What the Lord of the Rings trilogy mean to you.

As expected when the curtain come down on Middle Earth cinema I was balling my eyes out especially when this wonderful gift https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8ir8rVl2Z4 by Billy Boyd was heard at the end credits of the final hobbit film.
The Hobbit is not anywhere near as good as my favourite films of all time but this was a stunning end to it all.
I cannot put into words how much these films mean to me and now that it is all over I don't want to believe it.
It's the end of an era and it is all very sad :'(
You?

They lost me around the 2nd false ending of the Return of the King. Had only just finished reading The Lord of the Rings when the first film came out and remember the genuine awe at seeing it brought to life and that awe pretty much stayed with me all the way to the final third of Return of the King. That said, a great series of films and one of the great movie trilogies of all time and I'm not sure anyone could have done a better job of bringing the books to life.

I watched the first 30 minutes of The Hobbit and turned it off when I realized that there was still roughly 8 and a half hours of the trilogy left to watch and that I didn't have the heart to invest that much time in what seemed to be an unnecessarily long re-telling of a relatively short children's book.

What does it mean to me? 11 hours of my life I'm never getting back.

The Lord of the Rings itself was very well done, I thought, up until the ending as super has said. They did deviate elsewhere, but not enough to deter me.

As Super has said (again), The Hobbit has been a long drawn out affair for such a short book and is clearly just a money making exercise. That's not to say I haven't enjoyed them all immensely.

Rowley wrote:What does it mean to me? 11 hours of my life I'm never getting back.

And with a lifestyle as rock and roll as yours, Jeff, that’s 11 hours you can ill afford to lose.

I loved Lord of the Rings. There were parts of it that frustrated me, and some of the acting was suspicious (apart from Viggo Mortensen who was outstanding as Aragorn and the incomparable Ian McKellen who was just Gandalf, and forever will be), but overall I thought it was a magnificent effort at bringing a fantastic book to screen.

The battle of Helms Deep will forever be one of the greatest scenes of any film. Atmospheric, grand, dark and menacing. He had to spoil it slightly with Legolas skateboarding down stairs on his shield shooting orcs, but apart from that, it is an immense piece of action. Brilliantly done.

I love the books, and they were a massive part of my childhood. My arl man used to read them to me, and then I read them myself for the first time as a teenager. Seeing it brought to life in such a spectacular fashion was great. I could watch them again tomorrow and find them entertaining.

I could possibly have stopped watching when I did not enjoy the first. That would have denied me the opportunity to be snippy about them on here though, which would obviously not work.

They are an enjoyable bit of cinema. Excellent performances from some as Tina mentions and certainly no worse that some of the blockbusters we're supposed to rave about.

Time seems to have eroded people's opinion of Peter Jackson. I recall the "Fellowship" being greeted with rave reviews and now people are sniping at him because he's had the gall to make another three decent films (irrespective of the whether they remain true to the original story). I'm assuming none bar STRONGY on this forum have ever made a successful foray into Hollywood film-making therefore it does seem churlish to start pulling Jackson to bits.

I recall Barry Norman praising Braveheart when it came out and then, when it won the Oscars, he was suddenly very "meh" about it. Hypocritical pr!ck.

I like the battle scenes and stuff but there was no need to make the Hobbits so gay. The Sam / Frodo love affair is a bit silly.

I'd read the books several times before the first film came out. That film was the Star Wars of my generation - the sense of wonder when the fellowship walked through Moria, the sense of doom and foreboding. I'll never feel like that in a cinema again.

Then the second film ruined it. The ents were so badly done, and Saruman was a cartoon character. I loathed the second film. Then the third film went on for 8 hours and I really was glad it ended. What the hell was with Gandalf watching some sordid orgy in Frodo's bed?

The Hobbit films were always going to be poor imitations, but with that expectation I have enjoyed them far more than I should have. Martin Freeman is not a good actor. But Luke Evans does well, as does Richard Armitage. There's enough there to carry you through a trilogy.

Silmarillion next please Mr Jackson!

I often look back at some of my years as a teen, where I went through a lot of change and say to myself "man that was a depressing time in my life" . These films were what kept me going. I'd watch them over and over; waiting for the next movie then finally viewing it at least 3 times in the cinema was the highlight of my entire year. To me they were just beyond epic and had everything I wanted to see in a movie. I thank Tolkien, and Jackson and the crew for bringing this story to life, a cinema masterpiece that will echo through the ages.

I'm no fan of the Hobbit. I know this story came before LOTR, but the movies after and it was basically just a re-telling. It was also badly done, Jackson has gone off and done his own thing - think back to King Kong and how pathetic that was, the last 2 Hobbit films are on that level. As has been mentioned there is another book (Silmarillion). Ian McKellen also said "you may not have seen the last of middle earth." So it may not be over just yet, thought it kinda is as these events took place thousands of years before LOTR. Maybe the Elves will be there, I don't know the story. What I do know is that if Peter Jackson takes the reigns, it will be badly done.