I had never seen this movie before and my first time watching it was in a marathon of the trilogy, each extended to about a four hour runtime. I've only watched a few movies that skew into the four hour mark and they almost all feel like they could've been shortened by half of their runtime. Surprisingly 'Fellowship of the Ring' not only isn't a waste of time, but I struggle to understand how it wasn't four hours originally. Every second of the film is utilized in a seamless way that doesn't damper or drag the film down, but engages and builds the world these characters exist in. You're constantly enamored by the set pieces and locations these characters go to that you forget this movie was made in 2001, somehow rivaling current Marvel movies 20 years later. Every character in the main group serves their purposes in the story and not a single character feels out of place, underutilized or like they don't belong in this traveling group, reminding me of a Dungeons and Dragon campaign that you are playing with your friends. The only real negative is that the villain of this film doesn't demand much of a presence beyond being the evil Gandalf and its hard to take some moments seriously when I've seen them thousands of times in memes and parodies, not that that detracted from the film, more so just took away from serious moments. This is one of those once in a lifetime films you should consider giving a watch, even if you don't watch the next two, 'Fellowship of the Ring' has a great mix of story, characters and world building that will keep you engaged to end credits.