kudos to Peter Jackson for another fine cinematic experience. Please try to be nice to Faramir.