(Read Part 1 here)

Tours for International Distributors

KT: One of the things I talk about in the book is how the film was financed in part by New Line selling the distribution rights for various countries to these little companies in countries around the world. I think there were 25 or 26 of those. One thing that intrigues me is the fact that a lot of them were brought down to New Zealand to be reassured, because they had bought all three films completely sight unseen. They didn’t know what they were getting, and they’d paid a lot of money. So at intervals some of them would be brought down to be given tours of the filmmaking and the various facilities. You gave some of those tours. Could you tell us a little about what one would see or hear on one of those?

RP: I’ve never seen anything like that before, because I’d just worked on studio pictures. Great movies, but the studio was paying for it and quite often the studio had their own distribution. It was new for me to see all these people come in.

I don’t know whose idea it was, but it was brilliant, because it benefited them and it benefited us. It benefited them because they got to see their investment up close. You have to understand that these distributors weren’t necessarily gigantic companies. They’re sometimes smaller family-owned companies in these different countries. If we’d gone down with this thing, they would have gone down. It was a risk for some of these companies. Some were obviously larger. It was good for them to see the work see the art and meet the folks. For us it was a great benefit, because they were excited, and that kept rejuvenating us with every visit over the course of shooting.

They would come in, and we’d quite often first take them over to the art department. By then the art department had a wall, a long hallway on either side that basically gave you a pictorial representation of the trilogy. You’d go down one wall and up the other and show them that. Then we’d go over to Weta Workshop, and they’d then actually get to see and touch this stuff. They could pick up the swords. They could grab the helmets. They could see, because we were constantly making things, they could see guys working on everything. So it was very tactile, and Richard Taylor, if he was available, would quite often lead that, and he was just the best tour guide you could ever have through the art of Middle-earth. He’s brilliant creatively and has a lot of positive energy. So it was good for them to walk around and see stuff being made that they would later see in the film.

Then after that we’d take this “dog and pony show” over to Weta Digital, and there’d be these little reels that they had put together of R and D, visual effects shots that were in the middle of being made, some finals, depending on when they showed up. So they were able to see the Weta Digital work and realize,wow, this is going to be brilliant. After all of that, they would then end up back at the studio where we were shooting. We’d have tables set aside for them. They’d get to have lunch and see some of the shooting and meet the actors and the crew.

It was great. I remember one time when I was doing that wizard fight, they brought a crew through. I got all nervous, because they’re going to see I’d never done this before. But they were really lovely people. I can’t emphasize that enough. It was this amazing, organic thing that just evolved all of a sudden. They were just as excited about it as we were, and they could go out there and sell the movie, because they saw the process and were that much more connected to it.

The Cannes Event of 2001

KT: They really eventually saw footage for the first time at the Cannes event in May of 2001, which was about six months, seven months before the first part of the film came out. That was when 25 minutes of more-or-less finished footage was shown at the Cannes Film Festival to some of these distributors, to reporters, and so on. That really in many ways turned around public opinion around the world. A lot of reporters went back and said, “This is great footage,” and distributors were very relieved to see that they had actually invested in something that looked like it would succeed. Could you say a little bit about the Cannes event? Because you took part in that.

RP: I have to say, I think New Line were real geniuses about this kind of stuff. With Cannes and with those tours with distributors. It was Rolf Mittweg (President and Chief Operating Officer, New Line Worldwide Distribution and Marketing) and Camela Gallano (President, New Line International Releasing, Inc.) who were the main folks behind making all of that happen. They were really good at getting them involved and connected. The great thing about Cannes was that we were showing this wonderful reel — but we were nervous because no one had ever seen anything and you just never know – we were all holding our breath to see how everyone would react and when they cheered it was like a huge weight off our shoulders.

It was definitely interesting, that first one at the Olympia Theater. Dolby Digital was lovely. They came in, and they prepped the theater the same way that they prep the theaters for the Cannes Film Festival. It was during the festival, so we were able to grab them. So they made that room really sing acoustically. Peter introduced it, and we played it for everybody. It was exciting just to see everyone reacting so favorably to it and really getting it.

I think you do have it in the book, but Peter was really smart about what he put in there. The Mines of Moria sequence, if you remember that from the first film, is a big chunk of Film 1 and that sequence was put in. It was kind of a stand-alone piece. It was great, because it really got Weta Digital going, from doing R and D to actually doing shots. It really just invigorated everybody. Howard Shore actually came down. It’s the only score in all three movies that’s not done by the London Philharmonic. The Mines of Moria, was done by the New Zealand Royal Symphony and they did a wonderful job. We recorded in the old town hall in Wellington, which is basically a smaller version of what we ended up recording for much of our score in Watford just outside of London. The classic English town hall always had a similar shape, so therefore they gave you similar acoustics.

