Many thanks to Ringer Emma for this:
Hello!
My local newspaper here in Sweden had an article about LOTR last Thursday. It also had a beautiful picture I haven’t seen before, of Elrond and Arwen in Rivendell.
It said (poorly translated by me):
“The Fellowship of the Ring” is not a rush job – The preparations have taken seven years
Sometimes it feels like Hollywood is trying to manipulate the world’s moviegoers with commercial campaigns for millions. Then you have to be steadfast. Still I’m already longing after “The Fellowship of the Ring”, which has its premier in Sweden and Skellefteå [my town] december 19th.
Am I hereby a victim of smart marketing?
Most people have heard about J R R Tolkien’s trilogy about the Ring. I read the whole trilogy a few dark winter nights in the garrison in Luleå. My friend Gunnar from Stockholm said the books were just so good and lent them to me. I was doubtful the first 30 pages, after that I had no time with attentions and marches. Instead I took every opportunity to shirk away to read. I was done in a week and sat there with tired eyes longing for more.
I still don’t know exactly where the facsination was. Can it be so simple that the good fight against evil has such an attraction/force? Or maybe it was the little hobbits fight against such terrible opponents. It may be whatever it wants. Good it was, anyway, and since then, Frodo and his friends has always been my favourites.
Another film about The Lord of the Rings has been made. In 1978 came a cartooned variant by Ralph Bakshi. It was a great disappointment which felt way too blurry and lacked the special Tolkien-feeling wich is necessary to make it work. This time it is Peter Jackson from New Zealand who will bring life to the mythology. He has also used the magic nature of his homeland to recreate Middle-earth.
The preparations have taken seven years. No one can say that it is a rush job. Jackson has also made a row of famous actors appear in the films. Frodo, for example, is played by Elijah Wood, whom we’ve seen in movies like “Forever Young” with Mel Gibson and “Deep Impact” with Robert Duvall. I’m sure many recognize Liv Tyler from “Armageddon”, where she played the daughter of Bruce Willis. Here she plays Arwen, an elf forced to choose between immortality and love. Christopher Lee, forever connected with Dracula, is Sauron [it actually says Sauron, it is not my mistake][NOTE: We know this is an error; Saurman is the character played by Lee] the premier of all warlocks (yeah, Carl-Einar Häckner [a famous Swedish magician, warlock and magician is the same word in Swedish] can go hide himself) who wants to conquer the Ring for himself.
Doesn’t this look exciting? The only thing I am worried about is how the abstinence (substance?) for the next movie will express itself. Because the whole trilogy is already recorded. But we’re gonna have to wait until Christmas 2002 for “The Two Towers”. And Christmas 2003 “The Return of the King will be released.
It seems far away. Almost as far as wandering all the way to Mount Doom…
This article was written by Roger Lindström, for the newspaper Norra Västerbotten.