Things You Didn't Know About The 'Lord of the Rings' Films
Before Peter Jackson decided to take on J.R.R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, it had only existed in animated form. Most fans thought a live-action adaptation was impossible, given the scope of the work, but he managed to pull it off. His film series was so well-received, it's unlikely anyone will ever try to top it, and he even went on to adapt The Hobbit into another successful film trilogy.
It's been a few years since the Lord of the Rings trilogy made it to film, but how much does the average fan really know about it? So much went into making the movies, there are still quite a few details you maybe didn't know about the Lord of the Rings films.
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1317 VOTESIt Took Two Years To Make The Armor For The Movies
The trilogy features many extras and main characters wearing elaborate suits of armor, which were mostly composed of chainmail. All the armor was handmade, and designers needed two years to complete all the costumes.
They fabricated a total of 7 miles of chainmail, all by hand. Much of this went underneath plate or leather armor, so a lot of it wasn't even seen by the audience. A single suit of armor for an Orc required 13,000 individual rings, which took three days to make.
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2484 VOTESBecause Of His WWII Experience, Christopher Lee Knew The Sound A Person Would Make When Stabbed
During filming of The Lord of the Rings, Sir Christopher Lee had to correct director Peter Jackson about the sound a person would make when stabbed in the back. He pointed out that a person wouldn't scream "Argh" when that happened; they would instead say "uh." Lee, who knew because of his experiences during WWII, explained in an interview:
Have you any idea what kind of noise happens when somebody's stabbed in the back? Because I do. It's "uh" because the breath's driven out of your body.
Jackson went with Lee's "uh."
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- Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
- New Line Cinema
3478 VOTESThe Uruk-hai Army Sound Was Made By Sports Fans In A Stadium
To get the proper sound he wanted for the Uruk-hai army, Peter Jackson turned to sports: He used the sound of 20,000 cricket fans for the Battle at Helm's Deep scenes. Jackson managed to create the sound he needed from a match on February 16, 2002, which pitted New Zealand against England at Westpac Trust Stadium in Wellington.
During the innings break, Jackson went onto the field with a microphone and led the fans in a series of howls, growls, and roars. The match itself was reportedly far less exciting than the small break Jackson took advantage of; Cricket Country described the match as "an insignificant, insipid encounter." New Zealand ended up the victor (244 to 89). The most memorable aspect was apparently the sound generated for an award-winning film.
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New Zealand's Government Appointed Its Own 'Lord and Minister of the Rings'
While the films were being developed, to take advantage of tourism and future filmmaking opportunities, the New Zealand government appointed to its cabinet what the New Zealand Herald called a "Lord and Minister of the Rings," Pete Hodgson, who also served as minister of energy. "This film will really put us on the map,” Hodgson said. "Not many people knew that Star Wars was in Morocco, but everyone will know that Middle Earth is in New Zealand."
Hodgson did his job well. The films boosted the country's tourism industry; numerous tours take the island's visitors to sites used as Lord of the Rings locations.
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- The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
- New Line Cinema
5294 VOTESSean Bean Didn't Travel Like Everyone Else
Sean Bean, who played Boromir in The Fellowship of the Ring, is deathly afraid of flying, which led to problems during filming. For scenes that took place in the mountains, most of the cast flew there via helicopter, but Bean traveled part of the way via a ski lift, then had to trek for an additional two hours - all while wearing his full Boromir costume.
Bean told UnderGroundOnline:
I had to walk the whole way, really. I was two hours behind everybody else on top of this mountain because I just didn't want to get in any helicopters. I was terrified of them. But with planes, I'm used to them now. But I still get a bit dodgy with turbulence.
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- The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
- New Line Cinema
6591 VOTESSir Christopher Lee Was The Only Cast Member To Meet Tolkien
Sir Christopher Lee, who played Saruman, first read The Hobbit in 1945 after leaving the Royal Air Force. When The Fellowship of the Ring was published in 1954, Lee read it and continued to re-read all of J.R.R. Tolkien's books once a year. Lee was also the only person involved with the films to have met Tolkien, in the 1950s at The Eagle and Child, an Oxford pub.
Lee's recollection of the meeting suggests how much of a fanboy the late actor was:
We were sitting there talking and drinking beer, and someone said, "Oh, look who walked in." It was Professor Tolkien, and I nearly fell off my chair. I didn't even know he was alive. He was a benign-looking man, smoking a pipe, walking in, an English countryman with earth under his feet. And he was a genius, a man of incredible intellectual knowledge. He knew somebody in our group. He (the man in the group), said, "Oh Professor, Professor..." And he came over. And each one of us, well I knelt, of course, each one of us said, "How do you do?" And I just said "Ho.. How.. How..."
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7361 VOTESHalf Of The Men Of Rohan Were Women
The men of Rohan were some of the most formidable horse riders in the series - and half of them were actually women. When the production team sought experienced riders for the Rohan army, they found far more professional female riders than male ones, so they used fake beards and other makeup tricks to make the female riders appear male.
In The Two Towers Extended Edition extras, Viggo Mortensen comments that "there are some very good women riders in New Zealand, and it’d be silly not to take advantage of them. I mean, some of the women rode as well or better than the men, but it could be confusing at times."
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- The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
- New Line Cinema
8504 VOTESElijah Wood And Sir Ian McKellen Never Filmed A Scene Together
Despite being in several important scenes together throughout the trilogy, Sir Ian McKellen and Elijah Wood never filmed a scene together in person. This was due to the way each actor was filmed. Instead of using special effects to make Wood look short while Gandalf appeared tall, the actors were shot from different distances using forced perspective, then composited into the scenes.
