Flickering Opinions: The Two Towers

Film Details:

Directed by Peter Jackson (Dead Alive, The Frighteners, Heavenly Creatures, Fellowship of the Ring... You know. God of Cinema.)

Written by
Peter Jackson (the aforementioned GOD.)
Frances Walsh (Dead Alive, The Frighteners, Heavenly Creatures)
Philippa Boyens (Fellowship of the Ring, The Return of the King)
Stephen Sinclair (Dead Alive, Meet the Feebles)
J.R.R. Tolkein (novel)

Starring
Elijah Wood (The Faculty)
Sean Astin (The Goonies, Rudy)
Viggo Mortensen (G.I. Jane, Carlito's Way)
Christopher Lee (Aw yeah, baby!)

Review: by Melissa (e-mail your faithful reviewer)

When I watched this film, I had already been awake for 28 hours, living off of nothing other than a couple slices of pizza, a bag of Jelly Bellies, and some odd mix of Fruity Pebbles and Apple Jacks. Really, I should have been dead to the world.

Instead, I was wide awake, drooling like the slavish Peter Jackson worshipper that I am. I should make a shrine. Dedicate a church. Something. The Church of Peter Jackson. I kick ass for the Lord!

So, is Two Towers good?

Like you had to ask.

This film opens with a pulse-pounding sequence that clobbers you over the head like a gold brick laced in Balrog flames. Then you get up off the floor and beg for more of it.

And, baby, this film delivers.

Where Fellowship was a drama leading into battle, Two Towers is the biblical-scale carnage that follows. You have never seen anything like the sheer enormousness of this movie. The action is downright breathtaking. The effects, sets, and production design is flawless. For three hours, you are swept away into Middle Earth. And at the end, you still beg for the final three hours... which you will have to wait another year for. Sublime agony!

Basically, The Two Towers picks up exactly where Fellowship left off. No recap, nothing. If you haven't seen Fellowship yet (have you been living in a cave?!?), you had better see it before you embark on the second installment of the series. There is no forgiveness for people who missed out on the first film.

From an amazing pre-credit sequence that follows Gandalf down that pit in Moria, the film takes off in three different directions. The first plot follows Pippin and Merry as they are carried off by the Uruk-hai; the second follows Aragorn, Gimli, and Legolas as they try to track Pippin and Merry; and the third follows Frodo and Sam on their way to Mordor. This split in the plot lines is the only major weakness of the film, which was inherited from the book. Jackson handles the concurrent story lines with great skill, but it's very difficult indeed to make a solid film that both begins and ends in the middle of the story. He does succeed in weaving a magnificent film, but it does make The Two Towers just a little weaker than Fellowship in the story department.

As for the character department, The Two Towers is also a little behind Fellowship in some ways. You don't get a whole lot of additional development on the established characters, with the exception of the hobbits. However, where Fellowship's job was to establish these people, The Two Towers' job was to move them into action. Plus, the solid introduction of a few new characters -- including a CGI Gollum and an amazing Brad Dourif as Wormtongue -- just indicates that Jackson's focus has just shifted to events at hand.

The effects are amazing, as expected... an example of effects that are both well used and well executed. Gollum, who could have easily fallen into the Jar-Jar Binks trap, is actually a convincing CGI creation. While you can still tell he is generated by a computer, there are times that he really seems to blur the line between computer image and reality. Plus, the role is well written, very well voiced, and, at times, utterly convincing and heartbreaking.

Aside from Gollum, you really can't tell what's CGI and what's not. It's bloody amazing.

And the action? Wow. Just... wow. Perfectly paced. Perfectly filmed. Logical. Believable. Scary. Awesome, in the truest dictionary sense of the word.

I really can't think of enough praises to shower upon this movie. Go see it. The rabid fans are right. GO SEE IT.

Besides, it's got ents. You like ents.