The Lord of the Rings (film series)

• 1. Introduction

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  The Lord of the Rings, a trilogy of epic fantasy films directed by Peter Jackson, was shot entirely at once in his native New Zealand. Cameras rolled from the 11th of October 1999 until the 22nd of December 2000, with pick-up shots gathered each year from 2001 to 2003. The budget reached $281 million, making it one of the biggest and most ambitious film projects ever undertaken. The three films arrived in cinemas a year apart: The Fellowship of the Ring in 2001, The Two Towers in 2002, and The Return of the King in 2003. They are based on the novel by J. R. R. Tolkien and carry the same titles as its three volumes. Why did a project this size land with a director who had just finished a film called The Frighteners? How did a studio that wanted two hours end up with a three-part adaptation running nearly eleven and a half hours in its extended form? And how did a story set in the invented world of Middle-earth become one of the most decorated achievements in cinema history? The answers run through casting rooms, recording halls, and courtrooms alike.

• 2. The Quest On Screen

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  Frodo Baggins, a hobbit, inherits the One Ring from Bilbo sixty years after Bilbo first carried it home. The Wizard Gandalf recognizes it as the One Ring, forged in secret by the Dark Lord Sauron to rule the other Rings of Power. A council held by Elrond at Rivendell decides the Ring must be destroyed in the fires of Mount Doom. Frodo volunteers, joined by eight others who form the Company of the Ring. Bilbo gives him the sword Sting and a mithril mail-shirt. The Company travels through the Mines of Moria, where Gandalf confronts a Balrog and is pulled into darkness. Boromir later tries to seize the Ring and is killed by Orcs, and the Fellowship splits apart. Aragorn, heir in exile to the throne of Gondor, leads Legolas the elf and Gimli the dwarf to rescue Merry and Pippin, while Frodo and Sam press on toward Mordor with the treacherous Gollum as their guide. Gollum steers them toward the giant spider Shelob, who paralyzes and binds Frodo. At Mount Doom, Frodo succumbs to the Ring and puts it on, before Gollum bites off his finger, reclaims the Ring, and falls into the lava. Sauron, Mordor, and the Orcs are destroyed. Aragorn is crowned King and marries Arwen, Sam marries Rosie Cotton, and four years later Frodo leaves for the Undying Lands, giving Sam the Red Book of Westmarch.

• 3. Two Studios, Two To Three

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  In 1995, while finishing post-production on The Frighteners, Jackson and Fran Walsh wanted to make an original fantasy film, but every idea felt Tolkien-esque, so they pursued the rights instead. They approached Harvey Weinstein at Miramax Films, who obtained the rights from Saul Zaentz. Jackson first pitched a single film of The Hobbit followed by two Lord of the Rings films, but the Hobbit rights proved unattainable, split between Zaentz and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's United Artists. "We pitched the idea of three films and Miramax didn't really want to take that risk, but we agreed on two," Jackson recalled. As the scripts grew, the budget outran Miramax's capabilities. The Weinsteins pushed to cut everything to one two-hour film, and Harvey Weinstein threatened to replace Jackson with other directors. Jackson believed it was an empty threat. The project went into turnaround, and Jackson won an audience with New Line Cinema CEO Robert Shaye, who accepted it but asked that it be expanded into a trilogy. Initially each film carried a production budget of $60 million. New Line later granted Jackson's request for more money after a 26-minute preview of The Fellowship of the Ring screened at the 2001 Cannes Film Festival.

• 4. Filling Middle-Earth

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  Ian McKellen became Jackson's first choice for Gandalf, after Philippa Boyens drew a tape of Patrick Stewart performing opposite him and chose the latter. Christopher Lee sent Jackson a photograph of himself in a wizard's costume, hoping to play Gandalf; he was cast as Saruman instead. Miramax had wanted a recognizable name for Gandalf, floating Max von Sydow, Paul Scofield, and Morgan Freeman, while New Line suggested Christopher Plummer and Sean Connery, both of whom declined. Aragorn proved the most tangled part. Jackson cast Stuart Townsend, whom the studio deemed too young, then recast the role after shooting began, approaching Viggo Mortensen while also speaking to Russell Crowe as a backup. John Rhys-Davies, considered for Denethor, was instead cast as Gimli, and John Noble took Denethor after Patrick McGoohan proved "quite grumpy" when they met. The casting wishlist assembled by Jackson, Walsh, and Boyens had named Cate Blanchett for Galadriel and Ian Holm for Bilbo, both of whom took those roles. The crew behind them included composer Howard Shore, cinematographer Andrew Lesnie, and Tolkien illustrators Alan Lee and John Howe, who joined in November 1997.

