I’m always torn. I really enjoy these movies, but I sometimes wish that they’d stayed closer to the books; on the other hand, that would have made six to nine hours per movie. Maybe it’ll be a miniseries some day.
Spoilers? Here’s a spoiler: Sauron loses! Seriously, it’s hard to imagine what would be a spoiler for a book many viewers have read more than once. On the other hand, there’s lots of stuff that was done differently in the movie than in the book, which might surprise people. For instance, who woulda thunk that Ewoks would play such a crucial role in the third movie of the series? Oh, wait. That was something else.
Amusingly, I accidentally read the books in the time leading up to the movie. I forgot that the movie was coming up, but a while back, I read the Hobbit, and then I was working my way through the books; I’m just about at the end of the third book, and it turns out it’s movie time.
Fun movie, lots of cool scenery. I thought it was a bit too loud; they could have turned the volume down about 5dB and not bothered me any.
See it as a matinee; not that it’s not a good movie, but movies are way overpriced these days.