I've never been a Tolkien fan. That's not to say I don't like his work, I was just never into high fantasy (or low fantasy for that matter), so I never read his work with the exception of The Fellowship of the Ring, which was required reading in 11th grade English.
But of course I saw all three of The Lord of the Rings movies. You kind of had to. I remember liking The Fellowship of the Ring the most and seeing it at least 2 times, perhaps 3 times, in the early aughts. However, I only saw The Two Towers and The Return of the King once each. I saw them in the theatre and have not watched them since.
UNTIL NOW.
IN A WORLD...fraught with division and strife...
IN A WORLD...where evil gains traction every passing day...
IN A WORLD...where the little guy has to stand up for what's right...
ONE MOVIE LOVER...has the courage to return to the past and watch a series of movies that she was convinced were overrated and boring.
COMING RIGHT NOW TO AN INTERNET NEAR YOU is the sensation...the blog entry all the critics are talking about...
JENNY'S REVIEW OF THE LORD OF THE RINGS TRILOGY
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So it turns out that I was wrong and Peter Jackson's LOTR trilogy is an absolute masterpiece of filmmaking. I watched all three films--the extended cuts of each one--in less than a week. I planned to watch one film per weekend over the course of 3 weeks, but the minute that Fellowship was over, I started The Two Towers. With Two Towers and Return of the King, I watched a few hours each night for a whole week until I was finished.
These movies got their grubby little hobbit hands in me.
I'm not going to go into plot details because I'm guessing that most of you reading this are bigger fans of the series than I am. I'll just write about some feelings that came up for me as I worked my way through the movies.
Not surprisingly, I remembered the plot of Fellowship the most since I had seen it more than once. I remember enjoying the movie when I was a teen because I had a crush on both Elijah Wood and Orlando Bloom so, you know, eye candy. Fellowship is also the lightest of all three. Upon rewatching it, I'd also say it's the weakest film of the trilogy...but when I say "weakest", what I mean is that I'd give it an "A" rating and the other two movies an "A+" rating, so, like, it's still very, very good.
When it came to revisiting The Two Towers and The Return of the King, I remembered almost nothing. I remembered Merry and Pippin being carried around my some trees in the TTT and the whole "I may not be able to carry the ring, but I can carry you Mr. Frodo!" scene from ROTK. Otherwise, these were essentially brand new films for me.
And, like a virgin, it was like being touched by JRR Tolkien's tremendous prose for the very first time.
I was stunned by how much I enjoyed TTT and especially ROTK. This was not a situation where I was half-watching, half-playing on my phone. I was riveted to the screen. And those lines people like to quote from the trilogy hit hard. When I was watching these movies as a 16, 17, 18 year old, I was not the same person as I am now. We were not living in the same world as we are now. Gandalf's famous line, "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 to us." hits like a fucking freight train.
I'm still not a fan of high fantasy--that has not changed. What changed is that I grew up. As sheltered as I still am compared to many people, I'm not as sheltered as I was when I was a teenager. And while I had some semblance of "religion" back when I first saw the movies, what I have now is an actual, burgeoning concept of spirituality that is mine and mine alone, built through loss of innocence, built through experience, built through hard times, and still continuing to be built, day by day.
Even if you're a stalwart atheist, The Lord of the Rings trilogy is a spiritual story. When I say "spiritual", what I mean is the idea that there is something greater than us and our lives. That we actually do need other people. That we each have unique gifts and strengths no matter who we are. And that our strengths and weaknesses fit into to the strengths and weaknesses of other people like a puzzle.
This is the message of The Lord of the Rings: every person has unique qualities and are of value...but only in the context of being in community with others. Only Frodo could carry the ring as far as he did, but he wouldn't have made it without Sam. The Lord of the Rings says: you are not meant to be alone and to shoulder the burdens of the world by yourself. You are meant to be in relationship with other people. And they with you.
This is a message that I needed to hear and still need to hear because I struggle with two things: 1) a strong desire to be alone a lot of the time and 2) a feeling that I'm not as good as other people. My desire to be alone comes from issues with being overstimulated by other people and their noise and energy. And that's legit, but I also need to make sure that I don't retreat too much into myself. The other part of this is a feeling of creeping shame that I am not enough--not enough of an adult, not smart enough, not strong enough, and certainly not brave enough for this world.
But what LOTR says to me is: you, Jenny, are needed by other people. You, Jenny, do have strengths and skills that others don't have and they need your help. You, Jenny, can learn from others and it's not embarrassing to learn, even as you approach middle age. In fact, it's beautiful to keep learning as you get older.
Something that I had forgotten about the trilogy is that it ends on a pretty bittersweet note. After the four hobbits return home when Sauron is conquered, they try to get on with their lives. But Frodo can't. He has seen and experienced too much to just live a "normal" life in the Shire. He ends up going to the Undying Lands with Bilbo and Gandalf--basically, like going to eternity without dying. Sam and his friends are saddened to see him go, but it's what he has to do. The Fellowship is truly broken up at this point and everyone is moving on with their lives (or afterlives). And we get that lovely last shot of Samwise Gamgee, the real hero of the movies, going back home to his wife and kids.
This is really not a typical "happy ending" and I love the trilogy for that. I love that the story suggests that sometimes we are so impacted by life events and trauma that we cannot go back to who we were--we can only move forward to who we are becoming. That's beautiful, and that's truth.
So I rewatched these films while having a mid-life crisis and an existential crisis and a spiritual crisis...and, boy howdy, I cannot recommend these films enough if you are experiencing one or more of the above crises. It's goooood crisis-watching.
That's all I have to say. Well done to everyone involved in the making of these films. Hopefully they know how much the movies mean to so many people.
Grade: A+
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