Re: The Desolation of Smaug pre-release thread [2] [SPOILERS]

[bungobaggins]

I think the dwarves fab hairdo's get messed up when they fall hundreds of feet on that rickety bridge. That's a pretty big casualty if you ask me.  

[Mrs Figg]

at the risk of more moaning, I just saw the EE clip with Elrond and Gandalf on the bridge while Bilbo stares gormlessly into space and Thorin does some (more) brooding. Whats with the dialogue? ...Dwarves reclaiming their homeland blah blah..Gandalf and his cunning plan yadda yadda....Elrond doubting everything Gandalf says..been there got the T-shirt...what a snoozefest.

[Tinuviel]

I think we're all Gollum here; we both love and hate the films, and it will always be at the forefront of our minds.

[malickfan]

True. We are basically a bunch of angry geeks/drunks/crabbits anyway.

[Eldorion]

Is there any other kind of geek?

[Norc]

yeah, the cool geek aka. hipster..

[Eldorion]

Nope.

[Norc]

oh for f**-

[Mrs Figg]

this is what I want to do to PJ every time Azog comes on screen




and this the rest of the time

[Norc]

next empire mag will feature an interview with martin and benedict ++ talking smaug
http://sherlockology.tumblr.com/post/65355867104/empire-hobbit-smaug

snippet from it here

Benedict Cumberbatch: Playing Smaug was separate from any experience you can ever have as an actor – playing a fire-breathing reptile is quite out there! I just had to dive in at the deep end. I walked out and felt a bit of a prick. But no-one else seemed to notice so that was ok. Martin Freeman: I was coming back from Christmas and Benedict was leaving. We had a quick cup of tea and he was off and I was on to do the Smaug scenes without him. But Peter (Jackson) played me his demo vocal, and I could hear it very clearly in my head. I was reacting to that and to fuckloads of lighting changes. I didn’t work with Ben at all really. Which was kind of ironic considering Sherlock has been bookending this. Peter Jackson: We questioned whether we would have the dragon talking. I couldn’t get Sean Connery from Dragonheart out of my head. We did an animation test with some scenes from film two where the dragon is speaking purely psychically. We are hearing it in Bilbo’s head. It felt odd. Once you saw the dragon talking with Benedict’s voice, it was just fantastic. I had no more Sean Connery issues at that point. Philippa Boyens: He is not anything, except maybe a psychopath. Fran Walsh: He is quite English! Benedict Cumberbatch: It’s not the riddles scene. There are similarities, but it’s not the same. There are size issues. Smaug is bigger than the hobbit. Smaug doesn’t engage with the hobbit the same way Smeagol does. Smaug is on much more of an ego trip. He likes to feel dominant at all times. Phillippa Boyens: The first time I heard Benedict say “I smell you, thief,” it sent shivers through me. - See more at: http://sherlockology.tumblr.com/post/65355867104/empire-hobbit-smaug#sthash.dyYiGhUX.dpuf

[malickfan]

I actually got that empire issue through the post earlier today.

My scanner is broken, but if you can persuade me I might be kind enough to type up the article...

[Norc]

yeah.... that issue won't be here for another month or so i guess... but i'll keep an eye out, i kinda collect them hobbit issues  when i can.. i got two already.

[Eldorion]

So according to a guy on another forum I post at who has watched the AUJ-EE commentary, this is a thing:

Spoiler:

[Tinuviel]

Ummmm.... no. Nope. Nada. I think that fellow is wrong on the middle one. The logic doesn't make sense. And if that's the case, then I'm going to... ugh I don't even know.

[bungobaggins]

None of this is surprising.

Spoiler:

This sounds dumb.

Spoiler:

[Mrs Figg]

affinity? I never heard it called that before.

[malickfan]

So er...is anyone interested in me posting a transcript of the EMPIRE article? My scanner is busted but I can write out the article and post it if you guys want (There are certainly a few  moments in there), minus a few of the snazzy photos unfortunately.

[Norc]

if it is not too much bother, but i am still buying it, and if ur scanner is broken, it'll soon pop up on tumblr anyways so i can post

[Mrs Figg]

maybe some of the best bits, if you dont mind. I wouldnt like you to spend ages on it.
anyway anything would be appreciated.  

[malickfan]

Working on it. Won't be an exact type up as I'm too lazy.

[malickfan]

New EMPIRE Issue Article SPOILERS:

(NOT AN EXACT transcript Edited on account of my laziness-a few sentences and paragraph's cut out or shortened...and sarcastic addtions added... )

Sometimes he dreams up shots. Or lies in bed considering new ways to shoot the scenes listed on the pink or purple call sheets issued the night before. Not out of trepidation; he could direct this world in his sleep by now. That’s the point-to stay fresh, he needs to test himself. He wakes early by nature, 5am usually, and having contemplated Middle-earth, he’ll catch up on Doctor Who or Sherlock on his iPad. There is always the plan: the movies have been conceptualised, storyboarded and pre-vised, with Weta Digital prowling the production likea cheetah stalking antelope. If the muse deserts him, he knows he will be able to get through the day. But when he walks on set, he likes to push all that aside and imagine he’s making Bad Taste again-no money, no rules no stopping him. Peter Jackson turns to admire the set that stretches off in all directions to the limits of his soundstage. ‘Some of the stuff you’ve seen today’ he laughs ‘we’re literally making it up as we go along’.

