 | The filming of all three
parts of The Lord of the Rings in New Zealand took 18 months, cost $300
million, and required the services of 20,000 extras.
|
| Lord Of The Rings is the
most successful New Zealand movie ever made with its 13 Oscar Nominations, 4
Oscars and Millions of dollars earned at the box office.
|
| 1,600 pairs of ears and
feet were used.
|
| 5,000
cubic metres of
vegetables and flowers were grown a year before filming started.
|
| 250
horses were used. 70 were specially trained and 5 were miniature horses
especially for the hobbits.
|
| Gollum
is completely computer generated.
|
| A
lot of sets were carved out of polystyrene to make them look like wood which
had aged over thousands of years.
|
| 64
miniature sets were used to create places such as the land of the dwarves
and Khazuddum
|
| All
nine of the main cast members( the fellowship) each have a tattoo of the no.
9 in Elvish to remember their awesome time in NZ filming LOTR and the close
bonds they formed.
|
| $200,000
NZD
worth of Coffee was drunk during the 18 months of filming by the cast and
crew!!
|
| Filming
began October 11, 1999 but
beforehand all the main actors had to undergo 3 months of training and all
together it took 7 years to create Lord of the Rings!!
|
| Elijah
Wood( who plays Frodo Baggins) was to
nervous to audition for the role so he took a few friends and hired a few costumes
out to reenact a scene from the book and sent in the video tape to Peter
Jackson.
|
|
David Bowie was very
keen to play the Elf Lord Elrond but the part went to Hugo Weaving instead. |
|
Daniel Day-Lewis turned
down the role of Aragorn. |
|
1,460 eggs were served
to cast and crew for breakfast for every day of shooting. |
|
Dominic Monaghan wore a
fat suit made of foam. He drank 3 litres of water a day so he would not
dehydrate. |
| While filming
the scene where Sam rushes through the river after Frodo, Sean Astin stepped
on a branch that was sticking up from the riverbed. It pierced his foot,
even through the prosthetic foot, which bled so much he had to be airlifted
to hospital. |
| The Fellowship Of The
Ring was nominated for 13 Academy Awards and won 4, and The Two Towers was
nominated for 6 Academy Awards and won 2. |
| Elders from a local
Moari tribe said a blessing over the Lord Of The Rings location in
Wellington, NZ. |
| The Wellington
Knitting Club knitted string chain suits of armour for LOTR. |
| Christopher Lee
(Saruman) is the only member of the cast and crew to have actually have met
J R R Tolkien. He was also the very first person to be cast in the Trilogy
due to his extensive knowledge of the books. |
| Peter Jackson was
about to embark on a remake of the horror classic "King Kong" when
the opportunity came along to put the J R R Tolkien trilogy to film. However
he is still planning to make the monkey movie in 2004. |
