The stark cone of Mt Ngauruhoe played a leading role in Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy, featuring as a smouldering Mt Doom.
Now, only five weeks out from the scheduled start of filming for The Hobbit prequel, local Maori are set to put their foot down and refuse permission for the Oscar-winning director to use the central North Island mountains again. The iwi considered them sacred.
In The Hobbit, Bilbo Baggins and his entourage journey through the Misty Mountains on their way to confront the dragon Smaug at the Lonely Mountain.
In this episode we offer full details on our creative writing contest with Sideshow Collectibles and announce the official start date for the Hobbit. More Character studies including a complete outline for Bilbo Baggins.
Thanks to our good friends at Weta Workshop, we have a downloadable mp3 of the entire Hobbit Press Conference. [Download mp3 (25MB) ] And if you haven’t checked it out yet, read Tehanu’s full report of the event! [Tehanu’s Report]
We’ve loaded the audio onto our TORN TV YouTube Channel with some ‘Hobbit Art’ to accompany it. Take a look and listen!
I simply couldn’t do justice to the wit and warmth of this press conference with the cast playing Bilbo and the thirteen dwarves. Luckily, TV3 have now posted their video of the entire conference – a much longer clip than the one I posted before. ENJOY!!!
Martin Freeman (Bilbo) and Aidan Turner (Kili) at today's press conference - this cast is a killer combo of wit and good looks.
“Fourteen individuals – and an ensemble.”
Today’s press conference opened with an apology from Peter Jackson, who said he couldn’t be there as he was “under a form of medical house arrest” since being hospitalised with a perforated ulcer last week.
“And to be honest, perhaps it’s just as well. These guys make me laugh so hard that I’d be in danger of popping a stitch or something,” Jackson continued in his statement.
Confirming the truth of that, the cast of 13 dwarves and one hobbit kept up a constant flow of quips and wisecracks throughout the whole press conference. We knew Martin Freeman was funny with a good script – well, he’s hilarious without one as well.
The stark cone of Mt Ngauruhoe played a leading role in Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy, featuring as a smouldering Mt Doom.
