- Directed by: Peter Jackson
- Cast: Elijah Wood, Sean Astin, Ian Holm
- Based on: The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien
- Year: 2001
Frodo: I wish the Ring had never come to me. I wish none of this had happened.
Gandalf: So do all who live to see such times, but that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us. There are other forces at work in this world, Frodo, besides the will of evil. Bilbo was meant to find the Ring. In which case, you were also meant to have it. And that is an encouraging thought.
— from the movie
It is always interesting to see a movie adaptation of a well-written (or legendary) novel. “The Lord of the Rings” is the book that set the standard for what a fantasy novel should be. Adapting well-known stories can be a double-edged sword: it can be a chance that cannot be missed, but it might end in disaster.
Peter Jackson did a great job bringing Tolkien’s world to the movie screen. It is a magical balance among the characters, settings, actions, screenplay, and camera works. Even Jackson himself couldn’t quite achieve the same level of directing in his later movies — notably “The Hobbit” trilogy, which was very disappointing.
- Check my review of the book “The Fellowship of the Ring“
I highly recommend reading the book to fill in the gaps that were not explained in the film. While it is a rare pleasure to see the visual representation of each race — Men, Elves, Dwarves, Wizards, Orcs, and Hobbits — the film inevitably had to skip smaller episodes that connect the major events. I do not blame the director or the screenwriters; it would take 10 or 20 hours to show everything in “The Fellowship of the Ring”, which is only one-third of the whole story. Still, it is inevitable for viewers to notice moments where the narrative is jumping with no proper links.
The best part of the film is the otherworldly scenery of Middle Earth, filmed in New Zealand. Hobbiton is an ideal image of a country town Tolkien envisioned. Also, the depiction of the elf towns — Rivendell and Lothlórien — is what a movie adaptation should be supposed to accomplish: t fills the imagination of viewers with real images. However, the film occasionally gets distracted by typical Hollywood-style melodrama designed to force strong emotions around love, friendship, and loyalty.
The Fellowship of the Ring is the first entry in a three-part series, mirroring the novel’s structure of three volumes and six (sub) books. It starts with the joint birthday party of Bilbo (turning 111) and Frodo (turning 33), and ends with the formation and the break of the Fellowship dedicated to destroying the ONE Ring. While the film’s prologue shows the history of the Ring, I felt it contained too many spoilers, giving viewers too much information before the story truly gets underway.
A final pint worth noting is the sense of scale. Almost every scene required precise visual scaling to account for the height differences between humans and hobbits. It is wonderful to see how a movie can bring such visual experiences to viewers.
Scriptorium 