Hey folks, Harry here with the latest on the astounding Cricket match between New Zealand and England, where New Zealand apparently cricketed England's bloomers clean off. Well, seems Peter not only took over during every break in the game, but he's all over the place. A couple of days ago he was recording HELM'S DEEP noises, but today he was in a Los Angeles bookstore where Quint ambushed him with a movie poster and a camera to catch him in the act. Between post-production on LORD OF THE RINGS and the publicity of running an Oscar campaign... Things have got to be a bit hectic. Though my heart goes out to any poor soul that must lead orc chants & touch the hand of a salty seaman... Rough week....

NYC Alert!!!

Please join Peter Jackson (director), Fran Walsh, (screenwriter and co-producer), Howard Shore (composer), and Christopher Lee (actor) for an in-store discussion of "THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RING" on Friday, February 22, from 5:00 to 6:00 p.m. at Barnes & Noble, Union Square (33 East 17th Street), New York City!

Now here's those LA pics of Quints...

Undeniable proof that I'm one of the luckiest people in the world. Don't hate me too long...

-The fucking salty rat bastard.

Hey, everyone. "Moriarty" here. I was also at today's booksigning. In fact, I'm hidden quite craftily in that top photo. Peter dropped all sorts of news on those lucky enough to slip inside for the small Q&A (40 fans total) before Brentano's actually let in the bloodthirsty mob outside. For example:

THE TWO TOWERS trailer will be attached to FELLOWSHIP in mid-March, during the final weeks that the film is in theaters. It will be placed just after the last shot of Frodo and Sam and just before the credits. It's over three and a half minutes long.

FX teams are currently shooting miniatures, including Cirith Ungol, which Peter seemed quite pleased hadn't leaked online yet. "It's amazing," he promised.

Peter just finished cutting the new version of FELLOWSHIP that will be on DVD, which should be 30 minutes longer. There are new scenes with Aragorn and Boromir described by Peter as "high drama," and we will also see Galadriel give gifts to each member of the Fellowship. Expect more material about the relationship between elves and dwarves, too, as well as scenes we "don't know anything about yet."

Elijah Wood and Sean Astin will be returning to NZ in June to shoot new scenes that Fran Walsh has recently written involving Gollum, which is the material for THE TWO TOWERS currently being edited by Jackson. Andy Serkis is still shooting his motion capture material for the films.

RETURN OF THE KING starts with the reforging of Narsil in the foundry of Rivendell.

I'm sure there was more, and I'll do my best to think of it and update this story later this evening.

In the meantime, Quint's a punk for not mentioning me. I could have left his ass twisting in the wind outside, that poster clutched to his desperate little chest. But I got him inside where the action was. And does he even mention me? Or the Holy Grail of all LOTR items that I got Peter, Fran, and Philippa to sign for me? Or how nice everyone from New Line and Wingnut was to us? Or how cool Peter was for taking a private moment to talk to us before starting the signing for everyone else?

No. And for that, he will be punished. Oh, yes... he will.

Here's KiwiChick...

Dear Harry,

You ran a piece last week about recording battle sounds for LOTR (Two Towers) at a cricket match. Well, the KiwiChick, her Elderly Parent (long-time Tolkien fan) and the Junior KiwiChick were there and are proud to say that not only did New Zealand TOTALLY trash the Brits in the game, but 25,000 volunteers had a great time being Orcs at the battle before Helm's Deep. Lord Peter J came out (barefoot, in shorts) to a massive standing ovation, before leading everyone in stamping (the stadium seriously shaking), chest thumping, cheering and chanting in the Black Speech (I'd tell you what the chant was but then I'd have to kill you, as friends on the crew kept telling us during filming). I thought cricket was especially appropriate, as it's a totally Tolkien sport, with lots of breaks for eating and drinking. This has got to be THE most participative movie ever made!

KiwiChick

here's Filthymonkey...

Harry

Well heres an update from the Lord Of The Rings sound recording at the cricket in Wellington.

First up Peter Jackson came out and explained that the sound was for the battle at Helms Deep he then asked everyone to stamp their feet up and down like they were marching which in a stadium filled with 25,000 people sounds so cool you could almost see the troops of orcs marching to battle. Next up was some chanting in orc now i'm not an expert in the black language but it went kinda like this Darbgoo Darshshoo,Darbgoo Darshnoo, or somthing like that. Next we had to rhythmicly slap our chests,then they wanted to experiment with sounds and got us to all whisper and then to hum and then we had to growl/cheer like we were being addressed by the commamders of the army and were getting ready to kick some butt then he thanked us all and said we could look forward to hearing ourselves in the film and left it was a lot of fun and it was amazing the controll he had over a stadium full of boozed up cricket fans and in case you wanted to know New Zealand won the cricket.

The Filthymonkey

Here's the longest report...

Hey Harry,

Long-time reader... blah blah blah.

I was at the NZ-England Cricket match in Wellington yesterday, so I thought I'd tell you about the LOTR sound recording. Now the sound effects they recorded weren't sounds from the match itself, but of the crowd between innings (half time).

PJ came out onto the field with his trademark shorts and bare feet and got a massive ovation. Being that this was the Wellington stadium and PJ's a Wellingtonian you can probably imagine that he's a rather popular chap.

There were eight microphones placed around the crowd, and PJ was on the mic orchestrating the crowd. He explained that the first lot of noises he wanted were for the Orcs before the Battle of Helm's Deep.

First off the whole crowd (20,000 people) stamped their feet in time with PJ's, which were shown up on the big screen. Then it was the same thing with chest thumping.

The third one was the toughest, an Orcish language chant. Now being a dumbass, I didn't think to take a pen with me to copy it down. The words were put up on the big screen and at first everyone was "How the fuck do you say that!" But, PJ barked it into the mic, and everyone got the idea. Still, the crowd had to do it four times to get it right. This was followed by random gutrurral yelling, and that was it for being an Orc.

After these were some other sounds, but PJ didn't say where in the movie they'd be used. Firstly everyone in the crowd whispered, no words in particular. Then everyone wheezed. This was probably the worst of all since PJ didn't explain it too well. After the first attempt was a bit of a failure, he changed it to taking a deep breath. And then humming any song at all. And that was it. As he left the pitch a chant of "Oscar! Oscar!" started in patches around the stadium. And then NZ destroyed England, which rounded out a great day's entertainment.

I am known as Rubber

and then here's the pic from the event...

Hi Harry,

First time writing in so, just the facts man...

Scanned this pic for you this morning (Monday) from the Herald Sun newspaper (Melbourne Australia). Apparently those reports of WETA recording sound effects for part 2 (and 3?) of LOTR's at the England/New Zealand One-Day cricket match were spot on... Even the main man was there, leading the crowd in chants and marching for the sounds he wanted....

Notice they shot him with a wide angle lense (Sorry, cheap shot!!!)

Hope you enjoy.

Kilar