So it helped everybody. It was actually a great thing. I can understand why there was a need for it in terms of selling the project and creating that pre-release buzz, but from a practical view, it really helped us — even though we were all at the time like, “Oh, God, we’ve got to get this thing out!”

KT: I’m fascinated with that event. I probably spend too much time on it in the book. I would love to be able to go back and be a fly on the wall, watching all of that happen.

RP: I did a lot of drinking afterwards.

Question and Answer Session

Q: You mention little distributors. From what countries?

RP: The French Company, Metropolitan, is not small but it is family owned and run by Sammy and Victor Hadida. The English company, Entertainment, was a relatively big distributor as well but it was also run by two brothers. If I’m not mistaken, the Spanish company, Aurum, was a bit smaller and family owned. Some of the Eastern European countries, they were smaller. They might have been big for their country, but not necessarily big compared to the studios. And no matter the size of any of these companies, they were being asked to buy all three films in advance. For some of them, it was a big part of their budget, having to pay for three and not seeing the third one till years later. Now, obviously after the first they knew they had a hit, but what if the first one hadn’t been a hit? Then they would have had to survive for another two years. It would have been difficult and was a gamble. It’s just great that the gamble paid off! And they were all great at helping to sustain the popularity through their own marketing campaigns.

KT: I do have a case study of the Danish company that distributed Lord of the Rings. It was a branch of a well-established Swedish company, but they were not sure they wanted to keep these smaller branches open in the other Scandinavian countries. The person that I interviewed for this case study was fairly convinced that Lord of the Rings kept them going. They’re now quite a healthy concern, and they invest in local productions. It was a happy ending for them, and that was the kind of thing that was fairly common among these distributors.

Some of the bigger markets, like the U.K., were paying seven or eight million dollars apiece. That was a big investment, as Rick said, for these small companies.

Q: Recently Ian McKellen, about a week ago, was speaking. When he was talking about it, he said it was a great experience, but he said that when he first went down there and started the original filming—later on, he said, obviously he knew that it was a hit and were all cocky and having a great time—but he said that he really didn’t know if Peter Jackson was the man to do this job. He said he really didn’t think Peter was going to be able to pull this together. You were there working that whole time. What was your take? Did you feel that he definitely was going to do it?

RP: I’m the wrong guy to ask, because when I worked for Bob Zemeckis and when I worked for Peter I always believed 100% in their vision – maybe I’m the kind of guy who should avoid cults, because I was totally sold. There was never a moment when I doubted that Peter would pull this sucker off, because everything I saw was awesome. I just had complete faith in the breadth of his vision. This is a guy I’d already seen in post on one movie, so I already knew his ability. Think about the amount of stuff we shot on Lord of the Rings. It was a lot of stuff. We’d have dailies every night. They were three hours long. That’s a lot of film to watch. Peter could remember every shot. You’d be in the cutting room and he’d go, “There’s that one shot where Ian did blahblah.” “What?” “It was take five. Yeah, that’s the shot.”

Also, along with Peter, there’s Fran Walsh and she is very much a part of the success of that creative partnership. By the time Rings came along, they teamed up with Philippa Boyens, who’s a wonderful writer and knew a lot about the Tolkien landscape so it became an unbeatable combination. I guess I am the wrong guy, because for me, I … Did you guys ever see that documentary, Hearts of Darkness? It’s about Apocalypse Now. John Milius is talking—I love this part—and he goes down there. And they’re saying something like, “John, he’s lost it! He’s gone native. He’s going crazy. You’ve got to go talk to Francis and talk some sense into him.” John’s like, “You bet! This is nuts.” And he goes in there and comes back and now he’s like, “He knows exactly what he’s doing, it’s going to be great!” Well, I’m that guy.

There’s two times in my life where I felt like what was happening was going to win an Oscar. One was on Forrest Gump, and I felt that when I saw the first cut that Bob screened. The other was when we were making Rings.

KT: I should add, Ian said the same thing to me when I interviewed him. I think a number of the other actors and probably crew members who were invited onto the film probably went back and saw Peter’s early films, which are splatter horror films, comic ones, but they don’t really indicate that he would be able to work on a project of this size. I think Ian probably did that.

