The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring Movie Review

Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. This is an old adage that has been the basis for many a story. It is the primary plot device behind John Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings classic. Written in 1954-55, with origins dating back to 1937, the first of the three movie installments, which have already been filmed, tries to stay true to the mystical world present in the book. The resulting effort is a definite success.

The star of the story, and the film, is not a person, but an object, a ring. The ring allows one to control a host of other rings handed down to the different peoples of Middle Earth: three rings belong to the immortal elves; seven to the dwarfs; and nine rings to mortal humans. The ring that rules all the others, forged using the fires of Mount Doom by the evil Wizard Sauron (Sala Baker), gives its holder so much power that it corrupts all those who seek to wear it, even the purest.

Of course, there are some peoples that are more pure than others. Humans generally seem incapable of wearing it without being corrupted by its influence (no surprise there). But there exists a diminutive people, the Hobbits, who do seem at least capable of carrying it without being polluted too much. It falls upon one Hobbit, Frodo Baggins (Elijah Wood), to take the ring to Mt. Doom, which is the only place where it can be destroyed.

Frodo is aided in his quest by the wizard Gandalf (Ian McKellen), the elf Legolas Greenleaf (Armando Bloom), the dwarf Gimli (John Rhys-Davies), two humans Strider aka Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen) and Boromir (Sean Bean), and three other Hobbits including Frodo's friend Samwise Gamgee (Sean Astin). The story chronicles how Frodo, being a reluctant hero, travels through mysterious and dangerous lands of breathtaking beauty, and fights terrific monsters in the context of awesome towers and citadels, to achieve his goal.

Perhaps one of the most visionary aspects about Tolkien's work is how he set the stage for a Dungeons and Dragons style video-game. Director Peter Jackson imbibes to the film the same feel present the book, in terms of traversing a diverse variety of landscapes, while encountering a diverse variety of creatures, friend and foe alike. Watching the film, it's easy to become mesmerised by the fantasy that is unfolding purely based on the cinematography.

Like with Joanne Rowling's Harry Potter (or for that matter, Stephen King's It), this film does not live up what I imagined, but it does a great job of presenting what Jackson and his co-workers imagined. The special effects are spectacular and meticulously done, perhaps even better than those observed in Harry Potter. There are no cop-outs here and every place that it matters, the effort and the expense have been evidently put in. The soundtrack sometimes overwhelms the dialogue, of which there is a lot, interspersed between the action sequences. Do not miss seeing this on the big screen. This is how movies should be made.

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Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

It is extremely difficult, if not impossible, to translate a book into a movie. The problem has to do with one's imagination: words in a book conjure up images that are highly personal and subjective, and any attempt by a third party to lend form to them ends up disappointing. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone is no exception in this regard, but fortunately, the imagery presented is awesome and wondrous in its own right.

The film is made strictly by the book: Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe), a young boy mistreated by his foster family, learns that he is special and comes of age... in the Hogwart's School of Magic (!) where he learns wizardry, plays Quidditch and fights an evil despotic wizard (who does not turn out to be his father).

While the movie stays fastidiously true to Joanne Rowling's book, perhaps one of the best adaptations ever, the adage that a picture is worth a thousand words doesn't hold true here. For the most part, from the initial victory of the baby Harry Potter upto the Quidditch match, a lot of the details are skipped. What we're presented with is a jump from one scene to another (sometimes too quickly) that illustrates with painstaking effort the magical realm that Rowling has constructed in her series. For example, while the opening sequence shows Professor Albus Dumbledore (Richard Harris) turning out the lights in a street, Professor McGonagall (Maggie Smith) changing to her true form from being a cat, and Hagrid (Robbie Coltrane) bringing Harry on his flying motorcycle, we're not really shown the celebration of Lord Voldemort's fall. This isn't criticism but just an observation; in fact, I think doing this is especially okay if one is familiar with the Harry Potter books, but it does impart a sense of urgency in the beginning portions of the film.

I marvelled at how technology enabled the film makers to make possible the wonders of Harry's world, including Diagon Alley and Gringotts Bank, the moving pictures, Hogwarts Castle, the Sorting Hat (Leslie Phillips), the ghosts in the Castle (including a cameo by John Cleese), Fluffy the three-headed dog, the ugly troll, and so on. I believe that it is technology that makes the Harry Potter film authentic, in the same way as in the X-Men or the How the Grinch Stole Christmas movies, by letting at least the imagination of a few people come to life as vibrantly as possible. Most of what I imagined and what was projected on the screen weren't really colinear, but it was still cool, incredibly so at times, to watch.

The movie, however, picked up with the first Quidditch match where Harry, on a broomstick, plays the position of a Seeker after the Golden Snitch, a particularly hard-to-catch ball, which is key to winning a game. The inspired depiction of the game meshed with my imagination extremely well, and from there on, the story of Harry's second encounter with the dark Lord Voldemort (Richard Bremmer) enfolded in a less fragmented and more cohesive manner. The final confrontation, and what Harry and his friends have to do get there, is a delight to watch.

For those paying attention, the main change from the book has to do with how Hagrid's dragon is disposed of and the resulting consequences. The ghosts also play a smaller role here though given the movie's running time, I'm not surprised parts like those were omitted.

The actors playing the young leads give decent performances, with Emma Watson as the know-it-all Hermione Granger standing out. The adult actors aren't given much time but they all present solid performances. The score by John Williams is simple but effective. The set design, cinematography, and visuals are impressive. Director Chris Columbus does a great job of bringing to the big screen the Enid Blyton-like atmosphere that Rowling's books exude.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone is a great movie to watch. I viewed it from the perspective of someone who is intimately familiar with the books, and I believe there is strong merit to watching it being completely unfamiliar with the story, a choice I do not have given that I've read the four books a few times. Definitely check it out on the big screen and make sure you goto the bathroom before.

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