Today is June 3 2013, and the clouds have burst over Wellington, New Zeland, a portent of Winter currently making its way in from the Antarctic. This if the 3rd week of pick-ups or supplementary shooting, on The Desolation of Smaug and There and Back Again. The production has been challenged with completing filming in this 10 week slot as the actors haven’t been contracted for 2014. Jackson swears by postpartum shooting; it just makes sense ‘You Don’t discover the things you want to fix until you are editing’ he stresses explaining they have it built into the schedule as a matter of course. ‘I don’t understand why most movies with 100’s of Millions’ worth of investment, only go off and do something if it is a total emergency.
Jackson is famously unconcerned with outward appearances, the need for rumour control.He washes his face proudly in public-sharing his endeavours through lively video blogs and the net result is that no one conceives of these pickups as triage rather than the natural extension of his filmmaking process. Indeed by the end of principal production he hadn’t shot a single frame of the BOFA. He has the confidence to let his storylines and characters evolve before smashing them together in the pell mell of combat.

Empire and Jackson are perched on stools in what appears to be a type of eastern bazaar with drapes of cloth in melon hues dangling from the beams. 2 walls of this waterside emporium open onto the huddle of Lake-town’s timber warren, the scope of which has momentarily drawn the directors attention. Have we visited a shop yet. We’ve seen pubs and markets in Hobbit on-but an actual shop? The specifics, right down to the nails are stunning, a chess game lies on a nearby table.

Sets like this or trippy Mirkwood, solid as oak (being oak) whisper ideas in his head. They cry out for spontaneity, but there are more mundane shop floors no more than 200 feet from here where Jackson’s design minions measure everything to the letter of Tolkien’s books.

‘This is the fourth laketown set we’ve bullt and it’s been completely different each time’ he says appreciatively ‘The jumbled crazy wackiness of it is so great you can walk around in it and think of different camera angles’. This is in fact the 5th variation on Laketown according to production designer Dan Hennah, that is if you include the ‘really big one’ for the entrance to the towm where the floating barrels and their bruised dwarves cargo arrive, which was constructed on the backlot. There was also the ‘domestic area, Bard’s hours, the Master’s house and the market place and some streets and markets.

(I’ve skipped out a whole paragraph here-there’s an anecdote by Hennah about how a pub next to Mckellen’s house in London reminding him of Laketown. And Jackson talks about ignoring Del Torro’s blueprint for the film steeping back in time to 10 yrs ago instead)

Months ago on this very stage, they created a river that could gather it’s fury to 25 miles per hour. When your hairy feet can barely scrape the bottom, Martin Freeman can assure you that’s more than enough , to anyone how stayed dry it looked like the best log flume in the world; kidney-shaped about 40 metres long with an island in the middle and an edge of rock that jutted out into the ‘river’. They could add or subtract scenery transforming the landscape. To anyone required to get wet, it was formidable. The channel was 6 ft deep and 10 ft wide, with 3 V8 engines churning 300 tonnes of water, sweeping tree trunks debris and dwarves and hobbits along. ‘The waterline comes up to your chin’ says Freeman with more than a dash of feeling. ‘You properly get carried into rocks and into other barrels, my stuntman really hurt his leg. Bilbo doesn’t even have the safety of his own barrel.

(Not sure if this is a joke about the stunt man or Bilbo actually being barrels in the film)

Taking 12 weeks to complete the barrel sequence will be quilted together with location shoots from thunderous rapids on the North Island, where they throw in unmanned barrels and shots from the perilous river on the south island with the cast (mostly) afloat on the river. They also had wheelie barrels that looked ‘like the Flintstones’ according to Armiatge so that they could peddle along in the water. It’s another elaborate sequence founded on the most practical of set builds and embroided with CGI, as the dwarves famous escape from the woodland realm is hindered by an full on attack by Azog and his gang, arrows, elves and orcs fizzing over their heads as they are swept down river. It’s pure Jackson: the use of every available tool to create something thrilling and funny, a little mad and no not entirely reverential to Tolkien.

‘We have jazzed it up a little from what is in the book’ he confesses of his favourite scene from film two. ‘it will take people by surprise’. It certainly came as a shock to Armiateg ‘I nearly drowned again’ Thorin sighs having been trapped on inside a submarine cockpit on Captain America.

(A couple of boring paragraphs waffling on about CCI pros and cons follow)

By this point I was getting bit bored (both by typing and the article) so it’s just bullet points from here on folks:

-It notes Christian Rivers was shooting 2nd unit for DOS prologue-dwarves and orcs making ‘their grievances felt’ , Rivers asking Jackson’s advice for the best way for Jeffrey Thomas’s Thror to fall over.

