LOL, .......you must precious you must

My wife will be buying my copy today (Christmas present). But I won't watch it until after Christmas Day.
The wait will be very hard. :evil:

You can be sure that I will be giving a full review of this, and I won't gloss over anything. If I feel the extras are fluff and unnecessary (like much that has been included in past editions), I'll say so, and if I don't, I'll say so too. I have a bad case of the flu, which is disappointing, because I've gotten the other two EE DVDs at midnight the day they went on sale, and got to torture those who still hadn't gotten their's. (yeah, I guess I'm not a fan, but am just the first in line to buy this stuff so I can tell my grandchildren about it one day )

If I can muster the strength to get it today, I'll be sure to watch it asap and write up a review, but be warned, the theatrical is going to be mentioned, and if anybody can't handle an opinion that isn't "praise the precious", just skip over my review, because though I will probably be completely delighted with finally getting a ROTK movie that isn't a sloppy pacifier, it's a good bet that shots will be taken at the theatrical release as I discuss the improvements in the EE release, and I'll probably make a reference about the greedy Jackson moneygrubber who purposely left things off to sell more EE DVDs, and god forbid if there is one mention anywhere on this DVD of any awards, because the movie that won the awards (the theatrical) makes no mention of associating itself as an award winner, and if this one does, I will be sure to make mention of it, so cover your eyes.

The theatrical did have the 11 wins on the cover. What other mention were you looking for? There's only so much space on disc 2.

I know the Oscars are mentioned on the EE.

There is absolutely no mention of anything on my ROTK DVD cover, and there is no mention on any cover that I've seen. Just a soundbite from Jeffrey Lyons.



All is right in the world, because I now have the EE DVD in my possession, and my day is now planned. Be on the lookout for my review, as I'll post it when I've taken it all in.

The only thing I ask of Mav is to review it for what it is and what not for any opinions or anything anyone has on this board or the politics around it

I am sure you will get a more objective POV from me than anybody else here. I haven't already decided before viewing it that it's holy and the most breathtaking DVD I've ever witnessed , like others have, no doubt, already done. Not to worry on my end, you'll get it strait. As far as the others go, well... :arrow:

I'll be back later tonight sometime. I was going to view it while I was at the computer, but this deserves the big screen TV treatment.

You know what I mean ... I'm looking for reviews from people who do not take the obvious pot shot or jab in a subtle way ...

i enjoyed your ttt ee review last year .. hoping for something along those lines ...

the extra features?? bleh .. i dont care for those

I believe there was a brouhaha earlier this year with fans because for some reason some ROTK dvds had the blurb and some didn't (perhaps later copies had it).

I wouldn't read too much into the Oscars not being mentioned on the theatrical disc or its packaging. Chances are everything was completed before the end of Feb and it wouldn't have been cost effective to replace everything.

Mine has the Oscar Blurb...I bought it the weekend it came out, I believe (5 days after...at Target)

I spent a bit too much for the EE today ($29.99 at Borders. Coulda gotten it from Best Buy for $24.99, hehe), but I'm glad I've got all three. And, it's kinda nice that New Line is offering the slipcase box that comes with the three-ee collection set for $3 (free...$3 for the s/h)

Ya there are mentions of the Academy Awards......almost at the end of each department documentary......

That's one thing i think they took a bit too far with the docs....although you can't really blame them because its such a wonderful achievement......i would've liked the ending to focused more on the emotions of leaving MiddleEarth....

Anyway a brilliant Box-Set and i despite what i just mentioned, it is still the best EE to date.....there's some extremely sad momments......

The rebate is great as well. $10 bucks for buying the gift set and having a previous copy of the theatrical edition.

I know; I didn't buy the gift set, so I'll only get the $5 rebate.

Anyways, the Saruman scene in the beginning sucks. Honestly. Up until half of the first disc, the movie's much slower than it was in theatres (in FOTR EE and TTT EE, I actually found that they flowed better) and then it gets better. The extension to the Dead scene was great.

I haven't watched Disc 2 yet.

Many of the great moments are spoiled, like the arrival of the army of the dead. Having them appear earlier takes all the wow out of their charge into battle.

However some new scenes help make more sense out of other scenes, like the Mouth of Sauron. "For Frodo" now makes sense. I wish they would of put the horse and decapiated body in the foreground though.

