Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring

Director Peter Jackson

Cast Elijah Wood, Ian McKellan, Viggo Mortenson, Sean Astin, Liv Tyler, Cate Blanchett, John Ryhs-Davis, Billy Boyd, Dominic Monaghan, Orlando Bloom, Hugo Weaving, Sean Bean, Ian Holm, Christopher Lee

Finally, the film which everyone has been talking about for the past few years has hit the big screen. The first part of the classic Lord of the Rings trilogy of books, the Fellowship of the Ring is a sequel to The Hobbit, a childrens tale about little folk and wizards in a quest to steal some gold from a dragon.

The Lord Of The Rings has made it to the big screen once before in animated form. Impressive though the cartoon version was (use of live action mixed with animation created a very dark picture), it was incomplete. The story stopped after the Two Towers, and was also condensed into 2 hours. A definitive version of the books has been banded around for years. Finally it came to rest in Peter Jackson's hands.

Jackson, best known for low budget gore-fests Bad Taste and Braindead, fought executive decisions, and managed to get permission to film the books as three seperate parts. However, in a unique method, all 3 films have been filmed at the same time. Once filming was complete, the effects for part one were added (the effects for the other parts will be added over the next two years).

The end result.....

With a fantastic cast (Wood is the perfect Frodo, and Ian McKellen is amazing as Gandalf), spirited soundtrack, astonishing special effects, tight plotting, and spectacular direction, this film is THE BEST FANTASY FILM OR ALL TIME. Indeed, it may even be the best film of all time. A few alterations to the book (absence of Tom Bombadil, and a few tweaks on other characters to make the story more cinematic) do not upset the balance, in fact they enhance the flow.

The effects are the true stars. Meshing perfectly with live footage, the digital tampering (including turning 5'10" Elijah Wood into 3' Frodo) is spot on. The sets and backdrops are beautiful. The Mines of Moria sequence is perfectly realised.

The only possible gripe about the film is that due to the nature of the book (a trilogy), this part is incomplete. You are left at the end waiting for something to happen. However, this is the only way to stay true to the source material, and at least there is only a year before the next part comes out, The Two Towers.

At 3 hours running length, you would think it is too long. However, it isn't too long, and you find that the 3 hours fly by (unlike in, say, Titanic, where it crawled for the first 1 1/2 hours!)

An unmissable event in cinema history. Peter Jackson has redefined cinema, just as a certain George Lucas did back in 1977.