OK, so the puffy version of Two Towers is mind; since I watched it last night I figured I'd say a few words regarding the now 3h45m version of it...

3H45M!!!!! That's counting the credits but NOT the fan credits. The second disc is actually 2 hours in of itself, then the first disc is 1h47m or so. So it's actually a tad longer, but past a certain point, who's counting. It's safely over 3.5 hours, exceeding seven samurai (I don't remember the running time on 10 commandments, but clearly, it its whole, LOTR is going to be the longest movie ever.)

Some of the extra footage was rather nice, and it's seemlessly incorporated. I kinda feel the same way I felt after seeing this film the first time though. Obviously its a middle film, and there's a lot of things we'll need when 7 hours deep into a movie that seem rather poor when viewed as though its a stand-alone movie. The obvious things--the dwarf somehow just became comic relief (though John Rhys-Davies role in Raiders of the Lost Ark was hardly more than that...), and now we have two scenes where characters fall off cliffs and are presumed dead (but then come back later). More than this stuff though, I am still resolved that this film just feels a bit messy, but am confident when the whole thing is finished, this middle chapter will fall into place and make sense. There's still plenty of fantastic scenes in Two Towers--even while they jump back and forth not entirely unlike a star wars film. Arowen's vision of the future is still quite powerful, and Golem is still the best CGI character ever. I think the costumes worked even better this time 'round, while my first viewing left me a little dissapointed--some of the orcs looked a little too human (and they certainly do look more human after seeing some of the creatures in Fellowship), but this is on a much more massive scale with hundreds of costumed freaks running around--and most often this is done to perfection. For instance, I was reall happy how when the urak-hi (or whatever their names are) were screaming at the people they wanted to eat, their jaws extended abnormally low making them look pretty monstorous. So I guess all is well in this department.

Anyway, another month until the third installment...then I guess the unity that's held everyone together since the first installment will diminish and we'll each go back to our respective camps, watching our own respective movies. Guy movies. Girl movies. Adult movies. Kid movies. It will probably be a long time before another movie brings everyone together for three years...now if Peter Jackson would just get around to making Dead Alive 2!

Chris

Thanks for the review Chris! If you would like me to copy and paste your e-mail, drop me a line at gleep9@hotmail.com. If you're done gorging at the trough of LotR, head on back to either the Third Movie or Main page.