The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
There was a bargain, growing up in my family: if we read the Lord of the Rings books, we would be allowed to watch the movies despite not yet being 13, as is recommended by the MPA. Of course we watched the extended editions: my dad is a Tolkien superfan, and he owned all three on DVD by the time all my siblings were born. And these DVD box were a gift to me for my birthday, and it's only recently that I've found the time to sit down and rewatch them.
They were the first movies I watched that were really movies, you know? They set out to be something completely extraordinary, a fantasy of the highest caliber. I grew up with them, and my love of them grew into my love of fantasy as a whole, from Witch Hat Atelier to Berserk to The First Law. Tolkien casts a very long shadow over all following works, and I'm not sure I could effectively critique these movies if I saw them again.
Well... suffice to say that's not quite true.
I have often heard these movies called perfect, which I think is not true. I have also heard them called masterpieces, which I think is true. In my mind, perfection is the unattainable goal, and masterpieces are the closest we can get. And it's in going back to watch The Fellowship of the Ring that I can see some of the cracks that were patched over.
The editing is a bit much at time. The rapid cuts can often leave you disorganized, and while sometimes we get closeups on some important things (like facial expressions) there's a heavy focus on eyes, so we occasionally get shots that are way too close for comfort. I think the notable one that people know is after Frodo is stabbed and is taken unconscious to Rivendell, which has a very 2000's-esque editing style that dates this movie considerably. It's not the entire movie, nor even a significant minority, but it is enough to be annoying.
As for acting: Liv Tyler gets meme'd on for her breathy, husky voice in these movies, and I did find she did that here, but I was surprised to find it didn't bother me. Elves are portrayed as strange in this universe, and her encapsulation thereof made for a better viewing experience.
The surprising acting shortfall was Viggo Mortensen. Yes, not Orlando Bloom (he's competent to excellent here) but Viggo, who in the first half of the movie delivers most of his lines with a flat, even tone, mostly in a whisper, from the casualness of travel dialogue to the imminent danger of the Nazgûl. It gets better towards the second half, especially after he has some emotional moments with Arwen, but he's checked out before he's checked in, and that's hard to step over.
I also want to touch on the CGI. Granted, that comes with the acknowledgement that Wētā Workshop were breaking ground on entirely new technologies, and they continued to improve up to and past Avengers: Endgame. But that breaking ground does come with some growing pains: blue screen technology has only gotten better and trained us to be on the lookout for it, so when it's done badly here my eyes track it. And while they're usually pretty clever and intelligent when it comes to when and where to use 3D models, they don't always fit: one shot of Gollum, another of Legolas, and many of the cave-troll has that flat, weightless look of bad CGI, and they're mixed in with the excellent shots which makes for a bizarre viewing experience.
These drawbacks are helped by hindsight. Since CGI has only gotten better, I can see where the old CGI failed; having known emotional highs from other movies, I can see the flat acting here; and when I saw that scene where the Fellowship was trying to cross the gap in the bridge, I was only too painfully aware of what kind of process could eventually create the falling-bridge sequence with Legolas in The Hobbit: Battle of the Five Armies. It's toned down here, but the instinct for that kind of unbelievable scenes is still quite strong.
And yet... and yet, I cannot deny that these movies are excellent.
What else can I say? They have made their place among the greats of cinema, and going back to rewatch them I was swept up into the world of Middle-Earth once more. A solid chunk of that can go directly to Howard Shore: like John Powell for How to Train your Dragon, where the script and acting falls flat the score is there to pick up the pace. The Nazgûl would not seem so threatening were it not for the high-pitched strings warning of danger; the thrilling chase through Moria would not be so exciting but for the horns calling us to action; and the Shire would not seem so homely but for "Concerning Hobbits" cheerfully playing in the background, telling us to lean back and kick off our shoes. It's a wonderful score, and I have no complaints.
But there's also a great deal of buy-in from every creative department involved. From the actors giving their all to material that could seem silly and cheesy, to set builders and prop masters who make us feel like this is a living world with a rich history, to the CGI masters who show us things that aren't real. I could talk about the lighting and costumes and painters and stuntmen and probably a hundred little things, but all that it means is that it adds up to magic.
The Balrog, I think, is the shining culmination of this movie's achievement. On the surface, a sloppy CGI fight; but the script is laying seeds of the mystery of what it is; and the sound effects are telling us it's coming and it's big; and the goblins are frightened of it, and scurry away into the dark away from the shadow and flame of its unholy light. A goblin is nothing to the Fellowship; a cave-troll, a tough-but-winnable fight. But everything screams at us that the Balrog is a horror movie monster stepped into a high fantasy, and the instant it steps onscreen it becomes one of the iconic movie monsters, whether or not it's supposed to have wings (it's not but we'll move on), it's one of the coolest things I've ever seen in my goddamned life.
I can say nothing less than that I love this movie. We speak a lot of passion projects, usually from the point of view of a director wanting to make a specific movie, such as with Francis Ford Coppola and Megalopolis. It's something else entirely when the passion of the entire crew is just as palpable as the director, and everyone works together to make something great. I could not hate it if I tried, but having seen some flaws appear with time and distance, I wonder what the next generation will think of these movies. I hope they will love them as much as I do.
