USA / New Zealand (2001)
Length: 178 minutes
Directed by: Peter Jackson
Genre: Adventure / Fantasy
Starring: Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen, Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, Viggo Mortensen, Sean Astin and Liv Tyler

Frodo, a young hobbit (a race of beings about half the size of man) who has just inherited a plain-looking but extremely powerful (and evil) ring from another, much-older hobbit name Bilbo. The ring was forged by and belongs to an evil entity called Sauron, a "dark Lord" who attempted to take over Middle Earth thousands of years ago, only to be foiled by a joint army of elves and humans. The ring was lost, and has now resurfaced thousands of years later in the hands of Bilbo. And now poor Frodo, who dreams of adventure and leaving his hobbit home to discover the world outside, suddenly finds himself way over his head, as the long-dead Sauron begins to show signs of re-emergence and sends a group of black-cloaked horsemen called the Ring Wraiths to find his ring.

To be very honest with you, I'm not a fan of fantasy movies nor novels. After all, even if I reluctantly accepted to watch this movie adapted from J.R.R. Tolkien's novel, it doesn't mean that I hated Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring and I think that it's an amazing film to see. Needless to say that it is the first in a trilogy based on J.R.R. Tolkien's books and many people regard it as the most ambitious filmmaking project in the History of film, and it took two years and $300 million dollars to make it.

The movie's world is richly detailed and under Peter Jackson's skilled hands, the world of Lord of the Rings comes alive in vibrant colors. It can be said enough how stunning the universe of the movie is, from the plain vanilla look of the hobbit's Shire town to the majestic and magical aura of Rivendell, the home of the elves. Even the shortest transition scene is filled with richly-detailed CGI. There is no doubt that Jackson has lavished as much passion and money into every little (and seemingly insignificant) shot. Hopefully, Peter Jackson took the wise decision not to include all the scenes in which some characters, such as Frodo, are starting to sing (pff, just read the novels if you're so curious!), because it would have created long periods and the viewers will lose their interest for the story. As the saying goes, "All the money is on the screen."

As we can clearly see, Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring is ambitious in everything it does -- from the look to the acting, to the writing, to the sheer concept of a 3-part film to be released a year apart. True to the form, the ending comes quite unexpectedly -- or at least, unexpected for anyone who hasn't read the book. Not having read the books, back then, I came to see the first part of Lord of the Rings with high expectations, ready to be entertained, and was shocked by the sudden ending -- which, of course, is supposed to easily move into the second part, The Two Towers. Of course, I didn't know this, and was caught off guard. Because of that, I was a little bothered that I had paid full price to see an unfinished film. Yes, everything was perfect up to that point, and even full price seemed worth it. In short, I felt very soothed to see so much spectacular action scenes for my own pleasure and believe me, the action scenes are worth the price of the ticket.

The acting in Lord of the Rings is quite exceptional. Liv Tyler shows up as Arwen, an elf who helps Frodo to escape the Ring Wraiths. Arwen is also the love interest for Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen), who, I believe[d], is some kind of King on a self-imposed exile. Mortensen's Aragorn is a brooding but excellent warrior, and becomes a leader on the journey to destroy the ring. There are enough characters in Lord of the Rings with speaking lines and important roles in the trilogy's scheme, but there's so many that it's impossible to list them all. They all have very individual personalities, but I wouldn't presume to remember them all, or at least, their names.

Finally, Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring is a spectacular, grandiose and breathtaking film. It's a wild adventure filled with action, cutting edge computer-generated images, amazing animation and a brilliant set designs. It's an "international treasure" that everybody should discover for his or her own pleasure.

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scm on Sun Nov 13, 2005 21:31

I found episode 1 not so spectacular, it was episode 2 that got me interested.

flyingdagger on Mon Nov 14, 2005 00:05

I read the novels (they do contain long periods and they are a little bit boring) and I found that the second part was better than the other ones. Anyway, I would rather watch the movies instead of reading the novels.

Byo.H on Mon Nov 14, 2005 10:12

Quoting flyingdagger:

Anyway, I would rather watch the movies instead of reading the novels.

Who doesn't?

francis on Mon Nov 14, 2005 18:40

lol, it's true, watching a movie is 10000000x better

tomzx on Sat Dec 03, 2005 16:06

Goddamn, that movie was THE BEAST. You could really feel you were into it, gave a really good impression from the book story. Those landing, AMAZING. I could watch the movie a thousands times just to check out differents aspects!

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