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Topic: Review: A spectacular finish for 'Rings' (Read 398 times)

Rhune
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Review: A spectacular finish for 'Rings'
« on: Dec 16^th, 2003, 11:58pm »

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Review: A spectacular finish for 'Rings'
Trilogy goes out in triumph
By Paul Clinton
CNN Reviewer
Tuesday, December 16, 2003 Posted: 3:13 PM EST (2013 GMT)

(CNN) -- It's here.

The long-awaited final installment of the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy is now in theaters. And yes, "The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" is spectacular.

One thing first: it's way too long. The film clocks in at three and a half hours, though representatives from New Line Cinema (a division of Time Warner, as is CNN) repeatedly insist that the running time is actually three hours, 28 minutes and 58 seconds. Methinks they doth protest too much.

But I digress. This third in the series of the "Rings" franchise is utterly breathtaking. Even J.R.R. Tolkien would be highly impressed.

In a very clever move, director Peter Jackson brings us full circle with the opening scenes of "Return of the King," showing a young Deagol fishing with his creepy brother Smeagol (the future Gollum). When Deagol is pulled underwater by a huge fish, he spots a half-submerged golden ring in the riverbed. Once again, we see the power of the ring as the two brothers fight for possession. The scene also re-establishes the power of the movie series: you'll find yourself refocused and drawn firmly back into the grip of this most excellent adventure.

Ring and Doom
In this last installment, we find Sauron's forces have attacked Gondor's capital, in a final effort to erase mankind. The kingdom is desperately in need of a leader, and slowly Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen) begins fulfilling his destiny.

Battle after battle rages as Gandalf (Ian McKellen) tries to bring the fellowship together long enough to give Frodo (Elijah Woods) and Sam (Sean Astin) a chance to destroy the One Ring by throwing it into Mount Doom.

Meanwhile, Sam and Gollum (Andy Serkis) fight for Frodo's loyalty, as Frodo himself struggles against the power of the ring -- a ring still held firmly in place on a chain around his neck. Back and forth the battle for Middle-earth rages as wizards, hobbits, elves, humans and dwarves fight against Sauron's powers of evil.

As the story careens from one gigantic confrontation to another, one of Tolkien's main themes becomes more and more apparent: with determination, courage and faith, even the smallest of us can make a difference and change the world. It's this juxtaposition of the intimate relationships within the story, and the giant powerful forces creating the story, that gives "Return of the King" its brilliant combination of soaring cinematic climaxes and deeply felt moments of heart and soul.

The acting skills in the first two "Lord of the Rings" films went mostly unnoticed, but Wood and Astin both give award-winning performances as they struggle -- emotionally and physically -- towards their final goal.

A major triumph
Indeed, "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy is a major triumph on many levels. One of the most important is the marriage of current technology and Tolkien's vivid imagination. Visually, these films could not have been made even a few years ago.

The other major element is the wondrous combination of one man's vision and the perfect subject matter. Jackson seems to have been born to bring Tolkien's mammoth literary masterpiece to the big screen. His achievement is monumental in its scope and scale. The Academy will be hard-pressed to give best director -- or best picture -- to anyone or anything other than Jackson and his magnificent movie.

Historically, the Academy has rarely rewarded fantasy films -- or, for that matter, blockbuster epics. But surely this year will be an exception. By honoring "The Return of the King," the the entire trilogy will also be rewarded. That would be entirely fitting, since these three movies are destined to take a major place in film history, and will be enjoyed by generations to come.

Oscar also likes to honor the business, and arguably, New Line Cinema has taken the biggest risk in film studio history by making "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy. This $300 million gamble, involving the unprecedented step of filming all three movies at the same time, was a bold and gutsy move -- one that could have destroyed the small company. Instead, CEOs Robert Shaye and Michael Lynne have emerged as visionaries who staked their futures on the talents of Jackson -- never tested to this extreme -- and his unknown New Zealand special effects company.

They gambled and they won. All in all, "The Lord of the Rings" is the stuff that dreams are made of.

