HP is epic, but with some borrowing

I won't lie. I was really impressed by Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1. I mean, I've only been anticipating its release for months now. And it delivered. My blood pressure remained unhealthily high throughout the film (always ready for something to jump out and scare the living daylights out of me), and after 2 and a half hours of Potter, I left the theater feeling rather winded and exhausted. As fantastic as the film was, however, I thought that it had quite a lot of...overlap with the Lord of the Rings film trilogy. Like, a questionable amount of overlap.

TWO THUMBS UP, DUH.

Similarities between HP7 and Lord of the Rings

• Barren scenery with lush mountains in the distance
• Rapid switches between loud music and jolts of silence
• Flashes to scenes that are not really explained or played out in full
• Flashes of a great wizard falling down, down, down  
• Musical score -- not the same, but containing a lot of the same thematic motifs and elements (except for the music of the final scene, which sounded a lot like the Pirates of the Caribbean theme song in a different key)
• In the characters' search to destroy an evil object, they wear it on a chain around their neck and become corrupted and weakened by its power
• Elves are supercool

So.Much.Intensity.

Harry and Hermione on their way to Mordor?