Metro Pulse/Movie Guru/Lord of the Rings

Movie Guru Rating:

Enlightening (4 out of 5)

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LOTR's grand finale lacks depth

by Scott McNutt

Declaim, declaim, declaim. Sneak, sneak, sneak. Fight, fight, fight. Celebrate, celebrate, celebrate. Depart, depart, depart. Repeat this formula three or four times, especially the "depart" part, and you've just about got it. That is, you've got The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.

All right, maybe that's a little too clipped. Preceded by The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers, Return concludes the story of young hobbit Frodo Baggins (Elijah Wood) and his several comrades, whose quest it is to destroy the One Ring of Power before its master, the evil Lord Sauron, discovers their intent.

As Return opens, Frodo and his trusty sidekick Samwise Gamgee (Sean Astin), separated from their companions and following the lead of the treacherous fiend, Gollum (voice of Andy Serkis), try to find a way into Sauron's realm of Mordor, so Frodo can destroy the One Ring in the fires of Mount Doom. Unhappily, the ring's power is affecting Frodo's judgment, causing him to doubt faithful Sam and trust untrustworthy Gollum.

Meanwhile, their cohorts, including Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen), reluctant heir to the throne of Gondor, Gandalf (Ian McKellen) the wizard, Gimli the Dwarf (John Rhys-Davies), and Legolas (Orlando Bloom) the Elf, having just won a hard-fought victory against the traitorous wizard Saruman, are reunited with hobbits Pippin (Billy Boyd) and Merry (Dominic Monaghan). They all go to Rohan for some R&R, where they try to convince its king, Theoden (Bernard Hill), to take his men to the aid of Gondor, which is about to be attacked by Mordor. Theoden's niece, Eowen (Miranda Otto), gets moony at Aragorn, but he's still hung up on his elvish girlfriend, Arwen (Liv Tyler), who's leaving Middle-earth. Because Sauron's fighting forces are so vast, Gandalf suggests that Aragorn go conjure up some unearthly battalions to aid them while the wizard rides to Gondor to revive the flagging spirits of its despairing and resentful steward, Denethor (John Noble).

And that's only the first 30 minutes. Frankly, if you haven't seen the other movies, rent the DVDs before venturing this final installment. Even then, the who, what, and why of some of the characters, such as Denethor's son, Faramir, may escape you. There are, after all, a lot of broody guys with long hair and rakish beards scrapping for screen time in Return.

The movie is more impressive for sweep and spectacle than for spirit and substance. For simply bringing a coherent and often gripping version of author J. R. R. Tolkien's sprawling masterpiece to cinematic life, director Peter Jackson should be feted. Perhaps to expect him to capture the smaller character transformations that occur within the novel is too much to ask. Nonetheless, because the human element is so truncated, Return often feels two-dimensional. Even when the actors are given dialogue that does more than establish motive for ensuing action, any emotive force a scene commands is usually dissipated by the movie's breathless rush to the next scene. There are exceptions. Each member of the main ensemble gets a chance to shine, even if it is, as in Rhys-Davies' case, as comic relief. And then there are the intimate moments shared by the hobbit pairs of Sam and Frodo, and Merry and Pippin, which should set viewers' hearts fluttering gaily.

In all seriousness, though, the alterations between novel and film, especially in the hobbits' return to their beloved homeland, The Shire, generally give short shrift to character development. Of course, given that the film relies heavily on long, loving looks between all and sundry (and even between Gollum and himself), Jackson may have been depending on the talents of his actors' facial features to convey how their characters had grown over the course of the story. If that was his hope, sadly, it betrayed him.

But Return is the terminus of a special effects magnum opus, and in its technical artistry, director Jackson excels. The CGIs, from the haunted and haunting Gollum to Frodo's arachnid nemesis, She-Lob, are incredibly vivid. The battle scenes are spectacular. Don't be surprised if audience members lurch back to avoid projectiles that shower tons of masonry onto terrified soldiers and citizenry, duck under winged reptilian creatures swooping upon terrified soldiers and citizenry, or jerk away from the feet of truly mammoth mammoth-like creatures stomping on terrified soldiers but not citizenry. In the seamless integration of these elements with the human story, Jackson more than succeeds; he sets the standard by which future F/X extravaganzas will be judged.

Besides, as endings to popular fantasy trilogies go, The Return of the King's entertainment quotient is light-years ahead of, say, The Return of the Jedi or The Matrix Revolutions. Jackson neither succumbs to silliness, a la Jedi, or to pretentious mumbo-jumbo philosophy, as in Revolutions. Rather, the consistency of tone he maintains through all three installments allows the continued suspension of disbelief that is all-important for enjoying fairy tales. However superficial, Return is immensely entertaining.

But it's really long. Go to the bathroom beforehand. You have been warned.