The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)

	Also Known As: -
	Year of first release: 2002
	Director: Peter Jackson (Bad Taste, The Feebles, The Hobbit 1-3)
	Actors: Elijah Wood (Maniac, Open Windows), Ian McKellen (X-men), Orlando Bloom (Pirates of the Carribean 1-3), Sean Astin (The Goonies), Viggo Mortensen (A History of Violence)
	Country: USA, NZ
	Genre: Fantasy, Epic
	Conditions of visioning: 22.01.2015, Blu-ray, Home cinema
Synopsis: Frodo (Wood) and Sam (Astin) moving towards Mordor encounter Gollum, while Aragorn (Mortensen), Legolas (Bloom) and Gimli enter Rohan.
Review: This second movie of the Trilogy was a difficult exercise, lacking the introductory scenes of the first and the conclusion of the third, and is considered as the weakest. But watching it again, I realized that I liked it better than the first! I attribute this to the first encounter with the kingdoms of men (the Rohirrim horsemen and the people of Edoras) to which I could better identify, and in particular their king Theoden played by Bernard Hill who delivers for me the best acting performance of all the stars in the three movies. I find the scene in which he regains his strength the strongest one of the movie, surpassing in intensity even the climax. Acting aside, I can also praise the quality of the editing, a most complex job knowing that we follow many different groups of character and that at no moment the viewer is disturbed by the changes, remind me of such a difficult exercise in Cloud Atlas. This dispersion (already present of course in the original books) is very well illustrated in that chart on the xkcd website. The ending is definitely epic and together with hints in the last quarter of the movie (Faramir, Gollum, Saruman, war with Orcs) places the viewer in just the right mood for watching The Return of the King.
Rating: 8/10