So, I took the time this morning to watch The Hunt for Gollum. For those who haven't heard, it's a fan-produced 40-min internet film that follows the hunt for Gollum just prior to the start of The Lord of the Rings. It's a low-budget, non-profit film that flirts with copyright laws.
Basically, my reaction is that it wasn't bad - especially with the budget they were working with. I'm not one of those Tolkien fans who can quote the Silmarillion and speak elvish, so I can't really comment to how accurate it was, but it seemed pretty good. I think that they may have tried to piggy-back too closely to the movies, but I'm not sure they had a choice with that. In my opinion, the weakness was the fight scenes - they tried to get around a low-budget look, but didn't quite pull it off. Oh, and the sound through my computer was pretty weak.
But, it was 40-min of decent entertainment, and I can't argue with that.
EDIT: It looks like there is more to come - this fall is Born of Hope, another story of the Rangers.