I remember when I first saw the movies I was quite young, and didn't think them so bad, having not read the book for quite a while (I had lost it). But my mind remembered very clearly the final scene, how Gollum just falls over the edge.
In the movie it is exactly the same to that point, Gollum incapacitates Sam, goes after Frodo, who has done everything pretty much accurate to the book (apart from the much-needed "If you touch me again you shall be cast yourself into the Fire of Doom" but nevermind) and I felt the horror at Frodo's finger bitten off.
Right now Gollum is right over the edge, bending backwards, ring in hand, totally distracted, the exact moment when I thought with two minds:
Alright, now Gollum's just going to fall off, just like the book. Awesome!
and
Please please PLEASE don't stuff up now!!
And he doesn't fall off, and there's this Hollywood-made last battle between Frodo and Gollum. It killed me twice before I hit the ground.
The first mind thought 'Aw man, it didn't happen like the book', whereas the second mind thought, 'Oh God, they stuffed it up, nooooo'. Luckily this was stifled by the 'tension' of Frodo reaching out to Sam. But wouldn't it have been great if he HAD just fallen off, complete anticlimax, like a couple of trains dodging each other after playing chicken?
<sigh> It still gets me, that scene.
