The Lord of the Rings The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)

“Jackson has translated the best-loved fantasy novel of our age into a commanding screen adventure, one with a sense of human terror and danger and grit under its nails...” Andrew O’Hehir, Sight & Sound, 2002 Part one in a three-film adaptation of novelist J.R.R. Tolkien’s trilogy The Lord of the Rings, The Fellowship of the Ring is set in the fantasy world of Middle-earth. Sticking closely to Tolkien’s plot, it revolves around the attempt by an assorted group of elves, men, dwarves and hobbits to destroy a magic ring whose power the wizard Sauron seeks for evil ends. Shot in New Zealand back to back with its subsequent sequels, The Fellowship of the Ring was a hugely ambitious gamble that paid off. A landmark production, it marked a big advance in the integration of live action and computer-generated imagery, but at its heart was the robust, muscular and compelling storytelling style of director Peter Jackson, which ensured a big audience returned for the second instalment the following year. Before advances in CGI made possible the idea of a (largely) live-action Lord of the Rings only animation had been able to capture Tolkien’s vision, in Ralph Bakshi’s 1978 cartoon version.