"The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" opens nationwide on Wednesday, December 17, and is rated PG-13 with a running time of 3 hours, 28 minutes and 58 seconds.

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BlankWillWin
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Review: From the New York Times
« Reply #1 on: Dec 19^th, 2003, 4:58am »

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http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/16/movies/16RING.html?th
Triumph Tinged With Regret in Middle Earth
By ELVIS MITCHELL

Published: December 16, 2003

fter the galloping intelligence displayed in the first two parts of "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy, your fear may be that the director, Peter Jackson, would become cautious and unimaginative with the last episode, "The Return of the King." Look at what "The Matrix" did to the Wachowski brothers; the last two were like action movies made for CNBC.

But Mr. Jackson crushes any such fear. His "King" is a meticulous and prodigious vision made by a director who was not hamstrung by heavy use of computer special-effects imagery. A sequence in which a number of signal fires are lighted on a stretch of mountain ranges simultaneously is a towering moment; it has the majesty that every studio's opening logo shot sprains itself striving to achieve.

Mr. Jackson does take his time, but he's not sloughing off here. Rather he is building toward a more than solid conclusion. The grandiloquence that sustained the second installment, "The Two Towers," with its pounding and operatic martial fury — a movie that actually created a state of siege and left audiences hanging — can be found here.

Yet by its end "King" glides to the gentle bonhomie that opened the "Rings" movies, with an epilogue that is tinged with regret. It's been a long time since a commercially oriented film with the scale of "King" ended with such an enduring and heartbreaking coda: "You can't go back. Some wounds don't heal." It's an epic about the price of triumph, a subversive victory itself in a large-scale pop action film.

The closest thing to a recap of the previous films, "The Fellowship of the Ring" and "Towers," this picture supplies is showing Gollum (Andy Serkis) as a regular hobbit — Smeagol — before he was subsumed by his appetite for the glittering One Ring and transformed into a larval creature that looks like the worm Smeagol is shown putting on a hook. It's the One Ring that the hobbit Frodo (Elijah Wood) has to transport to Mordor and destroy it there.

The collaboration of actor and director — Mr. Serkis and Mr. Jackson — for Gollum is a frighteningly believable realization of computer imagery as performer. Gollum, whose phyllo-dough skin still masks his abrupt and fully felt changes of heart, is as emotionally rich a creation as any actor's work this year. A dialogue he has with his reflection in a pond courses with invective and self-disgust. All of Mr. Jackson's glib, funny pranks in "Heavenly Creatures" and "The Frighteners" — in which we were never supposed to be sure what was going on — prepared him for a dramatic application of those techniques here. (He also employs his haunted-house dexterity in a formidable sequence with a giant spider.)

Gollum's push-pull, divided between his hunger for the ring and his fears, makes him the most tragic figure in the movie. He preys on Frodo's weakened spirit, looking for the moment he can get the ring away and kill them both. The cursed ring pecks away at Frodo's humanity, as Gollum hammers away at the hobbit's remaining panes of will. The only thing keeping the wizened yet infantile goblin at bay is Frodo's loyal ally and sworn protector, Sam (Sean Astin). By making Gollum as integral a part of this tableau as Frodo and Sam, not only is there an important plot point at stake, but the movie is also frosted with misery.

That mournful note echoes as Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen) and his forces ready for their assault on Sauron's forces, the orcs. Gandalf (Ian McKellen), in a voice sodden with mellow sadness, realizes that Frodo and Sam are on a suicide mission: "There never was much hope. Just a fool's hope." Sir Ian's eyes move slowly, filled with mystery and pain.

There is a sacrificial cast to the entire endeavor. The dwarf warrior Gimli thrives on this fatalistic bent, and is given a wry heedlessness by John Rhys-Davies; his charm-offense basso rumble is also the voice of the lord of the forest, Treebeard. The pitilessly sure elf warrior Legolas (Orlando Bloom, whose physical élan fills out the role) observes "a sleepless malice" watching over them. The hobbit Pippin has a much bigger role in this battle, and Billy Boyd is up to it, allowing Pippin to mature.

