Star rating: 4 out of 5

Rating: 8/10 (25 July 2004)

The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers is a worthy sequel to the outstanding The Fellowship of the Ring. It is much darker than its predecessor in both mood and in the very coloration of the film itself. The initial scenes as the audience falls through the inky blackness of the mines of Moria, following the epic duel between Gandalf and the inferno that is the Balrog, sets the tone for the rest of the film.
The Fellowship of the first film has splintered into three groups  Merry and Pippin have been captured by Uruk-hai, and are now being tracked by Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli. Frodo and Sam are slowly edging nearer to the fires of Mount Doom in Mordor where they can destroy the terrible burden that is the ring. In their quest they are aided by the wonderfully dichotomous character that is Gollum/Smeagol. And The Two Towers really is Gollum's film. He is a triumph of digital wizardry that the audience will both loathe and wish redemption for.
The other major computer-generated characters  Treebeard and his ilk  are perhaps not so successfully believable; although few viewers could fail to be moved by the `last march of the Ents'. The settings are simply stunning; both the natural scenery of windswept plains and craggy mountains, and the built sets, such as the Kingdom of Rohan that echoes the Viking settlements of old.
At the conclusion of the Battle of Helm's Deep, where (despite being a supposedly purpose-bred fighting force) the Uruk-hai are massacred by a handful of men, Gandalf prophesies that `the battle for Middle Earth is about to begin'. The audience is left to ponder what further horrors, heartbreaks and triumphs are in store for the adventurers.