[Marileangorifurnimaluim]

Ah. Well, I'm back. Just saw it. <P>The movie was like seeing the story of the LotR through a different set of eyes. <P>The essence of the story is captured, but it's like when two people describe the same events, their perspectives are different, they emphasize different things, one person leaves out this, and adds that, another stresses the other thing or gets a detail wrong. Yet it's definately the LotR. Wow.<P>It enriches my experience of the books immensely, gives a new perspective, like particularly good ME artwork does. In a word: I loved it. I want to see it again. Tomorrow.<P><B>I think it's greatest strength is how the movie is carried by the characters. Its second greatest strength is cinematography. And I expected it to be the other way around.</B> Frodo's face is emblazened on my mind's eye, as is the compassionate twinkle of Gandalf. Bilbo is delightfully complex, eccentric and fun. <P>Galadriel is amazing. Cate Blanchet is both bewitching, mysterious, distant but very present and real. She turns in a very subtle performance. With a performance like that I don't think they needed as many special effects in the scene of the mirror. (She also seems like she's really ejoying herself as Galadriel.) <P>Ian Holm did not need special effects either, what an actor. <P>You know who really is the character? Sam. That's not an actor, that IS Sam. <P>Though the man who played Elrond surpasses my expectations by far. That's a tough role to make real, and he's a force to be reckoned with. <P>Elijah Wood was the right choice, not for acting subtlety but because he just glows. In every scene. He has that right combination of charisma, innocence and intelligent purposefulness. I couldn't take my eyes off of him, there's so much personal magnetism.<P>Next to Sam-that's-not-an-actor, who's as ordinary as a potato, they play off eachother perfectly. The coming scenes in Mordor are going to be very, very good.<P>I think in the long run the critics will wish to banish the CGI just to enjoy the characterization more fully.<P>I saw it with a non-believer, a Tolkien infidel. <P>It was Elrond and Gandalf that most impressed him, and he was blown away by Rivendell, as well by as the statues of Elendil and Isildur, and the scenery in general, whether it was ruins or Caradhras. <P>What didn't carry for him was the compression of time - because there was so little indication of time elapse between Moria and Amon Hen, it didn't seem right that Frodo would wander off while the hordes were still fresh in our minds (and should be in his). I had to explain how long they were in Lorien, the distance between Moria and the Anduin, and the fact they'd had two months to relax their guard. Lorien is so mysterious that for a neophyte it's not a break in the action.<P>I envy him a little though, my neophyte friend, because he hadn't read the books. He could sink deeper into the story, was without that darn voice in the back of my head that kept comparing the books to the movie. I want to see it again, with that voice Silent.<P>Oh Man-of-the-Wold, you are not alone, I too saw Bakshi's version in the theatres. It struck me as being all interpretation by someone who liked but didn't "get" the LotR. Peter Jackson on the other hand understands it. This is a great movie, and any complaints are petty ungracious nit-picking. (99.5% of Peter's changes work, so leave the few that didn't alone.)<P>I'm so happy. <P>My only complaint is I don't get to watch it five times, end to end.<p>[ December 21, 2001: Message edited by: Marileangorifurnimaluim ]