Well, I started to watch it, but couldn't. A double ear infection and a sinus infection (all at once) mean, I'm turning in early tonight. And from what I saw of it, I didn't like it.

spoilers

Well, the Saruman scene at the beginning definitely wasn't cut for pacing reasons, as I suspected, because it didn't hinder the pacing at all. It also went a long way in establishing just how far Gandalf had come in power, because he was portrayed as not much more than a soldier of the army in the theatrical, and that was something that made it weak.

Many of the scenes were understandably cut, but Saruman wasn't one of them. I felt disc 1 ended on a great note, with the army of the dead agreeing to fight, but I do wish that the arrival of Sauron's forces at Minis Tirith would have been where it ended, as Denethor first witnessed their arrival. The extended army of the dead scenes are also scenes that should not have been left off, because it really made the arrival of Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli on those corsair ships pretty lame by cutting them, and it really needed to be shown how they got to that point, and shouldn't have expected the audience to write it for themselves. I also liked the Indiana Jones type feel it had when all of those skulls started drowning our heroes.

Two other very important scenes that were left out , where the plots that were introduced with the Witch King vrs. Gandalf, and the pig faced general, and both of them were very satisfying, and there was no excuse for leaving them out. It was very powerful to see Gandalf knocked on his ass like he was, and you could tell he feared the Witch King when he mentioned him to Pippen, but he shouldn't have. All he needed to do was chase him off with a torch like Aragorn did in FOTR, but that's another story...

With the pig faced general, we no longer have to wonder why so much time was devoted to a character, only to have him disappear and never shown again. His battle with Eowyn and the cool way he was finished off by Aragorn, who was just passing by as he took him out , only took up about a minute of screentime. Again, sometimes the story should be more important that other things. Showing Denethor making a pig out of himself took up far more screentime than this resolution did.

Another problem I had with the theatrical was Eowyn, and for the most part, it was taken care of. All except for her ungodly strength. (lifting Merry onto her horse as she rode by with one arm, cutting off the Nazguls head so easily, dropping that huge Oilephant to it's knees by scratching it's knees with her little sword, etc...) In the theatrical, she looked like she was anything but a warrior when in battle with the Witch King, but she kicked ass in her fight scenes in this version , and it was nice to see that she looked like she could handle herself well.

The mouth of Sauron should never have been cut. That was one of the best scenes in the whole movie, and it really tied some spotty things up. It was also nice to see that the Black Gates didn't seem to be across the street from Minis Tirith like it was in the theatrical.

I really haven't had a chance to watch the extras, but I did see Jackson's intro, and couldn't help but laugh as he said he'd probably be back for a 25th annivesary edition, and then said he'd probably do something sooner than that. He knows damn well there is more milking to come.

This was the ROTK I had hoped to see, and the ROTK theatrical should have kept some very key parts in it, and scrapped some of the redundant ones and senseless ones, and I wouldn't have had issues with it's sloppiness at all, because it would have covered it's bases, instead of waiting for them to be covered when I had to pay for it again. I'll have to watch it more and let it all settle in to determine where I would list it on my favorites list, but if this version was up for the best picture and best director, it would have been deserving of the wins. (still not deserving of 11 wins, though)

ROTK Extended Edition is a strong A , and I hope the extras don't piss me off or bore me too badly (Mark Odesky's voice and Lani the stunt woman better keep away), so I can give the DVD as a whole the same grade as the movie.

Well, I've watched aorund 1/3rd of it. Most of the first disc. I was very dissapointed. Much of the new material was not needed. I'd just as soon re-watch the theatrical version. I am a huge LoTR fan (I even played the trading card game), so its not that. I just think that Peter Jackson let it go to his head.

I find Mavy's review very interesting. I would have never thought additional scenes could change someone's feelings so greatly.

Hmmm.

It's almost as if by heralding the extended edition, it helps your argument against the theatrical edition.

When in fact, they're really the same movie. Just one is tighter.

I have presented a perfect case against the flaws in the theatrical that can't be disputed. It's sloppy. Things(plural) are introduced and not resolved. Is it really so hard to understand how resolving plot threads that were introduced and then forgotten about in the theatrical could significantly make a movie better? It goes WELL beyond tightening things up, and any writer could easily identify that, which I'm sure you do.
You guys can try to pretend the flaws don't exist, and try to make it look like I'm making them up because of an agenda, but you're only kidding yourselves. The theatrical version of ROTK is messy. It's not a tight movie. It introduces plot points that it had no intentions on resolving until later. That's not a movie that finished. That's not a movie that's great.

