A wonderful film, bursting at the seams with action, adventure, a staggering battle scene, and enough sad emotional scenes to milk tears from a thousand cynics.
Comment
12/17/03
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
94
%
Tomatometer
How does the Tomatometer work 
Reviews Counted:232
Fresh:218
Rotten:14
Average Rating:8.6/10
Consensus: A moving and satisfying conclusion to a great trilogy.
Runtime: 4 hrs 10 mins
Genre: Science-Fiction/Fantasy
US Box Office: $376,958,965
Synopsis: THE RETURN OF THE KING, the third and final film in Peter Jackson's THE LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy, finds Middle-earth on the cusp of great change. Weary hobbits Frodo (Elijah Wood) and Sam (Sean... [More]
Starring: Elijah Wood, Viggo Mortensen, Ian McKellen, Sean Astin
Director: Peter Jackson
Reviews for The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
121 - 140 (sorted by date; Australian critics are listed first)
A movie for our time, perhaps for all time, mostly a good time and definitely a long time.
12/17/03
An excellent conclusion and a triumph of filmmaking, this journey may be at an end -- oh boy, what a way to go.
12/17/03
Top CriticIt reminds you of the power of film like no other movie in memory.
12/17/03
Even the weakest of these movies is head-and-shoulders above the vast majority of films churned out these days.
12/17/03
I went along with the first and admired the second, but it wasn't until the third that I was swept away by the magnitude of Jackson's vision.
12/17/03
Confirms Jackson's reputation as a kinetic director who has made author J.R.R. Tolkien's work his own -- not as plagiarist but as a visionary.
12/17/03
Despite maddening liberties and narrative asymmetry, Return works well enough on its own terms of rousing, whistle-stop spectacle.
12/17/03
Return of the King is such a crowning achievement, such a visionary use of all the tools of special effects, such a pure spectacle, that it can be enjoyed even by those who have not seen the first two films.
12/17/03
Top CriticI didn't know movies could get this big.
12/17/03
Still a pretty stirring epic and is a worthy conclusion to the saga.
12/17/03
ROTK would never be classified as a horror film, but it certainly is a deep-dark fantasy, and it's more scary and edge-of-the-seat than any horror movie I have seen all year.
12/17/03
Excellent as they may be, the first two films are really opening acts for Return of the King, which expertly knocks down all the pins set up for it.
12/17/03
With a sweeping narrative, mind-blowing battle sequences and gut-wrenching performances, could there be a grander finale to a classic epic? Not in this millennium.
12/17/03
Epic filmmaking in the achievement scales of Ben-Hur, Gone with the Wind and Lawrence of Arabia.
12/17/03
Each character captures our attention by plunging us so deep into this fantasy story that a restroom break is unthinkable -- even in a three-hour movie.
12/17/03
Is a seriously flawed piece of work that is missing that certain element called "believability." It's visual eye candy without the chocolate center.
12/17/03
A profound testament to the extraordinary power of moving images and sound.
12/17/03
In other words, it's exactly like the last picture - only bigger and louder. And there's more of it... It ain't deep, but it sure is wide.
12/17/03
The Return of the King is one of the finest things I've ever seen. And that includes stuff like sunrises and babies and the original, unaltered Star Wars.
12/17/03
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March 27, 2008:
Ian McKellen Is Not Too Busy for The Hobbit
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January 14, 2008:
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