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October 13, 2003 - October 31, 2003

10-31-03

Orlando on 'So Graham Norton'
maegwen @ 6:55 pm EST
Orlando was on 'So Graham Norton' tonight. He was mainly astonished at the information Graham gave him that there are now over a million web sites dedicated to him, but revealed the following about ROTK:

"The fans loved me sliding down the stairs in the 2nd film, and Pete was looking for something which, basically was going to top all of that. And he said it to me, he was, like, alright son, wait for this one! And I went out for 3 days of reshoots and basically was just hanging on wires, and climbing up things and swinging around....so its gonna be quite an extravagant thing, because by the time they've cut me swinging on ropes and flying all over the place in with the special effects they do really well at Weta Digital, which is Peter's company, it'll be killer! I hope, I think. I'm sure."

10-29-03

NEW ROTK Trailer Description ALREADY!
Xoanon @ 9:11 pm EST
Mr. Lost Apples

The quick (1 minute) theatrical trailer for ROTK is (not surprisingly) mostly old footage cut in different ways, though there's some new dialogue and a fair amount of fresh material and/or angles on some stuff.

For instance, we've seen the front end of Shelob already, but in the teaser they show Frodo in a more frightening and (I thought) more fitting Moria-like dark, staring at a set of glittering eyes as his phial begins to do its thing. This must be right before they start running from her. Elrond delivers his "become who you were born to be" line again, but this time it's laid over that one shot of Aragorn walking into the citadel or whatever looking like he's about to claim his destiny.

The text as I remember does not deviate too much from being along the lines of the initial preview, but there is a very exciting shot of what looks like Merry dragging himself to his knees in the midst of battle to draw his sword....made my heart jump, but they didn't play up the context of it that much, so it was difficult to say anything (especially after just one quick viewing).

I'm going to burn the bridges here, so to speak, so I cannot reveal my sources, but we'll all see it in its all-too-ephemeral glory in about a week anyway.

I know I'm far from being the only one who's seen it, so there'll probably be meatier details leaked out at any rate before the thing hits theaters.

10-19-03

Trivial Pursuit Spoilers!
Calisuri @ 6:59 pm EST
Thanks to Ringers Tanta Gold and Tiggerette for sending in the following movie spoilers that can be found in The Lord of the Rings Triva Pursuit Game:

Q; Whose fortress is surrounded by a moat of lava?
A: Sauron's

Q; What kind of creature is Theoden trapped beneath in his final moments of life?
A: His horse

Q; What do Orcs cast over the walls during the seige of Minas Tirith to horrify the enemy?
A: Heads of dead Gondorian Men

Q: Who kills Grima Wormtongue?
A: Legolas

And remember folks, this Trivial Pursuit is based on the films, NOT the book.

I'm sure we'll be adding more in the future!

View Ringer staffer Ostadan's interview with the game creator Rob Daviau. [More]

Would you like to purchase the game? [Amazon.com]

BBC UK Great Read: Vote for LOTR
maegwen @ 2:01 am EST
Richard writes: It's voting time again! Back in April, the BBC asked the public to name the UK's favourite books. From a list of 100 comes the top 21 and LOTR is in there. Vote HERE.


Tonight, the BBC reviewed the 21 finalists and regrettably LOTR received the usual mockery. In the studio were a mixture of novellists, media presenters and entertainers who summarised their thoughts on each book in turn. When it came to Tolkien's book the tone changed completely.

Whether this was due to programme editing I'm not certain, but as soon as someone admitted they liked the book they became the focus of derision. One such guest (a novellist whose name temporarily escapes me) was branded as "sad" as soon as he revealed that he had read the book five times. He immediately backed down by pointing out that this had all been before he was 20 years old. Well that's a relief then - heaven forbid that a grown adult should read such material. I swear by the expressions on some faces that there were others in the studio who wanted to say something in defence of the book, but were not prepared to risk their professional careers in doing so.

Over the next eight weeks a celebrity will champion each book and tonight we received a preview of each. Outdoor survivalist Ray Mears is to be LOTR's advocate. We shall have to wait and see, but if the presentation in the clip is anything to go by then the tone will be "tacky sword and sorcery" with the usual WW2 analogies. Yeuch! I dare say Ray Mears will make a good fist of it but I couldn't help wishing Christopher Lee were doing it instead, but that might have come off as overt marketing for the films.


10-17-03

Trilogy Tuesday Canada... Small Tidbit of Info
maegwen @ 5:55 pm EST
Paul writes in with some information that will bring partial relief to Candian Ringers: I hope I am not advertising my way out of a ticket for this, but I received the following e-mail from Empire Theatres which is the largest cinema chain in eastern Canada. Just thought you might want to post this response to my e-mail inquiry to them. Thanks again love your site.