It's just that PJ didn't take anything out, so in theory, all the issues anyone had before, should still be there. The multiple endings, the endless talking, CGI heavy fight scenes, they are all there PLUS another 50 minutes of more of the same.

If you weren't emotionally invested in the 3 1/2 hour version, adding 50 minutes should make you even less invested.

Yeah, it's not the greatest movie I've ever seen. I could name things that I don't like. (Gollum's reaction to falling into molten liquid magma, Eowyn's super strength, Denethor eating, etc...) I also thought the big battle wasn't nearly as well done as Helm's Deeps was, which doesn't mean that I hated it. It's not black and white with me like it is with many on the net. Those issues are not enough to take it from being an A. I think people forget that I gave the sloppy theatrical version a B. The stuff that I liked made it enjoyable, but the sloppy stuff took the shine off.

I'm not going to rehash the events of last winter. But it's pretty well known that your issues with ROTK go well beyond unresolved plot lines. Saruman being left out was a jumping point for quite a few LOTR bashers last year but that scene alone didnt make or break the film.

Your cause would be better served if you just came clean. :wink:

The Saruman plot going unresolved was just one of the plots that wasn't resolved until the EE DVD. I covered every issue that I had in my review, both this review, and my theatrical review. The only "issues" besides that, is the issues that the loonies have had with not accepting any opinion that is different than utter worship. Even now, you are trying to make it look like there are agendas and evil and malice at work, because it couldn't possibly be possible for the precious to have had a theatrical release that was very flawed in it's execution. Here's my review.

ROTK

I came out of the theater after seeing ROTK, with different emotions than I experienced with the previous two chapters. After FOTR, I was in AWE, and after TTT, I was also in AWE, even though I felt that FOTR was noticeably superior as a film. My emotion toward ROTK was one of confusion. I wasn't sure if I was supposed to love it, or to be disappointed, so I want to have another look to see if I can pinpoint what didn't hit me as hard as the other two. Perhaps it was the crowd that I saw it with the first time, because they were very uninspired, and the vibe was definitely in the theater. There was no electricity in the audience. There was for FOTR and TTT, each time I saw it.

ROTK had some great moments to it. Brilliant in fact! Unfortunately, too many of those moments seemed to be rushed through, and not enough was fleshed out in some important scenes. The battle of Helms Deep was much better than the Pelennor Fields battle. It didn't have the drama, or the sense of despair and impending doom, or the tension. It seemed to be one big action sequence after another, with no edge of your seat type of things like Helms Deep had. The much hyped Legolas/Oiliphant stunt was not that great IMO, and I'm a little suprised that it's getting many raves. It was not very good CGI.

Shelob made my skin crawl, and it was the most tense I felt in the movie. My skin's crawling as I type about it. When it first showed her, I was slightly disappointed, but I felt she looked much better when she attacked Frodo, and then Sam fought her off. Sean Astin gave his finest performance as Sam in ROTK. I felt for the guy, even though he seemed to do 3 times more crying in ROTK, than the other two put together. He was a true hero, and his determination was inspiring. Elijah Wood was also great as Frodo , once again.

The rest of the cast did well in their respective roles, but I didn't feel they had enough meat in the theatrical version, with the exception of McKellan and Boyd, and it felt kind of empty. Viggo Mortensen did not get the opportunity to expand on Aragorn, and even the Aragorn/Eowyn thing that was given time in TTT, it was completely swept under the rug with a simple line of dialogue. Gimli and Legolas were pretty much like extras, as they were hardly in it. Speaking of Eowyn, where did she get her amazon strength from? Not only did she ride by Merry, and easily grab him with one arm as she effortlessly lifted him only her horse, but she sliced through the Witch King's beast of burden, and took it's head off with one stroke. A champion male bodybuilder would probably have only made it halfway thourgh, yet she cleaved it off with hardly an effort. Farimir started off with much potential, but it was just thrown away, as he lay unconscious most of the time, and his father was the most confusing character to appear in LOTR, and I hope that the EEE clears that guy up a bit.

The Witch King's confrontation with Gandalf that never happened, as well as all the time spent on that pig faced "general", but never showing his demise, really had me wishing that those minutes would have went to showing Saruman's demise instead. For his part, I thought Jackson handled the Saruman debacle better than anybody probably thought he would, but I still would have rather seen that resolved, than to see two other things introduced, and never resolved. The beginning scene with Smeagel didn't bother me like it did some people, and the ending didn't bother me one bit, although it wasn't hard to tell that it made many people restless at the theater.

