omorka | The World's Silliest Nitpick:

So, in the climactic scene of Return of the King, Gollum falls into the magma and is sucked down almost immediately. The One Ring floats on top of the lava for a few seconds until the intense heat melts it, and it becomes a swirl of molten gold.

Okay, it's the One Ring; it can maintain its integrity far longer than anything else subjected to that heat. And Gollum is so happy to have his Precious again that he forgets to scream when he hits the lava. I'll buy both of those, because of the way the Power of the Ring is portrayed.

But Gollum shouldn't sink until he struggles. Lava is a lot denser than any creature who can swim! So it should act like quicksand - he should float half-in and half-out of it unless he struggles and pulls himself down.

The ring, on the other hand, is heavy. Even Sam found it heavier than a ring of gold should be, and of everyone who bears the ring he's the least affected, so it's at least as heavy as the gold it's made of. Gold in its solid form is denser than rock in its liquid form. So that's gotta be some serious surface tension there, to hold it up until the Tengwar appears, much less until it actually melts.

Yeah, okay. I know. It's a fantasy movie, and it's more dramatic that way. It wouldn't be any fun for the audience to see Gollum roasted atop the lava - it's enough to make you feel sorry for him again when he sinks like a, well, something heavier than a stone. But the physics in Tolkien's universe, at least in the Third Age, usually doesn't suck (giant flying beasties excepted), and Peter Jackson was usually fairly careful about things not being ridiculous.

Oh, well. If I'm complaining about it this far after the movie came out, it can't have been that bad.