My Review of "Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Rings (Extended Edition)"

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Rings (Extended Edition) is a movie I never thought I'd ever watch. I loved the Lord of the Rings movies and have watched them several times. The runtime alone on the theatrical releases are pretty darn long. To think I would be watching an extended edition that includes over half an hour of new footage was not in my cards. You never say never though because I finally took the plunge.

This movie starts off different right off the bat. The narration that I'm used to starts off the movie. It basically gets us up to speed as to why there is a ring and how this whole craziness starts. What's different is the extra scenes with Bilbo Baggins. He's basically starting to write his book The Hobbit.

After so many years and watching the Lord of the Rings trilogy as well as the Hobbit trilogy I think I got a little more out of the opening of this movie. There's multiple references to the trolls that turned to stone in the Hobbit. I know it shouldn't blow my mind since the books were out decades prior to the movies but the details did kind of get to me. It was so beautiful how they had such attention to detail for things to come later on.

The basic catalyst to this story starts off where Bilbo is trying to get away for one last big adventure. He decides to do this on the night of his birthday. Knowing that he'll never come back to the Shire he wants to give all of his belongings and possessions to Frodo his nephew. He has no heirs or connections anymore but I guess Frodo is the closest family member he has.

In inheriting all of Bilbo's possessions Frodo also inherits a mysterious ring. You already know what ring this is. Gandalf the wizard is a close friend to hobbits in general and in particular Bilbo. He has suspicion that the ring is the evil ring that they talk about in the opening narration.

When everything turns out to be what Gandalf's suspects he assigns Frodo to go to Mordor to destroy the ring. Along the way to get the ring destroyed Frodo is accompanied by a slew of old and new friends who are considered the fellowship of the ring.

That's basically the gist of the story in this first movie. It is an introduction to our heroes and villains. There are a ton of characters and it's hard to keep track if you're starting off brand new. That's why I kind of don't suggest watching this extended edition if you're a new viewer. Some of these side characters in this extended edition do not really have a huge impact on the main story. However they do have small roles in the way each of the characters interact with one another.

Most of the extended scenes that were added to this extended edition flesh out a lot more of the minor characters in the movie. We get to see their internal struggles and motivations. In some ways it builds more sympathy for them. For example we see the struggle with Boromir and how he has to constantly fight the desire of taking the ring from Frodo.

You'll also get a lot more fast montages of the scenery that our adventurers have to trudge through. Many of these montages are absolutely stunning. They basically make it feel as though you're watching a beautiful moving painting.

Lord of the Rings feels like the changing of the guard in terms of old school film making versus new school filmmaking. We see a lot of old school transitions from scene to scene. There are a lot of fade out and fade in scenes. At times they would place gorgeous paintings in the background instead of CGI although there is a lot of CGI. It just feels like the best of both worlds.

I think they have a ton of great discussions in this movie. We see that everyone is different in middle earth and no path is wrong. We have a lot of people that are happy with their family life but then we have adventurers like Bilbo and Gandalf who life a life of solitude. Even though they decide to live their lives of solitude they're still happy with the adventures they get themselves into. Everyone in this movie basically lead satisfying lives.

They do address the ego in each one of these characters though. Humans, dwarves and elves all have egos. Hobbits don't really don't really have huge egos. It says in Bilbo's introduction that they only really care about eating, drinking and smoking. They live simple lives. Then why would you get a hobbit to destroy the ring rather than a dwarf, elf or human?

Well that's the thing the ring represents power and wealth. It thrives off of the greed of the individual wielding it. Luckily hobbits don't have as much of that as the other races. This makes me think wow what the movie is really saying is that no one is insignificant. Everyone has a role in doing even the most important of tasks. You see all though Frodo is simply a lowly hobbit he's also tasked to destroy the ring. He could never do it without the assistance of his other hobbit friends.

It's such a deep movie that you can take so much out of this movie. This is also probably the first time we have two chosen characters that have to fulfill their destinies. We have Frodo that has to destroy the ring but then we also have Aragon who is heir to Gondor. He's supposed to lead the humans but he's reluctant to take his place on the throne. Probably because he doesn't want to follow the footsteps of his disgraced ancestor who didn't destroy the ring in the first place.

Then again in this movie it mentions that Elrond was there at Mordor and he just simply let the humans walk away from throwing the ring into the fires of Mordor. I'm like why didn't you fight him and throw the thing into the fire? I'm sure he could have easily out power him. I don't know, just go with the story.

So it's weird having two chosen ones having their stories play out in parallel with one another. It is an epic movie and there is a ton to analyze. I think that's why people can go back to the books and the movie so many times.

Overall, I really loved this extended edition. I really think that newcomers should watch the original theatrical trailer first though. This extended edition is more for people that have seen all of the movies already. There's just a ton of information in this movie that could be overwhelming for newcomers. That being said if you're a fan of the franchise you have to see this film. I have to give it an 8.5 out of 10. It is just as great as the first time I had watched the movies in the theatres.