Mooters' RotK reviews

[Nurvingiel]

This is certainly is a excellent point in favour of the movies. They did make the books more accessible to people. (This doesn't change the fact that there are a lot of needless changes, but it does make up for them a bit.)

Food for thought:

"[The scriptwriter has added] a great many Eagles, not to mention incantations, blue lights, and some irrelevant magic... He has cut the parts of the story upon which its characteristic and peculiar tone principally depends, showing a preference for fights..."
-J.R.R. Tolkien, commenting on M.G. Zimmerman's
(thankfully unproduced) film treatment of Lord of the Rings
(Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien, #210).

An excellent review of Ralph Bakshi's "Lord of the Rings", found here, made me think of interesting parallel's between Bakshi and Jackson's versions, such as a tendency to rely on battles to carry the movie, and issues with character development.