The Lord of The Rings: The Two Towers: Critic Reviews

A visual pageant of sorcery and action, all but surpasses The Fellowship of the Ring.

The most incredible accomplishment of Towers is that at its heart it is a transition film that lasts nearly three hours and holds the viewer's attention.

It's been a very watchable, distinctive, if over-extended FX spectacular. Nothing more.

Epic battles, spectacular effects and multiple story lines make The Two Towers a most excellent middle chapter in The Lord of the Rings film trilogy.

One fabulous Middle-earth show.

Convincing, gripping, whole and nourishing.

George Lucas should watch this and hang his head in shame.

Fans of the first movie will not be disappointed; neophytes may find the endless mixing it up with digital hordes a bit wearisome, even if the combatants are horrific hyena-riding orcs.

Though Frodo's quest remains unfulfilled, a hardy group of determined New Zealanders has proved its creative mettle.

Not since Japanese filmmaker Akira Kurosawa's Ran have the savagery of combat and the specter of death been visualized with such operatic grandeur.

What Jackson has accomplished here is amazing on a technical level.

This second installment in the trilogy ends with Gandalf intoning that the battle for Middle-Earth is about to begin. I'm pumped.

It is not faithful to the spirit of Tolkien and misplaces much of the charm and whimsy of the books, but it stands on its own as a visionary thriller.

Peter Jackson and company once again dazzle and delight us, fulfilling practically every expectation either a longtime Tolkien fan or a movie-going neophyte could want.

More graphic in its violence and more fantastic in its imaginings than the first film.

Though Jackson doesn't always succeed in integrating the characters in the foreground into the extraordinarily rich landscape, it must be said that he is an imaginative filmmaker who can see the forest for the trees.

Once again, director Jackson strikes a rewarding balance between emotion on the human scale and action/effects on the spectacular scale.

Jackson has accomplished the near-impossible, surpassing the first chapter - The Fellowship of the Ring - with a sweeping, visually magnificent work of epic proportions.

Has a sharper narrative focus and a livelier sense of forward movement than did the more episodic Fellowship.

An amazing feat of imagination.

The first film was good. The Two Towers ... is much better.

This is what the fans were really waiting for when they envisioned Tolkien's world on film.

The Two Towers is both a triumph of design and cinematic engineering and, at the same time, long, repetitious and naive.

Yes, there are some 'middle-chapter' problems, but Peter Jackson's Tolkien adaptation hasn't lost its devastating humanity, its heart-stopping cinematography or its epic sweep.