Review of Lord Of The Rings, The: The Fellowship Of The Ring

Introduction

Don`t get me wrong. I found J.R.R. Tolkien`s epic novel of "Lord Of The Rings" tough going when I was twelve, and a revisit made while the movie was in production didn`t fare any better. Peter Jackson`s movie adaptation, however, has me champing at the bit for the next instalment of this genuinely gobsmacking quest.

"Lord Of The Rings - Fellowship Of The Ring" is the first volume of a trilogy of pictures which will in 2003 form the (roughly) nine hour epic super-movie "The Lord Of The Rings". This November sees the release of the second volume "The Two Towers", and in about a year`s time we will be enjoying the climactic "Return Of The King". "Lord Of The Rings" is not a work that could possibly have been compressed into a single movie without ruining it. It`s a truly epic adventure and has to be adapted as such, and Peter Jackson and his Oscar(R) nominated writing team of Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens have done a rip-snorting job of turning Tolkien`s masterpiece into their cinematic masterpiece.

Tolkien`s novel is possibly one of the best-loved works of fiction, certainly of the 20th Century. It`s big (1077 pages totalling roughly half-a-million words by my estimate). It took Tolkien eighteen years to complete, finally being published in 1954-5 in three volumes. It`s also (by today`s standards) very dry. Tolkien was first and foremost Professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford - which means he knew how to swear better than most of us. He loved language and languages and for him the interest in the project was the languages of the Elves, the Dwarves, the dark language of Mordor. Professor Tolkien was more than most of us acutely aware that England (not Britain, just England) was bereft of the sort of epic mythological tale that many other European countries had in their histories - the Scandinavian and Teutonic legends of heroes, goblins, elves and dragons. That was the starting point for first "The Hobbit", then "The Lord Of The Rings" and the "Silmarillion". The novels are typical of their era and the type of person that wrote them. Tolkien was a close friend of "The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe"`s C.S. Lewis, and both men tended to write in the style of the day which modern readers may find a little over-descriptive and wordy. I honestly think that`s the charm of the novels, but it also means the story is not as fast-moving as it could be.

You can`t say the same thing about the movie, in fact, like "Harry Potter and the Philosopher`s Stone", you could find yourself wishing they`d spent more time on certain sections of the story. "Lord Of The Rings - Fellowship Of The Rings" is a cinematic treat, and on DVD it is almost possible to go into sensory overload appreciating some of the amazing imagery one is presented with. Hobbiton, the town of the Hobbits where we first meet our hero Frodo, is almost Tellytubbies territory it is so cute and rural. The Hobbits are lovely little people with the right sort of life-priorities (breakfast, second-breakfast, elevenses, luncheon, afternoon tea, dinner, supper...) Once on the quest, Frodo and his companions are out in the Big, Wide World and beset with all kinds of threats, not least being the Ringwraiths, genuinely scary nine-foot-tall horseriders who can sniff out the Ringbearer.

Before "Lord Of The Rings", director Peter Jackson was better known for his low-budget schlock-horror opus "Bad Taste", produced on the ultimate-cheap by himself and a few friends using a 16mm movie camera and a lot of spare time. Kudos from the Cannes Film Festival brought Jackson to the attention of Hollywood and "Meet The Feebles", "Braindead", "Heavenly Creatures" and "The Frighteners" followed. All in all, it`s quite a limited movie legacy - fantasy with lashings of horror - on which to found what may turn out to be the decade`s biggest film franchise. Jackson has managed to get the backing of a major studio (New Line) for not just one movie with an option for a second (like the Harry Potter films), but to make the entire trilogy back-to-back and release each volume annually over three years. Principal photography was completed in 2001, having taken the best part of eighteen months. "Fellowship Of The Ring" was concentrated on from that point to complete the special effects and other work for its Christmas 2001 release.

"Fellowship Of The Ring" was nominated for thirteen Academy Awards(R) in 2001, and won very deserved awards in the Cinematography, Make-up, Music and Visual Effects categories. It also won the AFI Movie of the Year, Saturn Awards for Best Fantasy Film, Best Director and Best Supporting Actor for Ian McKellen, BAFTA Best Picture and Best Director, Best Make-up and Effects categories. Peter Jackson also won the Director`s Guild Award. The movie picked up awards and nominations at just about every gong-fest in 2001.

Video

"Fellowship Of The Ring" is a visual feast. Presented in anamorphic 2.53:1, the picture is not quite reference quality - there being a little pixellation in dark or misty scenes - due to the sheer length of the movie and the compression required to get it on the disc (this will be corrected in the four-disc collector`s edition which will include the DTS sound mix so noticeably absent from the set). Having said that, the movie is so astonishing to watch you will only notice anything amiss if you`re looking for it. Andrew Lesnie`s award-winning cinematography of the New Zealand locations is frequently quite gobsmacking, but is nothing compared to the amazing tricks of scale carried out to make the Hobbits look small in comparison with the humans, or the other mythical creatures inhabiting that world.

