ABSTRACT
Although neither contemporary critical reception nor posterity (nor, come to that, the box office) has been kind to Ralph Bakshi’s animated film J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings which misleadingly claims the title of the entire work but offers an adaptation of only The Fellowship of the Ring and about two thirds of The Two Towers the film is at least historically important as the first theatrical feature to eventuate from the rights deal Tolkien signed in 1967 with United Artists.
