Jeroen writes: Hi, thought I’d write in my short review. I have seen the move two times now (I was that lucky) and will keep it as spoiler-free as possible. [More]
Month: December 2002
Sal A. Mander writes: Last Friday (the 13th), I was lucky enough to attend a TTT pre-release screening at a benefit for producer Barrie Osborne’s Alma Mater, on Friday the 13th. It was held at a brand new entertainment complex in downtown Minneapolis. [More]
Sal A. Mander
Last Friday (the 13th), I was lucky enough to attend a TTT pre-release screening at a benefit for producer Barrie Osborne’s Alma Mater, on Friday the 13th. It was held at a brand new entertainment complex in downtown Minneapolis.
Mr. Osborne introduced the film by saying that Peter Jackson would have been there if he could, but the director was home in New Zealand to prepare for the release there. Barrie also announced, to much applause, that he would try to have a pre-release screening for The Return of the King, next year. The film was shown immediately after.
When it was over there was a party at Gameworks; which is a restaurant, bar, video game center and bowling alley that is set up like a nightclub. There were free appetizers, soda, and best of all, TTT movie posters.
During the party I had the opportunity to get several people’s reactions to the film. Everyone I talked to thought is was very good and they will see it again soon. (WARNING: Minor Spoilers Ahead) Specific positive comments were;
“The one thing I was worried about was the Treants, but they nailed him dead-on. It couldn’t have been done any better”.
“Gollum deserves a Best Actor Nomination”
“The battle of Helm’s Deep was amazing”
Among the things not so positive things that people said were;
“I like the first one better”
“Every time Gimli was on the screen it just for comic relief. How many short jokes can you fit into a movie”?
After the movie itself, the highlight of my evening was talking to Barrie Osborne. At the party I was lucky enough to get a few minutes with him to ask a few questions. Please note that his responses are paraphrased and not direct quotes.
Sal: The Lord of the Rings has unprecedented cooperation between the studio and the fan sites. Do you feel this has been a positive experience or is there anything that didn’t work out?
Barrie Osborne: it’s not an industry standard but Peter Jackson is a big fan of the Internet, as am I. Some sites took a while to get up to speed, but all in all it was a good experience.
S: Ian Mc Kellan has stated that he would be interested in playing Gandalf in a film adaptation of ‘The Hobbit’. Is this something you would be interested in producing?
BO: (Laughing) Well, after this is over, I am going to take a big break. But, there are so many Tolkien stories out there that could be made, that you never know what will be done.
S: What difficulties do you see in getting the cast back to New Zealand this summer to shoot additional footage?
BO: I’ve talked to most of the cast and we became such a family that I believe that we will be able to get it done. Of course, many of them have other things going on, but I believe we will be able to work around everyone’s schedules.
This was all the time I had to talk to Mr. Osborne or I would have asked him a lot more.
All in all it was worth the $50 per ticket. The movie was great, the party was fun, and Mr. Osborne was very Gracious. The biggest problem with seeing the move when I did is; I have to wait 5 days before I can see it again.
Sal A. Mander
Wedge Greenleaf writes: Dutch television station V8 will air on wednesday the 18th of dec a documentary called The making of LOTR:TTT. It’s actually the second making off they are showing. last time they showed the already legendary warg attack!
James Brown writes: Tonight’s One News bulletin here in NZ had a very cool story, which I thought might be of interest, on the $2-million LOTR exhibition which opens at the Te Papa museum in Wellington this Thursday. [More]
James Brown writes: Tonight’s One News bulletin here in NZ had a very cool story, which I thought might be of interest, on the $2-million LOTR exhibition which opens at the Te Papa museum in Wellington this Thursday. Not sure if you will have heard about this exhibition, but it looks amazing. It will be at Te Papa until the end of February, then it will be touring science museums around the world for the next 2 years.
The story had some fantastic shots of some of the props and models in the exhibition, including a huge cave troll maquette, Sauron’s armour and the Hobbiton mill ‘bigature’ from Frodo’s vision in the Mirror of Galadriel. I can’t be the only one who has noticed that the spiky millwheel looks an awful lot like the infamous wizard-kebab picture. If this is a hint that we will get to see the scouring of the Shire in ROTK, I for one won’t mind if the details of Sharky’s death are altered slightly. The coolest shot, though, was an extreme close-up of the Boromir model we saw go over the Falls of Rauros. It’s an amazingly detailed and lifelike model. The skin colouring and texture is eerily convincing. And I’m pretty sure I remember Richard Taylor saying in the DVD commentary that the model was made in a hurry at the last minute. Wow. I can’t wait to see the exhibition.
The story was preceded by a little piece about how our Prime Minister is a big fan of FOTR, but still prefers the books. Here’s a transcript:
There’s been high praise from many quarters for the Lord of the Rings movies, but today the Prime Minister announced she prefers the books. Helen Clark, who’s also Minister of Arts and Culture, says good as Peter Jackson’s films are, no movie can do justice to a great piece of literature.
CLARK: ‘The definitive impression of Lord of the Rings will always be for me what I read in 1967.’
Helen Clark says she makes it a rule never to see a film when she’s read the book. But she made an exception for the first Tolkien movie, and will see part two this week.