* * *

From: XXXX@empiretheatres.com
Sent: Friday, October 17, 2003 3:17 PM

Hello and thank you for your email and feedback. We welcome all feedback and questions at Empire Theatres.

With the upcoming release of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, the film's distributor has decided to re-release the first two installments of the trilogy, with a marathon session of all three films in one day on December 16. But they have also decided to go limited in this endeavor. So we at Empire Theatres will be playing the re-release and the marathon at two of our locations, being Studio 12 Cinemas in St-John's, NF and Empire 18 Bayers Lake in Halifax, NS.

We do not have details yet as to when tickets will go on sale. But if you check our website every once in a while at www.empiretheatre.com, it will be the first place we make the announcement.

Thank you again for using Empire Theatres Feedback and please feel free to e-mail us anytime.

Cheers!

Trilogy Tuesday in LA -- via Japan
maegwen @ 5:04 pm EST
Eriniel writes: I received the latest LOTR newsletter from Japan Herald, the distributor of LOTR trilogy in Japan, and I found a article about "Trilogy Tuesday" Tour by a travel agency called Travel Pia.

http://www.pia.co.jp/travel/tour/ep_029.html (to view a translation, visit www.altavista.com, click on "translate," and paste in URL)

The cost of this tour is 137,000 yen ($1,251.03) for 5 days, included round-trip airline tickets, accommodations (for 3 nights), meals, pickup bus, ticket for "Trilogy Tuesday", half-day LA sightseeing, taxes, baggage conveyance fee.

In their schedule, they're going to see "Trilogy" in a movie theater in LA, and at least 40 persons are looked for on this tour. Also there's another sign in red, says "limited 120 persons" in the upper part of the advertisement.

I don't know how this agency could arrange and hold that much number of tickets. Unbelievable! I thought this "Trilogy" event is for LOTR fans, not for benefit of travel agency. Also I'm so disappointed it seems Japan Herald isn't planning to hold "Trilogy" event in Japan by their effort and expense (or is it?), and encourages (= introducing this tour in their official newsletter) this kind of commercial activity.

10-16-03

Interesting ROTK Movie/Game News!
Xoanon @ 11:55 am EST
Melt-Banana writes:

I work for *snip* and yesterday I got the opportunity to watch a friend playing The Paths of the Dead-level of the upcoming EA ROTK game. It looked great, and the king of the Dead was quite scary indeed, as Aragorn battled him in a giant cave inside the mountain, a cave "where the dead gather", according to one of Legolas' lines.

However, the main reason I'm writing you is that I got a sneak peek at some press information that said that the magazine was not allowed to publish screenshots of these bosses: The King of the dead, Shelob, The Witchking and Sauron's Lieutenant. I guess this means that a beefed up Mouth of Sauron will be the end of game boss, as well as "the big thing" Aragorn is rumoured to be fighting outside the black gates.

I have visited your great site every day for more than three years, and I do hope that this information is valuable to you.

10-15-03

I Spy the Witch King?
maegwen @ 4:11 pm EST
Goose writes: I was just looking at the new picture of the Witch King on the Officical LOTR website and notice the small picture they have resembles a shot in the newest trailer.


I Spy the Witch King

* * *

Hutson writes: Looking at the new image of the Witch King from the Official site, I wondered if this "look" for a Nazgul had been in the trailer. About 1 minute and 24 seconds in, I noticed that the shot of the Nazgul landing atop Minas Morgul as the light beam erupts from the top seemed to have some extrra spike-iness.


I Spy the Witch King

Looking at it frame-by-frame, it doesn't seem to be the Fell Beast's spikes, but that of the rider; a still frame, blown up and compared to the Witch King image, seems to point towards this in fact being the Morgul Lord himself. Looks pretty cool to me; I'm glad it doesn't just look like a mini-Sauron from FotR. Thanks for the great site, and keep up the great work!

10-13-03

EE Screenings in Oz
Xoanon @ 8:35 pm EST
HilltopHood writes: I'm not sure if you know about this already, but I haven't noticed it on your site so I thought I'd let you know.

The Hoyts (Australian cinema chain) website has details about screenings of the extended edition or FOTR and TTT. Fellowship of the Ring screens from December 11-17 and The Two Towers from December 18-22. There is also mention of a screening of a "Lord of the Rings Double Feature on December 23/24", ahead of the release of Return of the King on December 26.

The screenings are listed to be shown at the Fox Studios (NSW), George St (NSW), Highpoint (VIC) and Carousel (WA) theatres. No mention of ticket sales at this point.


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