• 5. Building The Look

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  Jackson wanted realistic designs in the style of historical epics rather than fantasy films, citing Braveheart as his model. "It might be clearer if I described it as an historical film," he said, contrasting it with "the meaningless fantasy mumbo-jumbo of Willow." He hired his long-time collaborator Richard Taylor to lead Weta Workshop across five major design elements: armour, weapons, prosthetic makeup, creatures, and miniatures. Lesnie and Jackson considered shooting in 65 mm or mastering at 4K, but both were cost-prohibitive and could not be done on New Zealand soil, so they shot on fine-grain Super 35 mm film and used rigorous digital grading. Principal photography ran across New Zealand's conservation areas and national parks, with seven different units shooting and soundstages around Wellington and Queenstown. Miniature photography alone amounted to over 1,000 shooting days. Weta Digital developed the MASSIVE software to generate intelligent crowds for battle scenes and advanced motion capture for bipedal creatures like the Cave Troll and Gollum. In total, six million feet of film, 1,828 kilometres, was edited down to the eleven hours and twenty-six minutes of extended running time.

• 6. The Largest Score

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  Howard Shore composed, orchestrated, conducted, and produced the trilogy's music, visiting the set in 1999 and writing a version of the Shire theme and Frodo's Theme before Jackson began shooting. He built the score around 85 to 110 leitmotifs representing characters, cultures, and places, the largest catalogue of leitmotifs in the history of cinema, surpassing even the entire Star Wars film series. The hobbits and the Shire alone carry multiple themes. Virtually all of the score was recorded at Watford Town Hall and mixed at Abbey Road Studios, played mainly by the London Philharmonic Orchestra ranging from 93 to 120 players. London Voices, the London Oratory School Schola boy choir, and artists including Enya, Renée Fleming, James Galway, Annie Lennox, and Emilíana Torrini contributed, as did actors Billy Boyd, Viggo Mortensen, and Liv Tyler. For the third film, the amount of music Shore had to write each day rose to around seven minutes. The end song, "Into the West," was a tribute to a young filmmaker named Cameron Duncan, befriended by Jackson and Walsh, who died of cancer in 2003.

• 7. Awards And Acclaim

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  Best Picture went to The Return of the King at the 76th Academy Awards, where it won in every category in which it was nominated, the highest clean sweep on record. Its eleven wins tied the record held by Ben-Hur and Titanic, and it became only the second sequel to win Best Picture after The Godfather Part II. Across all three films, the trilogy drew 30 Academy Award nominations and won 17, both records for any movie trilogy. The Fellowship of the Ring earned 13 nominations at the 74th Academy Awards, the most of any film there, winning four. The trilogy grossed over $2.9 billion worldwide, ranking among the highest-grossing film series of all time. The Return of the King became the second film after Titanic to gross over $1.1 billion worldwide. Critics ranked it among the greatest film trilogies ever made, with Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times writing that "the trilogy will not soon, if ever, find its equal." Stephen Regelous won a Scientific and Engineering Award for designing MASSIVE. In 2021, the Library of Congress selected The Fellowship of the Ring for the United States National Film Registry.

• 8. Profits And Lawsuits

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  Sixteen cast members sued over the lack of revenue from merchandise bearing their appearance, including Noel Appleby, Jed Brophy, Sarah McLeod, Paul Norell, Craig Parker, and Peter Tait. The case was resolved out of court in 2008, too late for Appleby, who died of cancer in 2007. Saul Zaentz filed a lawsuit in 2004 claiming he had not been paid all his royalties. The next year, Jackson sued the studio over profits from the first film, which slowed development of the Hobbit prequels until late 2007. The Tolkien Trust filed suit in February 2008 over a deal entitling it to 7.5% of the gross from any films based on Tolkien's works, seeking $150 million in compensation, and the dispute was settled on the 8th of September 2009. Beyond the courtroom, the films reshaped careers and a country. Jackson founded Wingnut Films and Wingnut Interactive, was given the chance to remake King Kong in 2005, and has been called a "favourite son" of New Zealand. The series renewed interest in fantasy film, lifted New Zealand tourism, and led directly to the Hobbit trilogy from 2012 to 2014, with new live-action films now in development and The Hunt for Gollum planned for December 2027.