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LORD OF THE RINGS:
RETURN OF THE KING
by Peter Sobczynski

December 17, 2003

(out of 4 stars)

FILM CREDITS: Starring: Elijah Wood, Sean Astin, Ian McKellen, Viggo Mortensen, John Rhys-Davies. Directed by: Peter Jackson. Produced by: Fran Walsh, Barrie M. Osborne, Peter Jackson, Tim Sanders. New Line Cinema

Writing a review of “The Return of the King”, the finale of Peter Jackson’s epic three-film adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Lord of the Rings” trilogy, is just about the most thankless task imaginable for a humble film critic. For starters, it isn’t as if a review is going to have any influence on viewers whatsoever-the viewers who made the previous installments-“The Fellowship of the Ring” and “The Two Towers”-two of the most successful movies ever made are certainly going to turn out in full force to see the final and those few who sat out the earlier editions are just as certainly not going to suddenly decide to turn up for the conclusion. Making matters even trickier is the fact that “The Return of the King” is essentially the final third of one long movie and, as any good critic knows, you never write about the ending unless the result is preordained. (You might argue that a film slavishly based on one of the most popular books ever written does have a preordained ending but I would be willing to bet that many fans of the films have never cracked any of the books.)

You can’t even write about the astonishing technical achievements that Jackson and his army of technicians have pulled off in bringing the book to the screen because they are on the same level as the sights that audiences were treated to in the other films. While the first film stunned fans with its fully convincing depiction of people and locales that had long existed only in their minds and the second introduced the equally impressive CG character of Gollum (based on the voice and movements of actor Andy Serkis), there is no similar leap in technology or technique in “The Return of the King”. This isn’t to suggest that the filmmakers are somehow slacking off; in fact, it is actually sort of a weird compliment that the effects (with the exception of those silly walking tree creatures) and locales are so convincing that we don’t even notice that they are, in fact, effects.

Using its longer-than-usual running time (200 minutes-one shudders to imagine the length of the upcoming Extended Edition DVD) to the fullest, “The Return of the King” ties up all of the storylines introduced in the previous films. The heroic Hobbit Frodo (Elijah Wood), along with devoted friend Sam (Sean Astin) and the potentially treacherous Gollum, is nearing the end of his quest to destroy the all-powerful Ring; unfortunately, his traveling companions are at odds and the decision of which one Frodo chooses to believes could lead to the destruction of the world if he picks wrong. Of course, even if he manages to choose correctly, the question remains of whether Frodo will be strong enough to overcome the power of the Ring so that he may be able to destroy it.

Meanwhile, the king-in-waiting Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen), aided by the wizard Gandalf (Sir Ian McKellan) is preparing his depleted armies for one last battle on the fields of Mordor, in order to distract the all-powerful Sauron, who craves the Ring for himself, from finding the location of Frodo. These plans are complicated by intrigues on several fronts. Denethor (John Noble), the caretaker of the land of Gondor (Aragorn’s land), has been so devastated by the death of his elder son Boromir (and if that name doesn’t ring a bell, a reviewing of the earlier films might be a good idea before tackling this episode) that he is perfectly willing to not only send his younger son, Faramir (David Wenham) to certain death but yearns to cremate the body himself-even if, to quote Monty Python, “He’s not quite dead yet!”. When Gondor is attacked by Sauron’s forces, King Theoden (Bernard Hill), leader of the neighboring kingdom of Rohan, has to decide whether he will assist them even though they did nothing to help his kingdom during the battle of Helm’s Deep.

