The Boston Globe has an article today about how this time next year, New Line Cinema/Features will probably release the first installment of the Lord of the Rings (The Fellowship of the Ring). In 2002, it will be The Two Towers and in 2003 it will be the Return of the King. The 3-film committment will cost $270 million (the most expensive movie deal ever).
Sir Ian McKellen will play Gandalf.
Sean Astin = Sam
Elijah Wood = Frodo
Dominic Monaghan = Merry
Billy Boyd = Pippin
Ian Holm = Bilbo
Liv Tyler = Arwen
Cate Blanchett = Galadriel
Viggo Mortenson = Aragorn
Location = New Zealand
The director is Peter Jackson (Heavenly Creatures)
Geez, Phobos, this is old news–where have you been?
Just teasing-there have been a few threads on this. I personally am looking forward to it because:
–Peter Jackson is a very clever and imaginative director;
–He has enormous experience melding live action with amazing special effects;
–He has a first-rate cast;
–He is filming all three at once, rather than risking Ralph Bakshi Syndrome.
I know he and the writers are making some minor plot changes, and a few major ones (no Tom Bombadil, for one thing), but I think that overall it will be a quality series of movies.
It’s going to be GREAT! It’s about time that Lord Of The Rings got the big-budget “Star Wars” style trilogy treatment. My daughter picked up on my excitement and read The Hobbit. Now she’s going to plunge into LOTR, and is looking forward to the movies. I can’t wait!
D’oh! Under a rock apparently (actually, a mound of diapers). I figured it would be old news once it hit the newspapers (I’m sure the sci-fi community heard about it a year or so ago) but I didn’t see any threads after a quick search.
To see just how good Peter Jackson is working with special effects that actually add to a story, look at his film “Heavenly Creatures,” about a muder in 1950’s New Zealand. Check out the fantasy sequences in that movie and you’ll be convinced he’s the right guy to direct “Lord of the Rings.” If anybody can do it (and I think we’ll all agree that it’s a huge undertaking) he can.
“Heavenly Creatures,” incidentaly, stars Kate Winslet in an early role, and is based on a real story about two young girls who may have been…erm…too close for their respective parents comfort. When the movie came out, soemone did some digging and found out that one of the girls had ended up back home in Britain and became the novelist Anne Perry. Unfortunate coincidence for Ms. Perry, as she was on a book tour of the USA at the time (she gave, as I remember, exactly one interview to try and clear the air - she basically took the position, which I agree with, that the incident was a long time ago and she tried to put it way behind her since she had been appropriately punished).
Anyway, “Heavenly Creatures” is a very worthy rental.
Yeah, I’m looking forward to it bigtime. Based on Peter Jackson’s work on Heavenly Creatures and The Frighteners (I confess, I’m the one who liked it) I have supreme confidence in his ability.
Check out Harry Knowle’s Online Diary of his trip to New Zealand to watch the final days of production. His sub-literate fanboy gushing is a little hard to stomach sometimes but his excitement is undeniable and his reports actually contain a lot of fascinating info.
It has regular reports from NZ, some written by the likes of Ian McKellan himself.
I think it will definitely be worth seeing. I worry a bit about the changes he’s had to make, but I’m hoping he will limit the changes to only those necessary, and not just because someone thinks they could have done part of it better than JRRT.
The thing I’m most worried about is the role of Arwen. They have stated that they have expanded her importance, though they haven’t gone so far as to include her in the fellowship (Which would have been an insane change.). What I haven’t heard yet is why they thought that was needed. I guess I’ll have to see it to find out.
Also, they have chosen the perfect place to film it. Except for maybe Yellowstone, no other spot on earth has beautiful plains, majestic mountains, and volcanic wastelands. All are needed to do this trilogy.
I just noticed an omission in your cast listing. John Rhys-Davies will play Gimli the Dwarf.
On of the effects that it will be interesting to see is that the hobbits and dwarf will be played by normal sized people of the correct proportions, then they will be electronically shrunk in post production. Looks like it will work out well.
I liked The Frighteners too, FWIW. Go beyond that and Heavenly Creatures, and you’ll see that Peter Jackson is one of the most energetic, flat-out brilliantly creative, and, most importantly, flexible filmmakers working today. He can go from balls-out zombie parody (Dead Alive) to extremely subtle mockumentary (Forgotten Silver) without breaking a sweat. I’m not at all worried about the prospects for Jackson’s adaptation of Tolkien’s masterpiece, and the more I find out, the more confident I get.
And the absolutely best site for collecting rumor and information on the upcoming films, IMHO, is The One Ring.
I have collected Tolkien memorabilia- books, movies, figurines, calendars, puzzles, games, etc.- for well over 20 years. I am very much of two minds regarding this movie. I think it has the promise of pure visual and visceral excellence if the stills and the trailer are anything to go by. But the plot changes are very worrisome to a purist like myself, and I stopped even looking at the websites for spoilers.
The changes to Arwen sound very troubling to me. According to some accounts, she actually takes part in battle. Arwen is NOT Luthien who, by any account, never hefted a blade or bashed any heads despite facing down Morgoth. Arwen is a very minor character in the actual narrative of LOTR, and what we see of her is not the stuff of an action movie. She is royalty, seen from a distance. In terms of LOTR she serves as Aragorn’s motivation as well as an echo of the Elder Days. I know that translating a book to film is never a 1:1 affair, but if Jackson has Arwen hacking orcs up or facing down ringwraiths I have to say that Jackson is seriously departing from Tolkien’s vision.
Put me down squarely in the “Looking Forward to It” camp. In fact, depending on how strong the “buzz” is come next winter, I may just have to camp out for tix like I did a coupla summer back for Star Wars: Episode I tix. Keep in mind that if I camp out for Fellowship… tix, I’ll be doing so in central Illinois in December :eek:! That’s how much I’m looking forward to it!
It looks as if Peter Jackson is doing his casting á la George Lucas and Star Wars; that is, a mix of unknown actors and marquee actors. OK, so Sir Alex Guinness was the only marquee actor in that series, but I digress.
So, yeah, I think this whole trilogy is going to kick maximum ass.