The beginning of the film, where we first meet Frodo (Elijah Wood), his uncle Bilbo (Ian Holm) and the wizard Gandalf (Ian McKellen) is the showpiece for these tricks of scale, and they are so well done that you can easily believe Ian Holm only comes up to Ian McKellen`s pockets. Even stranger, later in the movie we are introduced to dwarf-warrior Gimli (little taller than the Hobbits) and played by the ebullient John Rhys-Davies who was Indiana Jones` huge sidekick Sallah in "Raiders Of The Lost Ark" and "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade".

The visual effects in the movie are nothing short of mind-boggling, from the enormous battle with Sauron at the start of the movie to the shorts of Mordor, Rivendell and Isengard. New Zealand`s Weta Workshop and Weta Digital effects houses responsible have raised the bar for matte effects and digital effects that must have George Lucas grinding his teeth and will really give "Attack Of The Clones" (which I haven`t seen yet) a run for its money. The Balrog is definitely the scariest damn dragon I`ve ever seen, and I`ll bet Frodo and the gang wish they`d brought a Donkey along with them when they meet it.

Watch out for the levels of detail put into the movie. The costumes and sets are impeccable. The slightly art-nouveau design of the woodland kingdom of Lothlorien is worth the price of admission alone, but don`t think the movie is just picturesque imagery. There are some really scary bits, and some of the best hack-and-slash battles ever committed to celluloid in this movie. The storyline is too complex to go into here, and I`m under pain of death about spoilers at all times, but suffice to say there`s something in this movie for everyone.

Audio

Because of its 171 minute running time, "Fellowship Of The Rings" comes with just two soundtrack options, the main one being Dolby Digital EX 5.1. Although my kit isn`t up to reproducing the EX bit, the soundtrack is mightily powerful and active. You are genuinely surrounded by the soundtrack at all times and quite frequently it will jump out and make you jump a mile (usually when Sauron`s eye pops up). There is also a plain vanilla Dolby Surround soundtrack.

I have to say if you`re a sound and picture freak, or want a real reference disc to blow friends away with over a curry and a lager, then you might want to wait for the four-disc edition with the DTS soundtrack. That promises to be able to pop the putty out of your double-glazing if you`re in the mood.

Howard Shore`s Academy-award(R)-winning score is very satisfying throughout the movie - although its use on the menuing system can be a little repetitive. It`s not an overblown score, and tends towards the lyrical (like the cinematography), so it`s not intrusive and should please people who have trouble separating the dialogue from the rest of the soundtrack.

Features

Where to start? This picture raises the bar for extras as well. There are roughly two-and-a-half hours of extras on the disc, ranging from the sublime to the gore-blimey. At the centre of the suite of extras are three "in depth" puff pieces. Two are tv specials made as promotional material. One is by FOX-tv, and the other by the US SCI-FI Channel, and they are very satisfying if a little light-weight. The third is an in-store promotional loop made by Houghton-Mifflin publishers to tie in with the movie, while publicising their range of LOTR books, notably the excellent behind-the-scenes movie guide by Brian Sibley. This is the weakest and most trite of the pieces on the disc.

Then we have the featurettes produced for the lordoftherings.net website. These are like the shorts made by Lucasfilm for "Phantom Menace". There are fifteen of these ranging from two to five minutes and are basically sound-and-image bites. They are still fascinating although the lead-time between pressing the select button and them coming up is a little long.

There are the original trailers and tv spots, the video of Enya`s plaintive "May It Be" which accompanies the end titles, and a preview of the Electronic Arts video game.

Perhaps most impressive of all is the 10 minute behind-the-scenes preview of "The Two Towers", introduced by Peter Jackson which shows some of the work going into the second movie. Perhaps unfortunately this includes a ***major spoiler*** about the fate of one of the characters for those unfamiliar with the book.

Also in the "holy-flaming-cow!" category is the preview of the extended cut version of "Fellowship" coming out this November. Personally I`m glad to have the theatrical cut of the movie in this edition, but I`m going to splash out on the collector`s edition to see the 30 minutes of deleted footage, the second disc of extras and of course experience the blow-your-socks-off DTS version (unless they decide not to include this between this review going up and the disc being released - E&OE)

The movie is fully subtitled for the hard-of hearing. Well done, New Line.

Conclusion

This is definitely a contender for the title of "Disc Of The Year". As I didn`t see the movie at the cinema, I`m very glad to have this theatrical cut of the movie, but I will also be interested to see the extended cut of the movie and I will treat it as a completely separate version of the picture to this one. Having said that, I`m after the Collector`s Edition with the Argonath bookends rather than the plain vanilla four disc set that will be out at the same time.

If you just want to see what all the fuss was about, then this version of the movie - I`ve seen it as cheap as £15.99 at Kwik Save (!) - is the one for you. It has absolutely everything for LOTR-virgin or LOTR-fan alike. I cannot recommend it highly enough and I`m eagerly awaiting the sequels - why it might even tempt me back to the Odeon to see "Two Towers" on the big screen!!