On Boxing Day I went to see The Return of the King in Bendigo with my cousins and family. I had gone into it expecting it to be the best film ever, but it isn't. It's good though, and quite a feat when you think about how wrong the whole adaptation could have gone in a different time and in different hands without such a great commitment to the enterprise and the detail and the characters and stuff. Still, all during the screening I kept being assaulted by bad smells. The audience's bowels were percolating post-Christmas dinner/grog, or something. Phew. And the end was quite protracted, which is in itself true to the book, but you're like, "go away Frodo". It was very much like the book actually, and I kept thinking, "oh, I've seen this before", but only because it followed the story of the book quite correctly, which isn't a bad thing. Gollum was adorable as always, and I think he should get more credit than he is given for saving the world from darkness. Frodo wouldn't have got far without him, either. And Aragorn was so lovely [swoon] if a bit too clean by the end. And it was cool to see that Brett guy from the great NZ comedy duo, Flight of the Conchords [who were a highlight of the Melbourne Comedy Festival earlier this year], in a tiny one-line speaking role, all dolled up as an elf. God that guy is a genius. I'm pretty sure it was him. Man, I can't wait for the Comedy Festival to roll around. I think it should happen twice a year, at a minimum, though. That would be seriously sweet. So, thumbs up to the the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. You can't really be disappointed or critical about it when so much work went into it. And it is of a much higher quality than most other epic films. So, yeah. Good on it. And that Aragorn sure is a keeper. He just needs someone to rub some dirt into his hair. Mmmmm.