The books were great, the movies were even better. I've seen both, Lord of the Rings: Fellowship and Lord of the Rings: Two Towers, both movies were outstanding, yea the acting could of been better for a couple of the actors, but the screen effects, the story line and everything else is what made this movie(s) great.
But this realy isn't a movie for everyone, it sort of requries a certen 'taste' or 'liking', and it takes some understanding of the books and the story behind the author.
Mind you, like the books, there's 3 parts to Lord of the Rings. There's Fellowship of the Ring(came out Dec. 2001), then Two Towers(came out Dec. 2002), and Return of the King(due out Dec. 2003). You have to watch the first to understand the second one and so on. If you don't, you won't enjoy the movie(s).
I'm looking forward to watching Return of the King this dec., I heard it's the best one out of the three, and has more battle sences,
BTW, my favorite actor in the movie is Gandaf.