Very interesting post, Asliann! One thing you noted caught my eye in particular:

While male characters seem forever torn between good and evil, the only women we see are beacons of virtue.

That is sooooo 19th-century Victorian, and I think there is that aspect to Tolkein's writing; you find it in his distaste for the ugliness of factories, his "golden age" memories of a quieter, less industrial time, and certainly in his portrayal of women - Pure Dickens.

I don't think we have to apologize for Tolkein - he's a man of his time, and in his time, that whole theory that women embody the best human characteristics while violent men, although courageous, often embody the worst - well, he was just writing within the confines of his culture. If we go looking for a man writing about women as equal to men, we won't find him until, maybe, 25 years ago.

Anyway, his warrior culture just didn't make much room for women. But I thought Jackson did a marvelous job emphasizing, where he rationally could, the importance of women to the story.