The Frodo Franchise by Kristin Thompson
 
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June 15 : 2010

Doug Adams’ newly designed blog about his book on the trilogy’s music

I was alerted by Magpie over on the Message Boards of TheOneRing.net that Doug Adams has revamped his blog site in preparation for the publication of his long-awaited book on the music in the LOTR trilogy. Have a look here. Doug specifies that his book will come out this fall. Even those who don’t want to read close analysis of the musical tracks may want to buy the book anyway to get the accompanying CD (which I gather won’t be sold separately). It contains: “unused, alternate, and early-draft music from FOTR, TTT, and ROTK … and even a little discussion with Howard Shore and myself.” Doug has long had access to Shore for interviews, and there’s no one better qualified than he to create the definitive book on the subject: The Music of the Lord of the Rings Films.

I know a lot of us are eagerly looking forward to seeing this book at last. Some of the delays have been due to the formidable challenges of putting together an elaborate publication like this.

Doug has been very mysterious about the publisher. I’m curious, since of course this is a late entry in the continuing LOTR franchise, which this blog in part exists to update. Is this one of the official tie-in books licensed by New Line? Or is it an independent book that had isn’t licensed but has had to pay for the individual rights to reproduce the various musical notations, illustrations, and other material from the films? I’ll of course post a notice when the book becomes available, but in the meantime, you can follow Doug’s blog, which contains a link to his Twitter page.

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    The Frodo Franchise
    by Kristin Thompson

    US flagbuy at best price

    Canadian flagbuy at best price

    UK flagbuy at best price

    Berkeley: University of California Press, 2007.
    hardcover 978-0-520-24774-1
    421 pages, 6 x 9 inches, 12 color illustrations; 36 b/w illustrations; 1 map; 1 table

    “Once in a lifetime.”
    The phrase comes up over and over from the people who worked on Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings. The film’s 17 Oscars, record-setting earnings, huge fan base, and hundreds of ancillary products attest to its importance and to the fact that Rings is far more than a film. Its makers seized a crucial moment in Hollywood—the special effects digital revolution plus the rise of “infotainment” and the Internet—to satisfy the trilogy’s fans while fostering a huge new international audience. The resulting franchise of franchises has earned billions of dollars to date with no end in sight.

    Kristin Thompson interviewed 76 people to examine the movie’s scripting and design and the new technologies deployed to produce the films, video games, and DVDs. She demonstrates the impact Rings had on the companies that made it, on the fantasy genre, on New Zealand, and on independent cinema. In fast-paced, compulsively readable prose, she affirms Jackson’s Rings as one the most important films ever made.

    The Frodo Franchise

    cover of Penguin Books’ (NZ) edition of The Frodo Franchise, published September 2007. The tiny subtitle reads: “How ‘The Lord of the Rings’ became a Hollywood blockbuster and put New Zealand on the map.”