Do forgive me as well for being late to this discussion, especially as I was one of the first posters to express some interest in carrying it on.
There is merit to all of the proposed prologue/openings, but there is a part of the Tolkien fan and purist in me that wants to see the opening moments look something like this:
After the last of the interminable trailers for upcoming features, and the obligatory New Line logo, the screen fades to black for a few moments. Quietly, almost imperceptibly (i.e. just louder than the crunching popcorn from the moviegoer next to you), the score begins -- soft strings play a theme not unlike the Shire theme from FOTR but slower, more muted, as if not quite awake yet, as we see the "New Line Cinema presents" and the "A Wingnut Films Production", then the screen fades up.
The view is from aloft, flying (less like a plane, more like a hot-air balloon) over a lush green countryside in the twilight before sunrise. As we drift along, seeing the mist hanging low in the valleys, the music and the light rise in tandem and we begin to descend and zoom in on a small village town. Now, purposefully, you can see that we are coming in from a great distance to a particular door -- a round door in the side of a hill. And as the music reaches a peak-point, the sunlight breaks over the hill, illumining the hill and the door, and you hear the voice of Ian Holm (or whoever plays Bilbo) speak aloud,
"In a hole in the ground...there lived a Hobbit."
Cue the title card, pan around to the window, where you see Bilbo taking a cup of tea to his desk, a large red book open to the first words of "There and Back Again"
Finish the rest of the opening credits however you want, but you MUST have those famous words!