Though this made me laugh:

Foremost is the almost physic link he has developed with co-screenwriters Walsh and Boyesn, the brain trust who take the strain of staying faithful to Tolkien as their director let’s his imagination fly. It is touching to observe Jackson defer, with an plaintive shrug, to his partners when discussions tread the treacherous paths of Tolkienhood. Empire tried to recall if the original book had any female characters..
Boyens: No, none at all actually.
Walsh: There are references to Galdariel and Dol Guldor
Boyens: She is not actually ever referenced
Walsh: what about Lobelia?
Boyens:Yes Lobelia
Walsh: That paen to feminity
Boyens: Actually I don’t think she is
Walsh:She is, the silver spoons
Boyens:That is from The Lord of The Rings
Jackson: (Hopefully)Don’t the Sackville-Baggins buy all his furniture when they think he is dead?
Boyens: He always puts that first Rings chapter at the end of The Hobbit (Er, no he doesn’t my edition doesn’t have it, and it wasn’t a personal choice by Professor Tolkien). It feels like there are things in The Hobbit when there are not. Even the spiders are genderless. They do have a scary mother though.
The directors has long claimed that if he provides the energy whimsy and Mirkwoodian log flumes, Boeyns and Walsh are the beating heart of the films, and deserve a good kicking (that bit may or may not have been in the article)

   

-According to the article Jackson has proven a 'fine' eye for casting Tolkien on which the entire world seems to have an opinion…well der!
‘This is Bilbo’s story (apparently). The Hobbit has always been loved because of Bilbo Baggins (except by me I prefer farting Dwarves and action sequences). It even inspired a Vulcan to launch into song. You can’t separate the Thought of The Hobbit from Bilbo Baggins....(or can you?)... I mean they are absolutely interlinked. We need a fantastic Bilbo and we got one.

-There is a nice sub article about the writers cast voicing opinions on Smaug ‘psychopath, greedy vain, fast mobile, on an ego trip’ but no spoilers.

-On bard they have given him a longbow and ‘They’ve fleshed him out a bit, using the things he does in the book. Given him things he deserves (like an annoying family, and a welsh accent). Where Tolkien’s Bard is a bit of a stiff, Jackson and team have transformed the noted arrow man into a more engaging character ‘He’s a bit of a rogue. A Robin Hood type living in a controlled state’ Evans notes ‘His only agenda is to keep his family safe. Bard has lost his wife and is single father to a family who play a ‘incredibly strong role’ in his journey. Also significant is his strained role with the less than wholesome Master of Laketown.

-Short interview with Mckellan, ‘HUGE cows and HUGE pigs’ will be at Beorn’s house, ‘when Radagast is around there is always fun and games’.

-Short interview with Armitage, They establish the political importance of why Thorin needs the Akenstone and why they need a burglar to get it right at the start of the film, Mirkwood is a ‘trippy’ forrest, they spent weeks acting stoned for the scenes set there ‘The dwarves break into two halves after Lake-town’ reveals Armitage ‘Kili gets injured and has to remain behind so the dwarves break.

Short interview with Freeman-no spoilers, just more jovial swearing.

[bungobaggins]

Boyens: No, none at all actually.
Walsh: There are references to Galdariel and Dol Guldor
Boyens: She is not actually ever referenced
Walsh: what about Lobelia?
Boyens:Yes Lobelia
Walsh: That paen to feminity
Boyens: Actually I don’t think she is
Walsh:She is, the silver spoons
Boyens:That is from The Lord of The Rings
Jackson: (Hopefully)Don’t the Sackville-Baggins buy all his furniture when they think he is dead?
Boyens: He always puts that first Rings chapter at the end of The Hobbit (Er, no he doesn’t my edition doesn’t have it, and it wasn’t a personal choice by Professor Tolkien). It feels like there are things in The Hobbit when there are not. Even the spiders are genderless. They do have a scary mother though.

Wait, is this a real conversation from the article? Oh, my.

Thanks for the write-up and leaving out all the bunk.

[bungobaggins]

Also to the topic of Bilbo and barrels, I think it was pretty clear from the trailers/marketing/photos and such, that Bilbo wasn't going to be riding a barrel. It looks like he'd be hanging onto the side of Kili's (Fili's?) barrel. Kinda makes the name "barrel rider" entirely pointless, maybe they'll change it to "barrel clinger."

[Eldorion]

Holy crap at that back-and-forth! This is gold.  Really.

It reminds me of Boyens trying to appear knowledgeable on the ROTK-EE documentaries by saying that the War of the Ring was also fought in the north (true) and that "attacks were made on Rivendell" (never stated anywhere by Tolkien).

Thanks for typing this all up, Malickfan.

[malickfan]

Or maybe barrel scraper...*not that I'm making a sarcastic remark about some of the screenwriting*

And yes that was a un-edited transscript of a discussion by three screenwriters supposedly life long fans of Tolkien who aren't apparently overly knowledgeable of the book thye have spent six years adapting.

Of course Phillpa Boyens not having read The silmarillion for 25 years, Jackson having read the book once before starting pre production on the films couldn't possibly have anything to do with that...

I was tempted to post this over at TORn as well...but It wouldn't be as fun listening to the fnagirls squee.