The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring

The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, released in 2001 is the first of the Lord Of The Rings trilogy, directed by Peter Jackson, based on the beloved novels by J.R.R. Tolkien. I want to start off by saying I saw this film opening night, and saw it twice more in the theater after, which is the most I have ever seen one film in a movie theater. I think I was more excited about this film series than any other film series ever. I also bought all three films on VHS as soon as they were released. These three films still stand up as three of my all-time favourite films, though they are definitely flawed, and some details actually really irritated me about them, but they are still very well done, beautiful films, that are fairly faithful to their source material.

So, one question that I have always had is, how is it that the animated version that Ralph Bakshi released was able to stay truer to the novel, and tell more of the story in far less amount of time? I will be talking more about that in the future, but that (though unfinished) version is to this date still my favourite adaptation of the The Lord Of The Rings. But Peter Jackson did a damn good job on these films. First off the movie is absolutely beautiful, the cinematography, the special effects, the sets are all absolutely beautiful. This might be one of the best looking films that I have ever seen. The cast is also incredible, everyone is so perfectly cast for their character, and plays their character perfectly (I won't go into all of the names, because there are a few too many to talk about and give the credit they deserve). This film is definitely a huge feat as far as fantasy films, and stands as the new standard that all fantasy films are now judged. The Fellowship Of The Ring and the first Harry Potter film came out around the same time, and both dominated the academy awards, but I feel like the Fellowship Of The Ring stands as the stronger film, and hasn't lost anything over the years. I want to talk about the issues I had with the film though. There are a few characters who were very important to the story that were left out, one of which is Tom Bombadil, who might seem like a minor character in the book, but in the mythology of Middlearth is actually a pretty important character. They also left out the events on the Barrow Downs, which served to explain how Frodo and company got their swords. The events of the story are also greatly rushed, eliminating much of the time that elapses between events. Another important character that is eliminated is that of Glorfindel, as he was replaced by Arwen, interestingly enough in the animated version he was also eliminated and replaced by Legolas in that version, I don't know why film adaptations are always so unkind to Glorfindel. Speaking of Arwen, what the hell is she even doing here, I get that there are few female characters in Tolkien's novels but, why was it deemed necessary to increase her roll, and insert her where she did not exist, and yes her and Aragorn were a thing, but it was never a key element of the books like it is in these films. Are audiences that insistent on having a love story? This film is also a major time commitment, being over three hours long, so as much as I love these films, I tend to skip over rewatching them as regularly, the films also cannot really be watched individually either as there is no actual conclusion to any of the films until the last one, as Tolkien originally wrote them to be one novel rather than a trilogy. All in all I would say that the Fellowship Of The Rings is one of my favouite films of all time, and one of the greatest fantasy films ever made, and also very culturally important due to the impact that this and the rest of the trilogy had. It is hard to play a game like Dungeons and Dragons or any role playing game with out these films being quoted and referenced, there were also multiple video games made based on the series as well. It makes me happy that Peter Jackson, through these films, helped to introduce a whole new audience to Tolkien's world of Middlearth, so even though these films are not perfect, and either omitted or totally changed aspects of the source material, they are still amazing. Would I recommend this film? Yes, without a doubt, I do feel that the Fellowship Of The Ring is a must see film, because of its cultural importance, as well as how well it looks and how well it was made. This film is enjoyable, even to the hardcore fan, who may grumble about the changes made. So I highly recommend everyone watch this film, but set aside around nine hours of your time, because you need to watch all three films, and none of them are short by any means.