I didn’t get out to see this on the first day in the Odeon Leicester Square, as I did with The Fellowship of the Ring. But then I didn’t manage that with The Two Towers either. I guess that Christmas just isn’t a good time for squeezing in three and a half hour movies.
Let’s just first say that I’d have equally as happily gone along if it had been five and a half hours (and let’s hope the DVD is!).
I’ve been waiting for these films since they were announced, and somehow the two year gap between first and last doesn’t feel too bad. In some respects they could have been spaced out longer apart – I think that might be guilt that I haven’t yet watched my extended edition of The Two Towers DVD.
I don’t know what more there is to say that hasn’t already been spoken by others with better writing skills than myself. The tension is maintained, the story doesn’t drag. The whole thing looks stunning, with an outrageous battle sequence and beautiful set pieces such as the lighting of the beacons.
The scale, scope and audacity is breathtaking, and Peter Jackson has served the novel(s) well.
The special effects lead you to think that nothing is impossible to show in the cinema from this day forth – and that every time you sit there watching an effects sequence in a film in the future, admiring it as an effects sequence, then it’s being done badly.
It’s going to take me some time to get over dreadful effects sequences such as those in XXX and Die Another Day (neither are worthy of linkage).
The acting is first class, and I look forward to all the cast that wasn’t already big names, going on to some excellent work.
It’ll be interesting to see who’s first to attempt a big fantasy film outside the Harry Potter franchise. They’re going to be measured up against these films, and will know it. Even some years down the line, noone has yet attempted another Gladiator in the cinema, although we have Troy coming next year, and at least two versions of Alexander the Great.