Like I said, this is a lot of plot (and I haven’t even mentioned the stories involving the two babes nursing crushes on the hunky Aragorn; Eowyn (Miranda Otto), the princess of Rohan , and Arwen (Liv Tyler), the elf who has given up immortality so that she can marry her beloved) and it is to the credit of Jackson and his co-writers Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens that they manage to keep all of the balls in the air without bogging things down with endless explanations of who everyone is. They assume, correctly, that if you have made it this far into the saga, you don’t really need a recap along the lines of “Previously, in “The Two Towers”…” The only real storytelling mistake that they make comes right at the beginning, where a prologue explains how Gollum became acquainted with the Ring in the first place. The scene doesn’t work because it unnecessarily delays the flow between the films (one of the best things about “The Two Towers” was how it picked up from the exact moment that the earlier film ended) and because it is a scene that should have appeared in “The Two Towers” when Gollum was first introduced to us. If one looks at the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy as one giant film (which is probably the best approach), you shouldn’t wait until seven hours into the film to suddenly drop in a prologue depicting events that occurred before the story proper. This is a storytelling device that you can get away with in print (where it is easy to go back and forth in the narrative) but which doesn’t work as well in the forward-momentum style of film.

There are other flaws here and there-none of which are that damaging and none of which are likely to affect hard-core fans of the films. Even though the previous installments haven’t exactly gone light on the action, “The Return of the King” contains epic battle after epic battle and, at a certain point, it almost becomes too much of a good thing; they are staggering technical achievements (even if some of the techniques used to depict the battle of Mordor, especially the methods of defeating weird creatures like the Mumakil and the Nazgul, are strikingly similar to those seen in the ice-planet battle in “The Empire Strikes Back”) but they might have had even more impact with tighter editing. Another flaw is that the grand romantic triangle between Aragorn, Arwen and Eowyn never quite has the impact because Mortensen and Tyler have never really sparked in their scenes together-Otto, on the other hand, is all sparks to the point where it hardly seems to be a contest.

Most frustrating is the fact, well-reported on Internet fan sites, that the entire role of Saruman, the bad guy played by Christopher Lee in the earlier films, has been deleted from this film. (The only reference to him in the finished film is in one line of dialogue: “Saruman has no power anymore!”) His absence (though the scenes he shot will be restored on the Extended Edition DVD) is distressing because, having been set up as such a bad guy in the first two films, it just seems odd that he plays absolutely no part in the conclusion of the saga. The other problem with his absence is the fact that Christopher Lee, as close to a legendary actor as you are ever likely to see, is one of those rare performers who can take even the most ridiculous-sounding line of dialogue (and let’s face, the works of Tolkien are chock-full of such lines) and make it sound utterly plausible. To lose such a presence does leave a hole in the film and I wish that Jackson could have trimmed some other things-such as any of the scenes involving the ultra annoying Hobbits Pippin (Billy Boyd) and Merry (Dominic Monaghan)-to give both the actor and the character their due.

Those missteps aside, “The Return of the King” is still a pretty stirring epic and is a worthy conclusion to the saga-while it lacks the surprise of the first film, it never bogs down in the way that “The Two Towers” frequently did. Not only that but it provides a happy ending for all. Fans of the films get a finale that doesn’t fall apart along the lines of “Return of the Jedi” or “The Matrix Revolutions”. The folks at New Line (who should once again be commended for investing so much time and money on a massive project that could have easily turned into a studio-closing disaster) get zillions in additional revenue as well as a film that appears to be a mortal lock for sweeping the upcoming Academy Awards as a way of paying tribute to all three films. And for fans of Peter Jackson, the ones who glommed on to him when he was still making cheap, ferociously inventive horror films like “Meet the Feebles” and “Brain Dead”, they get to anticipate future projects that will hopefully follow his own twisted imagination (I can’t wait to see what he does with his long-cherished “King Kong” remake) instead of sticking to a familiar text. After working on “The Lord of the Rings” for so many years, I can only imagine the ideas he has stockpiled; now that he has the commercial credibility to achieve his visions, the results could be truly extraordinary

-- PETER SOBCZYNSKI

Copyright © 2003 Peter Sobczynski
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While the views expressed by Peter Sobczynski do not necessarily reflect the views of Criticdoctor.com, the Critic Doctor will occasionally examine Mr. Sobczynski's film reviews to bring forth an honest examination of those views expressed.