Quick Review: ‘The Lord of the Rings: War of the Rohirrim’

Directed by Kenji Kamiyama

Warner Brothers and New Line Cinema return to Middle-Earth in Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim. Kenji Kamiyama directs an animated journey through Rohan focusing on Helm Hammerhand and his daughter, princess Hera.

The sights of animated versions of Edoras and Helm’s Deep, as well as the sounds of the original score and Miranda Otto’s voice were heavily featured in the trailers and are present in the movie to attempt to recall nostalgic memories from the cinematic trilogy, with Peter Jackson returning as an executive producer as well.

But, as the movie progresses and takes off, Kamiyama focuses on an original story revolving around a feud between Helm and the antagonist, Wulf. It feels like your generic medieval story of a noble feud. The king has a daughter. One leader of a tribe from the land wants his son to marry the king’s daughter. The king refuses thus starting the feud and leading to a battle at the end. It is a story that assuredly has been told, or similarly told, in thousands of movies and animated movies before, and unfortunately it does not enhance the plot at all.

The real central focus of this movie is princess Hera. The creators of this movie try to make her character do it all as she is involved in the diplomatic hierarchy and decisions of Rohan, becomes their de facto leader, and, becomes their most fearless warrior. While there is really only one time in the movie that Hera says that she is the princess and she should be able to decide for herself who she should marry, there is an underlying tone throughout the movie catering to the modern feminist sentiment that a woman can and should do anything and everything just to prove that she can. In that sense, it feels like this movie caters to those people, the “girl-power feminists”, with their attempt to make so much of the focus of this movie about her. With Lord of the Rings in the title, and these previous points in mind, one can only wonder what the original creator of these characters, J.R.R. Tolkien would think of this character. Is this character that they have decided to spotlight for this movie resemble any Tolkien character at all?

The Lord of the Rings; The War of the Rohirrim focuses on a generic plot that seems to only circumstantially take place in Rohan. The very fact that this is a Lord of the Rings film is the most intriguing aspect, but merely setting this story in a familiar place and making such a drastic change to a character that seems so distant from a Tolkien character is certainly a bold move. There is such a standard of excellence and an expectation of greatness with any Lord of the Rings film, especially one that Peter Jackson is involved in and has a hand in creating. While this movie tries, maybe that expectation is unrealistic to expect to ever achieve again.