I went last night.
Ruth said that at the end a big hairy biker bloke next to her was crying his eyes out, but she didn't dare offer him a tissue!

I agree about the scouring of the Shire not being necessary. In the mirror of Galadriel it was only hinted at as something that may come to pass. Also, if you look as Frodo is completing his writing of Bilbo's book, there is a reference to Sam becoming mayor in the paragraph above the last one. Maybe that will make it into the extended edition.

I think that given the magnitude of the project, Peter Jackson has done a wonderful job. With something like this, you can't keep everybody happy all the time, but somebody has to be brave enough to make cuts and adaptations. Let's face it, you are dealing with cinema, and not everything makes a direct transfer from the page, and good cinema. It is also going to be viewed by people who have never been near any of Tolkein's works, and so it can't get too involved, otherwise it would lose its audience.

I was pleased to see that the Pelennor fields were almost exactly as my mind had seen them. I haven't read the book for about 3 years or more, and I purposely kept off it while I was waiting to see the films, because I wanted to take them at face value and not be too picky. Now I will go and read the book again and see whether it's me or Peter Jackson who provides the imagery!

Yes, we enjoyed the film. I daresay it won't be long before we go again and look at it in a bit more depth. I didn't notice Peter Jackson's cameo in this one, although he got his kids in 3 times by my count! They even get a mention as "featured children" on the credits.

Andrea

Anyone else think Billy Boyd's song rather good? If I remember from one of the pre-release interviews on TV, he wrote it too.