Harry here. Now to be fair and to give someone with an extreme minority view a forum to speak their mind. This is the first and only out and out negative review that I've received for FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING. Now I can't even conceive of this review as being a valid opinion on any plane of existence. But since this opinion apparently seems to exist, well I suppose to Agent Kushing it appears natural, so I will let you chew on it and see what ya think? Does he make sense? Is he crazier than hell? Is he just stupid? Or is he the only sane person left on the planet? If so, if the 90+ positively gushing reviews we've seen from various press folks, geeks around the world... If we've all been wrong, then gosh... Kushing is a hero to mankind. Ahem... coughbullshitcough.... Here ya go.....
Harry,
I know I haven't written in a while, but I felt it's time. I saw a screening tonight of Lord of the Rings, the most overhyped piece of shit since A.I. Pardon my language, but I feel that somebody needs to warn everybody out there that is going to run out to theaters and see this; especially since Moriaty put it on his top 10 of all time. Ahead of Shawshank? Ahead of Goodfellas? Ahead of E.T.? You are on crack.
Alright, on to the review. As you can tell, I didn't just dislike it, I hated it. You know that feeling when you are listening to a CD and it starts to skip and you don't realize it yet and then you do and you think it will pass and then it happens again and again, but your too lazy to get up and turn it off? Well that is this movie. It's the same thing over and over. The premise of the movie is the ring is bad and it needs to be destroyed, so that good can prevail. We all know that. So why do they need to keep repeating that 30 times? Why is every scene about being chased by some ghoulish figure or figures, to only narrowly escape death to have it happen again and again. Where is the drama, where is the tension? It's very similar to Harry's review of Ocean's 11, a far superior movie. Everything goes right. Sure, Gandolf dies to save the greater good, but that was such a rip off of Obi-Wan in Episode 4. The way he induced the dragon and then struck the bridge, was right o! ut of the scene in Indiana Jones. Lots of rip offs in this film. What role did Liv Tyler play? If she had such powers, where she could turn a stream into a raging possed river, than why did she wate till the last possible moment to do so? Likewise for Gandolf's special powers. What was the motivation for everyone to join Frodo on his journey? One guy swears to his death that he will protect him? Why? Lots of questions that were unresolved. If the audience is to believe that someone is going to endure that kind of journey, shouldn't we at least know why? What is the motivation? Money, fame, nobility? Something. Yet there was nothing. I can't stress this enough. The plot was stupid and repetitive, I found myself checking my watch over and over. The only reason I didn't leave was because I was there with a friend who wanted to see it. Only to find out that when it was over that he hated it as well.
Alright, there were a few good things. A few. Visually, it was amazing. But great sets and scenery are no reason to put a movie down as a top ten of all time. Sure, Peter Jackson used colors brilliantly and the goblins were great looking. If you want great goblins, great colors and a much better movie that is set some time ago, see Legend of Sleepy Hollow by Tim Burton. So much hype was made about the effects being so state of the art. So groundbreaking, etc. etc. Not the case. Groundbreaking special effects are Star Wars, Jurassic Park, T-2, The Matrix. Harry Potter had equally as good special effects as this. Sure, it was filmed all at once, so what? If not's good, who cares how and when you filmed it?
The movie was long, repetitive and served no purpose. I'm sure all the geeks will write back and argue, which I welcome. As long as one of you can clearly justify how this movie wasn't repetitive, how all the characters had purpose and reason. And how ever scene wasn't them fighting an opponent they had no reason to beat, to beat him by the narrowest of margins and all of thier injuries all get healed, while the villian dies. I hate that. Have it happen once, but no risiduol effects. When Mel Gibson hurt his shoulder in Lethal Weapon it bothers him the whole movie.
Don't give me, "this guy didn't read the books." I did. I read them once about 7 years ago. They weren't a religious experience for me and that's why I'm writing this review. I'm writing it for all the common fans, who love movies, but aren't losing sleep to see this one. I followed the production of these and even went to the website and watched the special. It looked good, but so did Blair Witch for a second.
All in all, I think this makes Harvey Weinstein look like a genius. I have read how these movies are guaranteed to be successful due to the overseas deals, but it still was a huge gamble and I don't see these being the big hit everyone expected. Harry Potter was a much better film if you want to see wizards and that movie has really cooled off at the box office and had an even bigger marketing campaign and must-see factor. I just wanted to get the message out. People who are obsessed with the books will love this, just like fans of the Cubs will come every day to watch a losing team. They just love it no matter what. Well it does matter what you throw out in front of us for most people and this was boring, repetitive, been there, done that - crap.
Sorry, but that's the truth. Someone needs to tell it like it is.
Agent Kushing
Here's another... genius...
Just read Kushings review of FOTR, so thought I would write to tell you I agreed with him totally. I saw it earlier this week at some press junket thing and it was not a good movie. It was slow, repetitive, and uninteresting. The one "positive" beyond looking good (TPM looked better though, by far) is that it is so faithful to the books. This is a positive to the fans of the books, but not to me. I have read the books and they are boring, slow and plodding. Anyway, just to let you know that there are others out there who don't like it (someone even walked out of the showing I was at, but to be fair, I don't know why she left. Might have gotten paged or something). Oh, and the reason I didn't write earlier, with a longer explanation on why this movie fails was because I was pretty sure you wouldn't print it.
Justin McGrotty
