The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)

Director: Peter Jackson

Cast: Elijah Wood, Ian McKellan, Sean Astin, Viggo Mortensen, Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, John Rhys-Davies, Sean Bean, Hugo Weaving, Liv Tyler, Cate Blanchett, Christopher Lee, Ian Holm

Writers: J.R.R. Tolkien (novels), Fran Walsh (screenplay), Philippa Boyens (screenplay), Peter Jackson (screenplay)

Synopsis:

The young Hobbit named Frodo Baggins (Wood), along with his loyal servant Samwise (Astin) and his cousins Merry (Monaghan) and Pippin (Boyd), leave the comforts of their home in the Shire to embark upon a dangerous quest to destroy The One Ring, an artifact of great evil that could bring about the destruction of Middle Earth. Frodo and company are joined by the wizard Gandalf (McKellan), Strider (Mortensen), the ranger, as well as Boromir (Bean) the warrior, Legolas (Bloom) the elf and the stout dwarf Gimli (Rhys-Davies). Together the fellowship must brave perilous mountain passes, dark mines and treacherous rivers as they try avoid the servents of the enemy, Sauron, as well as the machinations of the traitorous wizard Saruman (Lee).  

First Impressions:

There are events that take place in a persons life that are imprinted on their soul for the remainder of their days, for me, this movie was one of those events. Ever since I can remember, I've had a love for the fantasy genre and J.R.R. Tolkien's Lord of the Rings trilogy is basically required reading for those that enjoy fantasy. To say I was a big fan of the book series was an understatement, so when I found out a live-action film of the trilogy was being developed, I was more than excited. 

This is the first movie I remember following during production. I would devour any piece of casting news of production photos I could find and when opening night hit I remember eagerly waiting in line with my friends hoping to get a good seat. Three plus hours later, I came out of the theater in awe. I never thought it was possible to do a faithful retelling of Prof. Tolkien's epic masterpiece and still look good as a live-action film but I was wrong. Needless to say, I thoroughly enjoyed this movie upon my initial viewing and I have watched it many times since as it remains one of my favorite movies of all time. I was a little hesitant to review this movie because I was worried I may be disappointed by it after watching it with a more critical eye. It's been a couple of years since I last watched it, so let's see how it stacks up.

Story/Direction:

"I made a promise, Mr Frodo. A promise. 'Don't you leave him Samwise Gamgee.' And I don't mean to. I don't mean to."

**Note: The version of this film that I watched for this review was the Extended edition, which I view as the definitive version. **

Well, there's a lot to unpack about the story in this film and it's fairly difficult to find a place to begin. First and foremost, I think, this movie is about the power of friendship and the bonds built between individuals who share common hardships. One of the reasons I chose the above quote because I think it best sums up the movie's prevalent theme, even though the film is chock-full of more quotable lines. The line, spoken near the end of the film and delivered perfectly by Sean Astin, brilliantly condenses the character of Sam into just a few sentences and as the subsequent movies in the series show, he meant every word of it. The relationship between Frodo and Sam is central to the series and the lengths Sam goes to support Frodo in his quest is awe inspiring.

Another theme present in the movie, and one that is especially relevant today, is how good people need to overlook their differences and unite to oppose a great evil. At the beginning of the film, nobody particularly gets along with anybody else. Dwarves distrust Elves, Elves think little of humans and Hobbits just want to shut themselves off from the rest of the world. Any of that sound familiar? It's not until the presence of the One Ring is discovered that all these disparate cultures come together to determine the best course of action. You see it when Strider, Legolas and Gimli offer to join the quest to destroy the ring, knowing that if it fails, then all that they know and love is gone. There are several more themes that run through this film, but I don't the space to cover them all. 

I'd be doing this film a disservice if I didn't mention the fantastic job Peter Jackson does as director. As someone who has read the source material dozens of times, it's not hard to see why many people thought the books were unfilmable (including the author himself). However, Jackson managed to take a very dense book and make something enjoyable to watch, while at the same time staying very true to the novels and that should be commended. Kudos also go to Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens who did much of the heavy lifting with the script. Though they cut significant portions of the book from the film (Tom Bombadil, the Barrow Downs), they were able to stay true to Tolkien's vision, for the most part. Probably one of the reasons this film is my favorite in the series is because it strays very little from the source material. 

