The Lord Of The DVD’s
Peter Jackson’s classic “The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring” is also coming out today. Jackson has extended his thrilling fantasy epic by 30 minutes and offered the new 208-minute version in a remarkable four-disc box set, the widescreen only Platinum Series Extended Edition.
This version does not replace the two-disc set released Aug. 6, which is the only place on DVD you can see the original theatrical release intact. Also, the original extras — including a teaser for the release of the next instalment, The Two Towers — are substantially different.
Now, with five new scenes and 20 others with added bits of footage, the film is rich and fuller and more beautiful and absolutely exhausting (in this case, that’s wonderful).
A HUGE peeve is that the film is abruptly split with one half on disc one and the rest on disc two. The exact moment of this pause could have been better chosen. In teh end, it reminded me of having to flip a laserdisc (remember those?).
Everything else here is classy and unbelievably generous. There are four different commentaries involving 22 crew members and 10 star actors. All have useful Surtitles indicating who is talking.
Then, on discs three and four, ace DVD producer-director Michael Pellerin organizes six hours of documentary materials, plus 2,500 still images and another 75 minutes of on-set video footage.
The offerings include creative bonuses such as the active Middle-earth map that, with film clips, lets us follow both Frodo and Gandalf on their great adventures. The only thing missing is a character-by-character analysis and family trees that would help newbies figure this thing out.
So enjoy the pleasure of your own living room, and the movies!
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