The Lord of the Rings The Two Towers (2002)

“With The Two Towers it seems very clear that we are in the midst of one of the great achievements in fantasy filmmaking.” Charles Taylor, salon.com, 2002 Picking up more or less directly where The Fellowship of the Ring ended, The Two Towers sees the group of heroes at the centre of the first film scattered across Middle Earth as a final confrontation with the evil wizard Sauron looms. The focus remains on the hobbit Frodo Baggins (Elijah Wood) and his attempt to destroy a powerful magic ring to end the power of Sauron. But director Peter Jackson deftly maintains interest in the film’s many subplots, following the members of the fellowship as they are involved in various battles and political intrigues to support Frodo’s quest. Culminating in the extended siege sequence at Helm’s Deep, the movie’s use of CGI is spectacular and on a grand scale. The visual effects won a deserved Oscar. Motion-capture technology allowed animators to model the lizard-like hobbit Gollum on a performance by Andy Serkis. Jackson repeated the process with Serkis to create the giant ape in King Kong (2005).