RP: For me there was so much elegance to Heavenly Creatures, the way Peter shot that movie, the way he moved the camera, the way he edits from one shot to the next, the way he handled that subject matter. But again, he’s got a really great team. He’s a brilliant director with an amazing producing-writing partner in Fran Walsh.

Q: How many location shots did you have? I mean, where did you film it?

KT: The figure I’ve usually heard is around 140 separate locations, and they are scattered. There aren’t any in the north part of the North Island, but the south part of the North Island and much of the South Island were used. Some of those locations were extremely remote. They had to have roads built to them and in some cases you went in by helicopter.

RP: Yes, in some cases the army corps of engineers actually built us some roads. It was great, because for them it was practice. So they were always willing to build another road. And we’re going, well, we could use another road.

The remarkable thing about it is, outside of Hobbiton which was on private land, a lot of the stuff we shot was on public land or a combination of private and public. So, for example, Edoras, which is on this rocky kind of hilly mountain kind of a thing, in the middle of this valley that cuts into a V, and it is like a wind tunnel. It’s incredibly picturesque, but to get there is two miles of roads and three little bridges, and it was quite a deal. Every place that we built at, all the tussock, which looks by the eye to be just little scraggly plant life, was pulled out and kept protected and watered for a year. Then when we were done, they replanted it all back. So if you go to that location, it looks like it looked like when we reccied [reconnoitered] it, when we went on the first scout.

The structures on this hill were built to handle 120 mile an hour winds, because there were 120 mile and hour winds part of the year. Those were all taken out, and the whole thing was put back. We put a lot of effort into making sure we weren’t hurting the pristine New Zealand landscape, because it’s such a beautiful place.

We shot on this mountain, which is a volcano, called Ruapehu. Ruapehu and the peaks around it are sacred mountains to the local Iwi, which are the tribes from that area. We had an agreement that we wouldn’t show the peaks in the movie. We could shoot on the mountains, but we wouldn’t actually put the peaks in. When we were on this one section of it and there was this 300-year-old moss. We obviously didn’t want to hurt it, and that was part of the agreement. So we hired the local high-school rugby teams all around that area to carry these big rolls of carpet up the hill, hump it in, because by the way, we weren’t allowed to use choppers in the area as well. We had to hump all this stuff in there and then lay it in there. A lot of the shots were waist-up, because if you showed the ground, there’d be all this carpet. There was a lot of care put into it everywhere we shot.

But on the flip side, it meant that the whole country got involved. It wasn’t just us trying to do this. At one point we had 3000 people on payroll. There were 50,000 items actually built for it, from artisans all over the country. Every community we went into, there were extras in those scenes. You look at Hobbiton. Half those people are from Matamata and the surrounding areas. Everybody got into it, and that really helped us keep our energy going. Because a fifteen-month or a fourteen-month shoot is quite a long shoot.

Q: There are rumors that there’s possibly twice as much that was actually shot than what was needed. There were rumors that Peter may come up with this super-deluxe version. [Partially inaudible, but asks if Rick has seen such footage.]

RP: I actually don’t know the answer. I’m not trying to be coy. We did shoot a lot. My poor crew, when I was directing my unit—if you want to call it directing—I shot a lot of takes, because I didn’t want them ever have to reshoot anything I did, because we had a limited amount of time. So I overshot.

But in terms of sequences, I actually don’t know. Obviously not every single thing that was shot ended up in the film. But we did put a fair amount back in, in those extended cuts. I don’t know, I’d actually be more interested, and I think Peter has even commented about a documentary in the book. For me, I’d be interested, if that ever happened. In terms of other sequences, we never shot Bombadil, so it’s not like that’s coming back.

Q: [Largely inaudible, but apparently asking about a part of a scene in which Gandalf is teaching Frodo Elvish.]

RP: We definitely cut down some of those sequences, but to be honest, I don’t remember big chunks of additional story beats that would create a whole new scene, if you will. It might just be an extension of one.

KT: The statement that Rick said that Peter had made was basically that Peter has said he might go back and do a sort of diary on film of the making-of, and he says that that’s the context in which he would like to see any extra scenes. He doesn’t want to cut them into the actual film, but he wouldn’t mind having those trims or whatever in that kind of a context. So maybe someday he will.

RP: Yeah, I think that would be fascinating, because a lot of these things—I don’t know what was behind every single aspect, so that would be quite cool—and a cool way to see that other stuff you were talking about.

Part 3 to follow