It's been so long since I've read or re-read those books that I wasn't really aware of the changes. The confrontation at the waterfall did seem awkward, but not gratingly so. Anita and I just came away with a consensus that the movie felt right, and I could feel subsconscious bursts of delighted, awed recognition as it progressed. I didn't end up shedding tears as I did after the first viewing of Fellowship of the Ring, but it was close.

It fascinates me how fantasy stories, or at least the demonstrably popular ones, are receiving such reverent treatment by the movies, while beloved sf tales suffer one indignity after another (I, Robot?).

I first saw Tilda Swinton in The Deep End. She has a chilly role there of a different sort.