McKellen explained the process in an Uproxx interview:
In Lord of the Rings, I never got to look Elijah Wood in the eyes. We were never in the same place to do that. I was always looking at the mask of his small-scale double, and he was always looking at a big pole, 7'2".
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- The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
- New Line Cinema
9308 VOTESViggo Mortensen Supported His Favorite Team Underneath His Costume
Though you'd never know it watching the movies, Viggo Mortensen is a dedicated Montreal Canadiens fan. The audience didn't know this, but the cast and crew likely did, as he wore a T-shirt underneath his armor while filming all three movies.
Mortensen's love for the team may not have been directly apparent, but he certainly appreciated having the shirt on underneath his armor. "It gave me just a little more power with the sword," he said.
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- The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
- New Line Cinema
10406 VOTESViggo Mortensen Grew So Close To The Horses He Rode In The Films That He Bought Two Of Them
Viggo Mortensen grew so close to two of the horses he worked with on the set of The Lord of the Rings that he became their permanent owner. He told IGN:
I bought the one in Lord of the Rings 'cause... even though I wasn't with him all the time, I just developed a real good friendship with him. His name is Eurayus. He kind of came into the movie similar to the way I did. You know, didn't have much preparation and was just thrown in and had to swim, basically. And it was rough on him and it took a while for us to kind of get in sync and for him to be comfortable around the set. So we got to be close and I wanted to stay in touch with him.
He also bought Kenny, a horse he rides in The Two Towers, because "he was very easy and relaxed and I just wanted Eurayus to have a buddy."
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- The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
- New Line Cinema
11328 VOTESThe Fans Received A Proper Thanks
The Fellowship of the Ring extended edition takes the time to properly thank the 15,000 fans who were members of The Lord of the Rings Official Fan Club. Each one received acknowledgement in the credits, adding 20 minutes to the film's total runtime.
The trend continued with the second and third films. For The Two Towers, 12 minutes of fan club credits were added, while The Return of the King also features an additional 12 minutes. Combined, all three films added 44 minutes of screen time just to say thanks.
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The 'LOTR' Film Series Has More Awards Than Any Other
It's no secret that the Lord of the Rings trilogy has won some awards, but most people aren't aware of just how many made it to the mantles of Peter Jackson and his crew. The series received 800 nominations and won a total of 475 - the most in all of film history. That puts it well above everything from Star Wars to the films of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
In terms of the Academy Award, often considered the most coveted film award, the series won 17 of 30 nominations, including best makeup, cinematography, original score, and visual effects for The Fellowship of the Ring, and sound editing and visual effects for The Two Towers.
Return of the King won all 11 Academy Awards it was nominated for: best picture, director, adapted screenplay, art direction, costume design, makeup, original score, original song, sound mixing, film editing, and visual effects.
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- The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
- New Line Cinema
13379 VOTESThe Series Was Originally Meant To Be A Single Film
As Peter Jackson was working on adapting the books into film, he briefly toyed with the idea of adapting the three novels into a single movie, which is what Miramax - the studio he first started working with - wanted due to budgetary constraints. In that case, scenes involving Helm's Deep and Saruman would have been cut. Rohan and Gondor would have been merged, as would have Éowyn and Boromir's sister.
Jackson believed these changes would cut out necessary story elements, so he asked Miramax if he could create a longer film than the two-hour one that Miramax had approved. Miramax refused, and studio head Harvey Weinstein threatened to replace Jackson as screenwriter and director. In the end, Miramax let Jackson take the project to another studio, and New Line Cinema picked it up as a three-picture deal.
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- The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
- New Line Cinema
14244 VOTESA LOT Of New Zealand Residents Took Part In The Movie
Peter Jackson's love of his native New Zealand meant that he incorporated the people of his nation into the film as much as possible. The cast and crew included thousands of people from the country where the films were made.
Because of those high numbers, as well as the 20,000 cricket fans who helped provide the Uruk-hai army's sound, it's estimated that one out of every 160 New Zealanders took part in the production. The cricket match was vital in achieving this number, as the population in the early 2000s meant that around 25,000 people would have been a part of the films' production.
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15110 VOTESAndy Serkis Auditioned For Gollum's Voice By Imitating His Coughing Cat
In 2021, Andy Serkis joined Tom Hardy for a Wired “Answer the Web’s Most Searched Questions” YouTube session. When answering the query, “How did Andy Serkis get cast as Gollum,” Serkis shared what happened at his audition:
[T]hey wanted a voice for a digital character. And I said, “Surely there must be, like, some really good roles in that movie. Why do you want me to do a voice for a digital character?” And then they said, “No, he’s Gollum.” And so I said, “OK.” So I based it on… I’m going to basically impersonate my cat. So I impersonate my cat coughing up fur balls. And I went [imitates cat coughing noises], and that became Gollum.
Hardy’s response: “Whoa.”
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- The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
- New Line Cinema
16297 VOTESWomen Don't Converse At Any Time In The Trilogy
Although the Lord of the Rings trilogy doesn't feature many prominent female characters, several do take up screen time. Still, it's interesting to consider that no two women speak to each other during the entire trilogy.
The production has been criticized for this fact, especially because the books don't suffer from the same problem. Arwen is a complex female character, but if you rewatch the movies, you'll see that she only ever talks to men.
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