Aragorn has the slinky swagger and dreamy stubble that make him look like a legend created by Tolkien, Sam Shepard and Ralph Lauren. Fortunately Mr. Mortensen also has a touch of modesty as an actor, which allows him to take up space as if he belongs in the center of the frame rather than battling the other performers for it.

Pippin's pal, Merry (Dominic Monaghan), joins the fight, too, pulled along by Eowyn (Miranda Otto, touchingly ferocious). Ms. Otto stakes a worthy claim for every moment of screen time, while poor Liv Tyler, as the elf princess Arwen, is limited to dialogue that sounds like a spoken portion of a Spinal Tap album. Cate Blanchett's Galadriel hardly appears at all, and Hugo Weaving, as the elf lord Elrond, arrives just in time to answer a trivia question. (Who is the best-known Australian actor to appear in the "Matrix" and "Rings" movies?)

The actors all look older than they did in "Fellowship," and it fits the strategy of employing the same cast over an extended period for the films. This decision adds fresh dimension to the lingering sadness, as we can see some of the bloom worn out of their flesh and sadder, reddened eyes on all of them.

Their battle weariness is appropriate given whom they are up against. The orcs and their terrifying behemoths of burden have a surreal confidence in victory; they even turn the phrase "Release the prisoners" into a threat. Sauron's misshapen foot soldiers and their collection of mutated animal freaks look as if they've crawled out of the sewers of Love Canal looking for summer work.

"King," which opens round the country tomorrow, features more prognostication and exposition than its predecessors. Yet despite all of the setups required, Mr. Jackson maintains tension. In "Towers," the director and his fellow screenwriters, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens, secured a spiritual fidelity to the novel. In "King" they manage that and far more; the last third is especially condensed, and Aragon's role in the last battle is fleshed out. But the Tolkien search for purity is central to their "King," too. And the movie isn't as exclusionary as the books' implicit Christian forcefulness, which made Middle Earth a re-creation of the Crusades.

"King" is the product of impressive craft and energy. The "sleepless malice" is aligned with controlled chaos; the sizable exertion of concentration from Mr. Jackson is multiplied by his "Rings" team, including his cinematographer, Andrew Lesnie; composer, Howard Shore; production designer, Grant Major; and the battalion of other artisans responsible for the costumes, makeup and special effects.

It is evident that the grip of "The Return of the King" on Mr. Jackson is not unlike the grasp the One Ring exerts over Frodo: it's tough for him to let go, which is why the picture feels as if it has an excess of endings. But he can be forgiven. Why not allow him one last extra bow?

"The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" is rated PG-13 for a stunning mastery of violence and intense scenes of bloodletting.

THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING

Directed by Peter Jackson; written by Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens and Mr. Jackson, based on the book by J. R. R. Tolkien; director of photography, Andrew Lesnie; edited by Jamie Selkirk and Annie Collins; music by Howard Shore with the song "Into the West" performed by Annie Lennox; production designer, Grant Major; special makeup, creatures, armor and miniatures by Richard Taylor; produced by Barrie M. Osborne, Mr. Jackson and Ms. Walsh; released by New Line Cinema. Running time: 3 hours, 20 minutes. This film is rated PG-13.

WITH: Elijah Wood (Frodo), Ian McKellen (Gandalf), Liv Tyler (Arwen), Viggo Mortensen (Aragorn), Sean Astin (Sam), Cate Blanchett (Galadriel), John Rhys-Davies (Gimli and voice of Treebeard), Bernard Hill (Theoden), Billy Boyd (Pippin), Dominic Monaghan (Merry), Orlando Bloom (Legolas), Hugo Weaving (Elrond), Miranda Otto (Eowyn), David Wenham (Faramir), Karl Urban (Eomer), John Noble (Denethor), Andy Serkis (Gollum/Smeagol), Ian Holm (Bilbo), Sean Bean (Boromir) and Alan Howard (voice of the Ring).
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