reviewed by Brian "the Naked Gun" Felts
& Benn "Where's the Humanity" Farrell
Lord of the Rings:
The Return of the King
My apologies Mr. Lucas (George) and Mr.
Spielberg (Steven), director of the Indiana Jones' Trilogy, Peter Jackson (Dead Alive, The Frighteners)
has made three great movies, in a time when all we have is mediocre movies winning Academy Awards® for Best Picture,
like "Titanic."
I can't even complain
about the length, being 3 hours and 20 minutes. I saw the midnight showing
here in Colorado Springs. I didn't get home until 4:00 a.m. and had to be up at 7:00 a.m. for work.
I had tickets to see it Wednesday night, and the Theatre actually oversold the showing.
There were 50 angry people who had paid for the 7:30 p.m. showing who didn't get to see
it.
Go see it. It should win Best Picture¹.
Brian-The Naked Gun
Yep. This was definitely my favorite of the trilogy. Although, Peter Jackson's visual style on
this one adopted all the more annoying tricks he used in the previous two, the characters, battles,
struggles and frustration was well worth sitting through his visual circus.
The picture is dripping with heroism from almost every likeable character. The music was exceptional
as usual, compliments of Howard Shore who won an Academy Award® for his composition of "LOR: Fellowship
of the Ring."
My favorite performance came from Sean Astin (Rudy) as Samwise, despite seeming like he couldn't deliver
a single line without crying. However, if I were shooting 12 hours worth of trilogy over a two
year span in a foreign country I'd never been too, I think I'd start crying every time I opened
my mouth also.
Like the previous pics, I did find a couple moments where the "real" world invaded Jackson's take
on Tolkein's world, which stuck out like a soar thumb. For example, in "LOR: The Two Towers," when the pack
Urak-Hai stop to rest, arguing whether or not to eat Pippin and Merry, one gets his
head lopped off for insubordination, to which the assaulting leader claims, "Meat is back on the menu, boys!"
I hardly think a Urak-Hai beast has any concept of a "menu" actually is.
However, for the fantastic story, the gripping characters, production design, music, costumes,
cinematography and general performances, "LOR: The Return of the King" rivals "The Last Samurai" as the best
picture I've seen this Academy Awards® year. Whether the academy thinks so come February², I couldn't say. There's
still a big buzz over "Mystic River."
See "LOR: The Return of the King" in the theaters if you can. When it comes out on DVD, buy it, love it
and sleep with it naked. Benn - Where's the Humanity?
Wow. Did you here that? Wow. What a movie. "Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King"
is the best movie to come out in years;
a great mixture of action, drama and comedy. I will not go into details, because
chances are, you have seen the other two LTR movies or read the books.
If you haven't for shame. I have, and I will say these three movies are now
the greatest trilogy ever made, which--considering I was born in the 70's and my first
movie was "Star Wars"--says something, I think.
¹ ² "LOR: The Return of the King" did in fact win Best Picture at the 2004 Academy Awards® presentation.