Ringer Spy 436×800 sends in the latest from an undisclosed company that New Line is trying to court to get merchandising contracts. Read on:
Some representatives from New Line gave a group from my company a presentation on their new property. This happens here all the time, and I’m very used to the wisecracking, schmoozing style and tone of pitches we get from studio people. This was genuinely different. These people were passionate. They had been to the set, seen about a half hour of footage, and were ENTHUSIASTIC. They really seem to feel they’re part of something special. Imagine being in on the ground floor of Star Wars. That’s how they look…
They began with the 6-minute trailer, which was very warmly recieved by us.
They had put up 6 largish (maybe 18″ by 27″) photographs of scenes from the film, which was nice because I could really study them. Some I had seen (4 hobbits hiding in a hollow of roots/foliage, the orc in profile from the 2-minute trailer), some not (a beautiful shot of the fellowship in line walking past beautiful autumnal trees, ringwraiths riding down a night road), but all of them were great, staggering. Up-close, that orc makeup is really something. The teeth were really nasty, jagged things, and the skin has a papery, mottled texture. Beautifully detailed. On the topic of orcs, there were some terrific shots in the trailer that really are more impressive than what made it into the 2-minute version. One had an orc in warpaint, it made my jaw drop, because it looked so ‘right.’ EVERYTHING DID!!!
Then they had a well-done powerpoint presentation that showed a lot of slides, including multiple views of pretty much everyone except Galadriel, Gollum, Treebeard, and Sauron.
They brought 2 kinds of leave-behind materials. One was a large 11″ by 17″ booklet, with gatefold cover and beautiful big reproductions of 5 or 6 of the original 9 production images from the official site. Seeing them in better resolution made me hanker for the LOTR art book that seems like an inevitability. The other was supercool, a little leatherbound journal with the LOTR movies logo worked into the cover and a little leather strap to bind it.
Click on each image to enlarge