Acting:

Wow, this film has a huge cast and pretty much all of them do a great job, so it's difficult to pick just a few performances to highlight but I'll give it a go. I'm going to start with Sean Bean's Boromir, who is my favorite character in the books. Boromir is the essence of a tragic hero and though he is brave and noble at heart, his desire to protect his country and his people at any cost proves to be his undoing. As the film wears on, Boromir is slowly corrupted by the ring until he snaps and tries to take it from Frodo. Bean does a great job in making Boromir very sympathetic, we may not agree with some of his actions, but we understand why he's doing them. Not to mention he has a redemptive arc that is extremely satisfying, if not bittersweet.

Ian McKellan's turn as Gandalf is also notable, so much so that he received an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting Actor. McKellan's performance as the gray wizard was so good that when I read the book, I picture his face and his voice on Gandalf. McKellan's Gandalf is equal parts crotchety old man and caring grandfather. He, more than anybody else in the Fellowship, understands the enormity of their task and understands that they all may not make it through alive. Plus, who doesn't love his delivery of "You shall not pass!" Chills, every time.

Finally, I want to talk about Cate Blanchett's Galadriel. She plays the character almost ethereally as someone who exists in the world but is separate from it. Blanchett's line delivery almost seems off-putting at first but I think that's on purpose as this is an individual that's thousands of years old and blessed with immense knowledge of many things. Since acting is primarily experience, I'd imagine it would be tough for an actor to play a role like that but Blanchett pulls it off beautifully. 

Visual/Special Effects:

Where to begin? The special effects in this film were groundbreaking, particularly with its CGI components. This is one of the first movies to make heavy use of CGI and not have it look like CGI. This was especially important because if the filmmakers couldn't pull that off then the whole atmosphere of the movie would be ruined. That being said, compared to it's sequels, this film makes fairly light use of CGI, using it mostly for large scale battle scenes and some landscape alteration. Nevertheless, it still holds up pretty well nearly 20 years later.

The miniature work was also top notch and I think one of the reasons The Hobbit trilogy didn't work as well was because they had to forgo the use of miniatures due to a condensed pre-production period. The folks at Weta did an amazing job at adding in so much detail to the miniatures (known as "bigatures" to the crew due to their sheer size) that you could have sworn they were actual real places.

The set and costume design are also top-notch in this film, with the craftsmen at Weta hand crafting each suit or armor and weapons, giving the film an authentic feel. In addition, the production team not only built the entire village of Hobbiton but did so a year early to allow field and flowers to grow around to it to give it an actual lived-in appearance. It's a level of dedication that I wish more movies would aspire to.

Score/Music:

While he doesn't get the recognition of more well-known composers like John Williams or Hans Zimmer, I think Howard Shore is one of the best in the business and his score for this series is his magnum opus. The music in this film is absolutely phenomenal and is one of my favorite movie scores of all time. Shore just seemed to really have an understanding for the source material and it showed in the music. One particular piece of music in the film that I absolutely love is the Bridge at Khazad Dum, which combines deep percussion with piercing horns and tosses in a choir chanting in Dwarvish as the cherry on top. Masterful.

Action:

Compared to its sequels, this film is a bit lighter in action. That's mostly because it has the unenviable job of getting all of the exposition out of the way. That's not to say that there's no action at all, in fact there's quite a bit. The fight in the dark atop Weathertop is a standout action sequence, along with the final battle at the Falls of Rauros.

For me though, the key action sequence is the battle in Balin's Tomb as the Fellowship makes it way through the  Mines of Moria, which culminates in Gandalf's confrontation with the Balrog. This sequence is the first real all-out combat sequence of the film. In it, we get to see each of the Fellowship have their own shining moments. Jackson also does a great job in transitioning that fight into a tense chase as the heroes try to escape the coming horde. The icing on the cake is of course, Gandalf's battle with the giant Balrog, which I swear was ripped straight out of Tolkien's words. 

I also want to highlight the aforementioned Battle on Weathertop, which illustrates not only how terrifying the Nazgul are but also the heroism of Strider. The fight makes great use of lighting and fire to give it almost a horror movie feel. Again, it feels as though it was taken straight out of the books (though I'm pretty sure Jackson did make a few changes to it). 

Final Verdict:

I'm happy to say, that my final verdict is much the same as my first impressions. I still think this film is terrific and it still remains one of my favorite movies of all time.