When Michele Maro became captivated by “The Lord of the Rings” movies, she never imagined she would one day be walking around in the Shire, touring Hobbiton and peeking into hobbit holes. Those are all fictional places, but fans can visit the closest thing possible in New Zealand, where the trilogy was filmed and where specially designed tours will take visitors to some of the stunning locations featured in the movies. Maro, who lives in St. Petersburg, Florida, spent two weeks in New Zealand in 2003 being guided around forests, national parks and farms, exploring sites that she didn’t think were real when she first saw them on the big screen. More…
Day: April 4, 2009
Dear Tom DiChiara and moviefone.com, we got you…April Fools! From moviefone.com: ‘The Hobbit’ May Be a Trilogy – Peter Jackson and Guillermo Del Toro clearly don’t care that ‘The Hobbit’ is merely one book. The filmmaking powerhouses are reportedly negotiating to triple fans’ pleasure by spreading the ‘Lord of the Rings’ prequel over three movies rather than the initially planned two. We can already see the tagline: “Three films to rule them all.” And we dig it. Moviefone.com Fooled by TORN
Diane writes: Cinemaworld celebrates the 6 year anniversary of The Lord of the Rings trilogy with an exclusive screening of all three The Lord of the Rings films on April 25th & 26th, starting at Noon. See these ground-breaking films, up on the big screen again, on film, in all their glory. Cinemaworld is also proud to announce that we have managed to reserve the Extended Editions of Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers, showing you more of the movie than ever before! The fun starts at noon with 20 minute intermissions between film. Join us to relive one of the greatest feats in modern movie making. More…
Hugo Wallace Weaving (born 4 April 1960) is an Australian film, stage and voice actor of English descent. He is best known for his roles in the films The Matrix, The Lord of the Rings, V for Vendetta, and Transformers Weaving was born in Nigeria to English parents Anne, a tour guide, and Wallace Weaving, a seismologist. He spent his childhood in South Africa and then moved to the United Kingdom in his teens. While in England he attended the independent boarding school Queen Elizabeth’s Hospital, commonly known in Bristol as QEH. He moved to Australia in 1976, where he attended another private school, Sydney’s Knox Grammar School. He later graduated from Australia’s National Institute of Dramatic Art in 1981. More…
A tall poppy statue that Weta Workshops’ special effects guru Richard Taylor designed six years ago can finally cosy up next to his Oscars. Named the supreme winner of the 2009 World Class New Zealand Awards last night, Taylor said he had designed the winning statue and produced a set each year for the past six years. “It’s really odd receiving an award you made yourself,” he said. “I didn’t know when I sent them up here [to Auckland] that one of them was for me.” Statue Taylor made for the cabinet