Production video blog #9

I was worried that we wouldn't see another blog by the film crew until after the release of  An Unexpected Journey.
But thankfully, PJ released this just in time. With only 5 day's until the world premier in New Zealand and 2 1/2 weeks for the rest of the world, the movie is making plenty of Internet buzz. And fans are getting ready to enter Middle Earth in 3D !

There are allot of sweet shots in the blog that makes me even more excited to see the finished film.

The Troll Shaw sequence, and the Goblin caves look fantastic. One can only speculate as to what the rest of the movie looks like.

The section where they show the audio portion of making a film is quite unique. Foley, is the art of audio for everything a person does on film. And I got a kick out of watching that. It's crazy, because I always assumed that some of what we hear in the film, was the audio filmed on that specific day that made in into the movie. I was obviously wrong.

Steven Colbert is a Massive Tolkien Geek

I've watched Steven Colberts show a few times. The Colberts Report is really intellectually funny.
But I never really knew how big of a geek Steven was until lately when MSN and many other news sources were sharing his rival on air with James Franco.

The two men are massive Tolkien geeks and were trying to quiz one another, who would wear the crown?....looked like Steven won.

Recently Colberts has been in the head lines as he visited New Zealand and the film set of the Hobbit. The rumours that he might have a cameo has sparked some nasty Internet banter from fans. Personally I would like to see him in a cameo.

He is a fan after all and has shown, on his show, his collection of collectibles. Aragorn's sword and even going as far as Using Lord of the Rings figurines to explain to the audience the Debt crisis in America. Now that's funny.

Peter Jackson said " I have never met a bigger Tolkien geek in my life. Philippa Boyens is our resident Tolkien expert, and when Stephen came down to visit the set, we put him head to head with Philippa on a Tolkien quiz - and Stephen triumphed. I have to say, his encyclopedic knowledge of Tolkien is spectacular, and points to a deprived childhood in some respects."

That is saying allot. Seeing as Philippa is a massive Tolkien geek, who in her own respect knows way too much on Middle- Earth to begin with.

As for this Blogger, I hope to see Steven somewhere in the film. He has earned it.

Who is Peter Jackson ? Part 2

Peter married Fran Walsh. They met in the mid 80's and have been working together on Peter's movie scripts ever since. Fran wrote for television shows and they wrote the script to Heavenly Creatures  (1994) They both got Oscar nomination's for the screenplay. The co-wrote allot of scripts but it wasn't until they were ready to start the screen play for The Lord of The rings that Philippa Boyens would be added to the team and form a power trio.

They would go on to write together for King Kong, The Lovely Bones, and now the Hobbit.

Peter is possibly breaking some rules and making history with the Hobbit trilogy. First he is using RED camera's and filming at 5K and 48FPS (frames per second) which is not common.
The human eye can see at 62FPS so this would make the 3D experience all that much more "real"like.

Peter, in one of the hobbit blogs goes on to say that some people said it was like having the screen cut out, and what lied beyond was real.

There has been so much negative responses to this in the media and plenty of Internet trolls making stupid remarks. But PJ knows what he's doing. The blu ray's will look amazing playing at 1080p and the increase frame rate can only help make it that much more visually stunning.

What must be noted here is that Peter is trying to help out the movie industry. He made comments on several interviews that the times are changing and Hollywood is trying to figure out how to make it work for them. The age of downloading and people getting lazy and not attending theatre box offices as much as they once did. The introduction of Netflix and rogers on demand and Home theatres being of great quality, Hollywood is hurting. Movies cost as much and pay less.

My hat's off to anyone who step up and says something.

Originally Guillermo Del Toro was set to direct the hobbit. But to to legality's and the amount of time it took to clear, he had to step down. The fan's had mixed feelings about having someone else take on Tolkien's Middle Earth. But this blogger believes Del Toro would of done a great job.
Jackson, Walsh, Boyens and Del Toro worked on the original script. His name might still be on the credits at the end of the films.

Because Del Toro back down, fan's were wondering if Jackson would resume the roll of Director for the Hobbit. It was announced that he would.

The films have been 11 years in the making. Many road blocks along the way. When all was green lit and the word Go had been given, the unexpected happened (pun intended) an actors strike in New Zealand. This was a great stress amongst the film makers and producers. Some serious thought had been given to shoot the movies in another country. Canada was considered ! yay Canada (it is rather a Tolkien Country)

But politics and New Zealand pulled together and the strike was lifted and allowed the actors to work.

Though the movies are now 2 months away from being released there is still another year of post production to do on films 2 and 3.

I've never met PJ, but I can honestly say that he's been one of my role models for the last 12 years. If you read this blog and enjoyed it, please leave me a comment.

                                                           There and back again......
 

Trailer #2

New trailer (#2( has been out for a while now but I wanted to take some time before I blogged about it. Since everyone world wide has seen it, and if they haven't they clearly aren't Tolkien fans.

Anyhow I must of watched this close to 20 times now. My first thought was that there's just too much in this trailer for me to focus. I had to rewatch it to know all the scenes that were being showed.
The kitchen scene is great, in the books though (as well as in John Howes art) they are in a bigger room. The visuals look great and I'm sure the 48fps will be breath taking in 3d. Now that I'm excited about!

Showing Bilbo running to catch up to the company, Rivendel and the white council and not to mention RADAGAST! Im not going to lie to you...I almost hugged my computer.

Great Troll Shaw scenes, and Wargs, Goblins and Gollum in the caves and the riddles in the dark.

There is allot of humour in these films. When you go to the official www.thehobbit.com website you can see different endings. All of which have a funny ending.

Only 2 months away from the release of part 1, An Unexpected Journey, and I can't wait to claimed I've watched the film at least 5 tines in theatres.

Not to mention the blu ray extended edition! oh come on you know what I'm talking about.