By Rodney Joyce
(Reuters)
WELLINGTON, New Zealand, Aug 25
The magic won't only be in the script as Frodo the hobbit sets off to
rescue Middle-earth in the cinema version of The Lord Of The Rings.
New Line Cinema has committed $130 million (NZ$264 million) to a movie
trilogy based on J.R.R. Tolkien's classic fantasy stories, the studio
said Tuesday.
At the helm will be New Zealand director and producer Peter Jackson, who
is promising to bring large doses of computer wizardry and misty New
Zealand scenery to the project.
Computer effects will make the movie's actors look half the size to match
hobbit dimensions, Jackson said. There will be more than 1,200 computer
effects shots with two specialist Tolkien artists -- Alan Lee and John
Howe -- brought in from Europe to produce conceptual designs.
Computer technology has made it possible to film The Lord of the Rings
without resorting to the animated format used in a 1970s version, said
Jackson. "It's one of those books that has had the 'unfilmable' tag for
just cause," he told Reuters.
On show will be picture postcard scenery from around New Zealand --
ranging from Frodo's pastoral home in the Shire to a volcanic climax at
Mordor. "We've got it all really, it's almost like Tolkien wrote it on
vacation here one day," Jackson said.
The Lord of the Rings is one of the world's best-loved books and has sold
more than 50 million copies in 25 languages.
Jackson was aware that the expectations of movie-goers would be daunting.
"It's one of those situations that if you stop and think about it too
much, complete terror could set in," he said. "If I try to guess what
the millions of readers of the book are expecting then I'm going to
produce something that is going to be a mess."
Instead, he plans a personal version born of his first reading of the
book during a longtrain trip as a teen-ager. "It's going to make the
version of Lord of the Rings that I would want to see if I went to the
movies and paid ten bucks."
One of the executive producers will be Academy Award winner Saul Zaentz,
known to cinema audiences for works including One Flew Over the Cuckoo's
Nest and The English Patient. He had held the rights to the movie for
more than 30 years, having bought them off Tolkien, and made the
animated version.
Jackson, whose own credits include The Frighteners and Heavenly Creatures,
had been working on the trilogy project for 18 months with Walt Disney
Co's Miramax Films but plans stalled when Miramax wanted the three books
compressed into one film.
That would have necessitated cutting about half the story, said Jackson.
"We came to a mutual decision that if they were going to go that way
then it wasn't going to be with us -- I just didn't want to be involved
in a film that did that to Lord of the Rings."
It was agreed Miramax would retain an interest in the project, while
letting Jackson search out a new backer whom he found in New Line Cinema.
New Line has also picked up rights to The Hobbit -- the story of Frodo
that predates the trilogy.
The first of the movies, The Fellowship of the Ring, is due for release
at Christmas in year 2000. The sequels, The Two Towers and The Return of
the King, will then roll out in 2001.