The army of the dead wasn't much of a problem either, though I can underatnd why some would think they didn't look as good as the walking dead in POTC, because they didn't. They were still fine, as far as I was concerned. The eagles arriving without any explanation, except the butterfly, hinting that Gandalf used the same trick that he did in FOTR when he was a prisoner of Saruman, wasn't handled as well as it could have been, and it felt like it was just a quick way to tidy things up. There were just too many scenes that couldn't breath, because of the time constraints, and perhaps a quicker ending was exactly what was in order, to give more life to those scenes, without trimming the 3:20 run time, and the extended ending could have been on the EE DVD. I think it would have made the theatrical not appear as rushed, contrived, and sloppy in some places.

The final fate of the ring, was exactly as I had imagined. Powerful, tension filled, and captivating. I only wish that the Gollum CGI was at the same level as it had been throughout, as it lessened the effects a little. Not too much, but when he was dancing around after biting off Frodo's finger, he looked like a cartoon, and when he falls into the molten lava, you would think he fell into a suana or something. He would have been melting and screeming bloody murder, not peaceful looking. It was pretty cartoony looking as he sank into the lava. I'll probably hear it for this comment, but I hope ILM does that scenerio better, when Anakin meets the same fate in EP III.

The many endings didn't bother me, like I said, and some of the best scenes in the movie were in that footage. When Frodo wakes up, and one by one, the surviving fellowship enter the room, it gave me a very warm feeling, as if all of my friends were once again with me too. When Aragorn becomes king, and looks upon the 4 hobbits as they start to bow, and tells them that they didn't have to bow before anybody, and then he and his whole kingdom take a knee before the little halflings, it was powerful indeed. The best scene in the movie, and it didn't involve any action or FX. That's where it should have ended, and Cate Blanchet could have taken over with a voice over, as she explained the rest to the movie goers. There really was no need to spend so much time on Sam's life after the journey.

Which brings me to my last point. Frodo leaving with Bilbo, Gandalf, and the elves. I felt that this could have been handled in a way that completely blew me away, and I blame the score for not quite achieving that with me. It reminds me of the same scenerio in Ghost, when Patrick Swayze was ascending to heaven. The score was what totally what hit upon those emotions, but the score wasn't up to the scene in ROTK IMO, and left it a bit shallow and confusing. A simple line of dialogue from Frodo to Sam could have also cleared up the confusion that they would never see eachother again. As far as things were explained, you didn't get the feeling that they would never see eachother again, just that Frodo was leaving the shire. Gandalf's line, didn't really tell me that Frodo wouldn't be coming back, just that Gandalf's work there was done, and he had no reason to come back. Frodo had friends and family, so he had ties that Gandalf didn't.

To sum it up, ROTK was an entertaining film, with many thrills, but ultimately, it felt uneven in too many places, and the restraining time limit had some affects on the execution. I was left wondering why some people consider this the best of the three, but it was the same with TTT when it first came out, and once the novelty wears off, I think that FOTR's theatrical will clearly be seen as the best. This will definitely be a masterpiece when the hour of footage is restored to the EE DVD, and I can't wait for it, but the theatrical is lacking because of all that's missing. Much like I felt when I walked out of Daredevil, I knew that I couldn't give it an A, so my grade for the theatrical version of ROTK is a B . That might change when I see it again this weekend, but I honestly don't really see it changing until the EE comes out, but maybe it was just other factors, and not the movie itself. Still, it was a good movie, but not a masterpiece, and a little underwhelming. That's about as honest as I can put it. For those who saw a masterpiece, I hope that I do as well this weekend, but I think you'll all see the real masterpiece, next November, when the EE DVD comes out. Too much missing from the equation for me to bestow that kind of greatness on it now.


Now loyal, isn't it possible that the true agenda at work here, is the agenda to try and discredit anybody who isn't praising the theatrical ROTK, because if they are veiwed as credible, the denial you are in about the movie being great becomes something that you and others have to deal with? :idea:

I think the problem some people have in regards to you and ROTK is how contradictory you are at times. I highlighted just a few points in your theatrical review. You can't say the ending didn't bother you, then go on for two paragraphs about all the issues you had with it.

All things considered, I'm happy you enjoyed the EE so much. We'll see if you like the Ultra High Def 10 Year Anniversary Edition even more.