As reported yesterday, the BBC program Film 2001 last night was recapping the Cannes Film Festival, and included in that recap was a segment on Lord Of The Rings. The show begins with the presenter, Johnathan Ross working through the schedule from the show, and after talking about the main item on tonight’s show, Moulin Rouge, Ross moves onto the next item on the agenda:

“…….and Lord Of The Rings is premiered on the Riviera…well kind of.”

The screen changes to show Liv Tyler standing in front of the castle where the party was held, dressed in black. She begins to speak elvish! I think it sounds somewhat similar what she said on the Conan O’ Brien show a few weeks ago. See for yourself! Check out the attached recording I made of Tyler speaking Elvish. The reporter asks her what does it mean, to which she grins and says, “I’m not telling.” 15 minutes later, after a run through of Moulin Rouge and the Mummy Returns, and we finally come to Lord Of The Rings. During the paragraph below, we were shown several pieces of the trailer shown in cinemas a while ago put together. Then, once we moved onto the topic of interviews, it showed footage of several stars being interview in casual clothes, including Sean Bean, John Rhys-Davis and Viggo Mortensen, Sir Ian McKellen and Liv Tyler.

“Tolkien blockbuster to-be Lord Of The Rings debuted in Cannes this week, with distributors New Line allowing a select band of journo’s a sneek peek at a mere 20 minutes of footage. On the back of that the chosen few were then granted interviews with the films stars although the results have been embargoed until the film’s release in….December.”

The footage then changes to show images from the Lord Of The Rings party that was held in the castle, showing the reconstructed Hobbit-Hole with genuine Hobbits, and Sir Ian McKellen wearing a rather fetching Hawaiin shirt under a jacket.

The film set builders were then brought in to re-create Middle-Earth for the lavish party later that night, which, joy of joys, we ARE allowed to show you. Sir Ian McKellen breaks down the marketing hype – ‘I think it’s important that, uh, it should be talked about, because we’re desperate to have as many people as possible see it.’ “

And that was pretty much it. Nothing new, except some more Elvish from our lovely Lady Arwen.

*Bows Deeply*

Strider