Yesterday was our anniversary, so Madeline and I finally got to go out and see The Return of the King. (No, that wasn’t all we did; we did go to Masa’s the night before.) When one’s expectations are so high, the movie is bound to disappoint — which it didn’t, as it exceeded them and more. Absolutely amazing. (I read the books when I was in high school and all I could remember from the last book was the spider — couldn’t even remember whether Frodo made it out alive.)

Favorite moments off the top of my head:

- Andy Serkis in the flesh.

- The “helicopter shot” of Gandalf, Pippin and Shadowfax riding up the levels of Minas Tirith.

- “Sneaking? Sneaking?”

- The lighting of the beacons.

- The scene when Hugo Weaving presents Aragorn with the reforged sword. (Madeline had to chuckle, though, when the camera pans lovingly up and down the blade.)

- Eowyn pulling off her helmet.

- Legolas surfing down the elephant trunk.

- Shelob wrapping up Frodo in a cocoon. (I honestly thought he was dead.)

- “Don’t go where I can’t follow.” (Sentimental fool that I am, I almost lost it on that one.)

- Frodo and Sam, holding each other on the rock surrounded by lava, “at the end of all things.”

- “My friends, you bow to no one.”

- Elijah Wood, looking like he stepped out of a Caravaggio painting, boarding the ship.

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