Lord of the Rings, The: Book I - The Return of the Shadow

Review by Adabisi — March 7, 2009 @ 9:44 pm

*This rating was given before reviews were required*

Review by Link — February 22, 2009 @ 2:56 am

*This rating was given before reviews were required*

Review by Haltiamieli — February 16, 2009 @ 10:16 pm

*This rating was given before reviews were required*

Review by JasonN — February 14, 2009 @ 9:47 pm

*This rating was given before reviews were required*

Review by spelledaren — February 6, 2009 @ 2:16 pm

Nice, but not perfect. The new intro works, but later references to Gollum for example become weird, because we know nothing about him. I wasn’t too fond of Gandalf’s ride through the Shire. I was going to buy it, but then there came another scene with focus on him speaking, and still with no words. I prefer Bilbo’s sillyness.

About removing the black rider you say that “Frodo and Sam don’t know as of yet that they are being hunted. In order to follow the book, neither should the audience.” But isn’t this just a smokescreen for the fact that it gets hard to cut from the hilltop to the field, because of the sudden shifts in music it would require? I mean, it’s obvious that they are hunted, you have already shown us all the other Nazgul scenes.

I think I noticed two sound cuts (apart from knowing that they are there), one was in Bree when they are nearing the inn, and the other was when the Nazgul enters the inn. Just some unevenness.

Now that I’ve gotten through that: excellent editing choices! This edit does most, but not everything, that I would want to do myself. The edited scene at the Ford is especially good, a great improvment over the original.

A minor point: if you are trying to follow the books as closely as possible, why does Gandalf show off fireworks to the children? I mean, it’s a good scene, but it wouldn’t be too hard to remove.

I’m giving this 4 out of 5. I will try to watch the rest, but from TTT it gets increasingly difficult to keep the movie true to the books…we will see how it goes! Good work, keep it up!

Update Sep 29, 2012.

Added ratings for the categories.