Return of the King triumphant in poll

Published on Thursday 23 December 2004 01:34

MOVIEGOERS have voted the final instalment of the Lord of the Rings trilogy best film of the year.

The Return of the King topped the BBC’s Film 2005 poll of the year last night, adding to the plethora of awards and titles the movie has received over the past 12 months, including 11 Academy Awards.

The result completes a clean sweep for director Peter Jackson, as the two previous films in the trilogy, The Two Towers and The Fellowship Of The Ring, also took the title in 2002 and 2003.

The chart also reflected the popularity among Film 2004’s viewers of smaller, less commercial titles. Taking second place was Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind, starring Kate Winslet and Jim Carrey, which, despite its A-list stars, was an off-beat film concerning the erasing of painful memories from Carrey’s character.

Winslet appeared again at number three with Finding Neverland, the biopic of Peter Pan creator JM Barrie in which she appeared with Johnny Depp.

Another critical success was Lost In Translation, a quirky, low-key film which starred Bill Murray, of Ghostbusters and Groundhog Day fame, and Scarlett Johansson as two lonely people visiting Japan, brought together by shared jet-lagged insomnia and existential crises.

Harry Potter And The Prisoner Of Azkaban was in fifth place.

There was also room in the top ten for a low-budget British hit and a foreign language film.

Shaun Of The Dead, the "romzomcom" (romantic comedy with zombies) written by and starring Simon Pegg, creator of the cult TV series Spaced, was sixth, and Chinese martial arts epic Hero, which grossed 77 million worldwide, was seventh.

The recent animated smash The Incredibles, blockbuster Spider-Man 2 and Tom Cruise thriller Collateral made up the top ten.