1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die- The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King

#1022- The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
Starring: Elijah Wood, Ian McKellen, Viggo Mortensen
Directed by: Peter Jackson


Plot Summary: The quest for the Ring will come to an end as Frodo and Sam get closer to Mordor. Their friendship will be tested, however, as a treacherous Gollum plans to turn Frodo against Sam and lead Frodo into a trap in order to get the Ring back. Meanwhile, Aragorn, heir to the throne of Gondor, must accept his destiny and assume his true role, as king. Help comes to Frodo and Sam in the form of Aragorn and company, who plan to fight Sauron's forces in order to buy the hobbits more time to get to Mount Doom and destroy the Ring.


After sitting through The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers, with a combined total of 6 hours, moviegoers were hoping that The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King would not disappoint as a conclusion to the trilogy. How did it do? Well, it won an Academy Award in EVERY category it was nominated for and holds the record for largest number of wins in an Oscar sweep, with 11. With a track record like that, many would probably consider it the best movie in the trilogy. I appreciate the entire trilogy so it is hard for me to say one stands out above the other two, but rather consider these three films come together as one gigantic movie. But I will say that The Return of the King is a very satisfying conclusion to The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

Aragorn, played by Viggo Mortensen, is the titular character of The Return of the King. Mortensen has a difficult task of playing a version of Aragorn that fans of the books are not familiar with. Peter Jackson wrote this Aragorn with an internal conflict to make him a more interesting character with an actual story arc. Aragorn's conflict is that he is afraid to become the king of Gondor because of the mistake of his ancestor. The Return of the King is where Aragorn must accept his destiny and take a commanding role as a leader in battle. I've always felt that Aragorn was one of the best characters to watch in the action scenes because I love good sword choreography. Aragorn has always been one of my favorite characters in The Lord of the Rings because of his skills in battle, his leadership, and his wise demeanor, qualities that are very befitting of a great king.

Despite being the main character, Frodo is not the character with the most growth by the end of the films. His companion Sam, played by Sean Astin, starts the trilogy as Frodo's gardener, who lives a very safe and cautious lifestyle. As the journey progresses, so does Sam's courage and his friendship with Frodo. Astin is able to portray Sam as the most human of the characters, making him the character audiences could relate to the most. A theme in The Lord of the Rings concerning the hobbits is that they can do extraordinary things, despite their size. I feel that theme is present with all the hobbits, but is strongest with Sam, who represents an ordinary man, but is capable of doing extraordinary things. He's not the best fighter, nor is he the strongest physically, but Sam has the biggest heart and knows what he must do, and that is what makes Sam the most relatable, and my favorite character in The Lord of the Rings.

Sam isn't the only hobbit with massive character development in The Return of the King. Merry and Pippin, played by Dominic Monaghan and Billy Boyd respectively, start out the trilogy as an inseparable comic relief duo. By The Return of the King, they find themselves split up, Merry staying with Rohan and Pippin going with Gandalf to Minas Tirith. It is here where their true heroic qualities are formed. Merry is a little more brave than Pippin and wants to fight, but he is told he cannot because of his size, which makes Merry more determined to prove them wrong. Pippin feels more caught up in battle and does not want to be in a battle, but when he does fight, he proves to be a noble fighter. The Return of the King is great for Merry and Pippin because it gives the characters an extra layer to their depth, instead of just making them comedic.

The Return of the King does a great job of surpassing the other two movies in its grand scale of visuals. The scenery and battle sequences are created to look so epic, that Jackson and company needed to adapt new forms of technology in their special effects department. When you watch it on the big screen, you're blown away and go "Wow. How did they make that?" When you get the DVDs and see how they were able to make one shot of the final film, you are still left blown away by the time and effort put into making the shot. I look at the different stages that were needed to make just one shot of a film, then compare it to the final product, and I'm left in amazement of how they were able to create it through special effects and still make it look like it was real. I'm a big special features fan on DVDs, and I feel the bonus features on the Extended Cut of The Return of the King add to the epic scale of the movie by going as in depth as they can to show us how they made the movie.

Director Peter Jackson's involvement in the trilogy should also be observed. A fan of Tolkien's work growing up, Jackson patiently waited for the day when someone would adapt The Lord of the Rings to film. Fate would have it that HE would be the one responsible for making the film adaptation of The Lord of the Rings. What makes his involvement great is that he is not only observing it as a filmmaker, but also as a moviegoer and as a fan of the books. Peter Jackson made sure to observe the work of every aspect of the film, including acting, special effects, music, editing and much more, to make sure the film was cohesive in all areas to the vision he had for Middle-earth. Many of the crew members said that Jackson's approach to making the trilogy was one of the most difficult efforts that no director should try when making a film, but his efforts paid off as he is responsible for creating arguably the greatest motion picture trilogy of all time.


Rating:  5 out of 5 stars.

If you've made it through the first two, there is no reason to skip the third. The Return of the King brings the journey to an end that should be very satisfying for moviegoers. I recommend seeing and owning the concluding chapter in the trilogy, making The Lord of the Rings the first film series I would fully recommend to all fans of film.

Comment below to share your thoughts on the movie or to discuss a topic that I left out of my review 

The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King and movie images are copyrighted by New Line Cinema