Huzzah! I’m just going to pretend I didn’t see that bit where the elves are snowboarding through the trees and shooting arrows at the Dwarves as they escape in the barrels. Nothing to see here folks, move along!
Oh, and, Smaug. Yum.
Posts Tagged: J.R.R. Tolkien
Who doesn’t love LEGO? As a child with a strong sense of imagination, and a tendency to be happy enough staying indoors on a rainy day, LEGO was a door that allowed me to enter into an infinite number of other worlds. My time with LEGO and my time discovering Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings didn’t quite intersect, but they’re both formative parts of my childhood and adolescence. Hell, I have a LEGO set of Gandalf’s carriage, from the beginning of Fellowship of the Ring sitting on my desk at work right now.
Based on the layout of Helm’s Deep featured in Peter Jackson’s film adaptation, this 150,000 brick set piece is astounding. The artists, who go by the names Rich-K and Big J, apparently, nail the atmosphere and scale of the conflict of one Lord of the Rings most iconic scenes. At the time these photos were taken, the model was about 90% complete, with an estimated four months worth of work. The time, money and personal investment that must have gone into this project is impressive.
More photos of this LEGO Helm’s Deep can be found on the artist’s MOCpages post.
I happened across these maps a couple of weeks ago on the Fantasy sub-Reddit (enter at your own risk), and they haven’t left my mind. So, like any thought that won’t escape, I felt it’d be best to set it free so I can move on.These maps are hand-made, and gorgeously textured. The map-fetishist in me (and, frankly, the ol’ Warhammer fan) is madly in love. It’s been discussed to death, but there’s something magically tangible about a good map, one on paper, or leather and hung on a wall, and I’d love to see how these models appear in person. Read More »
According to First Things, J.R.R. Tolkien once nixed a film adaptation of his classic novel, Lord of the Rings, by the Beatles. Better yet, the film was to be directed by Stanley Kubrick.
Via Patheos, First Things lays out the original plans:
Once upon a time, the Fab Four—having slain the pop charts—decided to set their sights on the Dark Lord Sauron by making a Lord of the Rings feature, starring themselves. One man dared stand in their way: J.R.R. Tolkien.
According to Peter Jackson, who knows a little something about making Lord of the Rings movies, John Lennon was the Beatle most keen on LOTR back in the ’60s—and he wanted to play Gollum, while Paul McCartney would play Frodo, Ringo Starr would take on Sam and George Harrison would beard it up for Gandalf. And he approached a pre-2001 Stanley Kubrick to direct.
More details came from a conversation between Paul McCartney and Peter Jackson, who successfully managed to coerce the Tolkien estate into giving up the film rights to the trilogy (something that Christopher Tolkien still hasn’t lived down):
McCartney told Jackson about the failed scheme when the two bumped into each other at the Academy Awards: “It was something John was driving and J.R.R. Tolkien still had the film rights at that stage but he didn’t like the idea of the Beatles doing it. So he killed it,” Jackson told the Wellington Evening Post in 2002.
“There probably would’ve been some good songs coming off the album,” said Jackson.
That Tolkien didn’t care for the Beatles will come as no surprise to fans of either one, but Tolkien’s letters give us a hint that his opposition to the Beatles may have had a more personal dimension.
I think the real question, though, is whether the Beatles/Kubrick film would have managed to feel even more like an acid trip than the terribly awesome (or awesomely terrible) Ralph Bakshi adaptation.
Art by John Howe
One evening, I had the chance to sit down with Steven Erikson and several other people over a glass of wine and dinner. It was a wonderful evening, full of laughs, camaraderie and discussion. Despite what you might think, me being a book blogger and Steve being a popular author, only a small portion of the evening was spent discussing fiction, books or writing. However, one short conversation, not with Mr. Erikson but with one of his friends, led me to think a lot about why I read, and when I read.
The conversation began with a question, “Do you read before bed?”
Some of us answered no, others, including myself, said, “Yes, I can’t fall asleep otherwise.” Those who answered “no,” had some interesting reasons, though they escape me now, but one of the other diners, a woman whose name I’m sorry to say I can’t remember, began talking about why she reads before bed. She made an observation that has stuck with me since. You see, she reads before bed because it allows her to put aside the events of her day, the events that might be coming the next day, and immerse herself in the emotions, problems and triumphs of the people living in the fiction she holds in her hands. Instead of falling asleep thinking about what needs doing tomorrow, or how her exam went poorly, she falls asleep wrapped in thoughts of these characters, wandering through these other landscapes. Read More »
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