A Happy Birthday to Bilbo & Frodo Baggins

On This Day

The following event(s) took place in Middle-earth on September 22:

• Birth of Bilbo in the Shire (1290)
• Bilbo and the barrels reach Lake-town just after sunset (S.R. 1341)
• Birth of Frodo in the Shire (1368)
• A long expected party!! (S.R. 1401)
• Bilbo and Frodo’s birthdays (S.R. 1418)
• The Black Riders reach Sarn Ford at evening (S.R. 1418)
• Gandalf overtakes Shadowfax (S.R. 1418)
• The hundred and twenty-ninth birthday of Bilbo and Frodo’s fifty-first birthday (S.R. 1419)
• Saruman comes to the Shire (S.R. 1419)
• Bilbo’s hundred and thirtieth birthday. Frodo’s fifty-second birthday (S.R. 1420)
• They meet the Last Riding of the Keepers of the Rings in Woody End (S.R. 1421)
• Master Samwise rides out from Bag End (S.R. 1482)
  

Hobbit Day & Tolkien Week

“Warner Bros. Pictures, New Line Cinema and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM) are joining the worldwide celebration of Tolkien Week with the debut of the highly anticipated theatrical trailer for “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” on September 19, 2012.

The week-long Tolkien Week celebration encompasses the 75th anniversary of the publication of The Hobbit novel and the worldwide celebration of Hobbit Day.

The American Tolkien Society first proclaimed Hobbit Day and Tolkien Week in 1978, though Hobbit Day celebrations existed prior to its official recognition. Tolkien fans the world over celebrate by having parties and feasts emulating Hobbit celebrations as described in the books.

The new trailer is set to debut on broadcast and online media on September 19, 2012, then roll out in theaters around the world throughout the day. The first satellite feed will be coordinated worldwide at 14:00 Greenwich Time; the second satellite feed at 17:00 Greenwich Time. Satellite coordinates are TBA.

The celebration will continue on Friday, September 21, with activities related to the 75th anniversary of the book’s publication, which occurred on that same day in 1937.

On Saturday, September 22, fans around the world will recognize Hobbit Day—marking the birthdays of Bilbo and Frodo Baggins, the Hobbits who are the unlikely heroes of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings, respectively—with Hobbit Day parties and celebrations. Bilbo and Frodo were both said to be born on the same day of different years, Bilbo in the year 2890 and Frodo in the year of 2968 in the Third Age (1290 and 1368, respectively, in Shire-reckoning, the Hobbits’ own calendar).

Throughout early September, the Facebook page for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey will roll out a series of features and ideas to create a fun, communal experience leading up to Tolkien Week, including “How to Throw a Hobbit Party” instructions, a “Fan of the Week” contest, and a special app on which fans will be able to share and collect recipes inspired by Middle-earth.

From Academy Award®-winning filmmaker Peter Jackson comes “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey,” the first of a trilogy of films adapting the enduringly popular masterpiece The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien.

The three films tell a continuous story set in Middle-earth 60 years before “The Lord of the Rings,” which Jackson and his filmmaking team brought to the big screen in the blockbuster trilogy that culminated with the Oscar-winning “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.”

Under Jackson’s direction, “The Hobbit” Trilogy has been shot in 3D 48 frames-per-second and will be released in High Frame Rate (HFR) 3D, other 3D formats, IMAX and 2D. Under Jackson’s direction, “The Hobbit” Trilogy has been shot consecutively in digital 3D using the latest camera and stereo technology. Production has taken place at Jackson’s own facilities in Miramar, Wellington, and on location around New Zealand.

“The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” and the second and third films of the trilogy—“The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug” and “The Hobbit: There and Back Again”—are productions of New Line Cinema and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures, with New Line managing production. Warner Bros. Pictures is handling worldwide theatrical distribution, with select international territories as well as all international television licensing being handled by MGM.

“The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” will be released worldwide beginning December 14, 2012, with “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug,” the second film, releasing beginning December 13, 2013, and “The Hobbit: There and Back Again,” the third film, slated for release on July 18, 2014.”

Elijah Wood “Frodo Baggins” gives an interview to Kyle Buchanan in nymag.com

Reprising his role as Frodo Baggins

It’s interesting to note, as theonering.net points out, that if he is going to the U. K. to shoot first, then it could be that Christopher Lee’s principal photography would be taken at the same time. On the other hand, it is a possibility that Wood was talking about shooting for another film in the U. K.

Here is an excerpt from the interview:

When do you go back to New Zealand to shoot The Hobbit?
October. I’m going to the U.K. first to do some shooting, but then I’m going down in October for the New Zealand part.

At what point did you realize you were going to be a part of this prequel?
I had some notion of it over a year ago. Peter and Fran [Walsh] had mentioned the possibility of something that they’d written. At the time, Guillermo [del Toro] was directing. I didn’t read anything, and we didn’t go into too much detail as to what it was going to be, but they’d sort of conceived of this idea of where it could work.

So Frodo will essentially be used as a framing device?
I don’t know that it is. One could probably ascertain or conjecture that it is, because Frodo’s not chronologically in The Hobbit, so I don’t know how else it could exist unless it was just the framing device, unless it was potentially in the middle or the end. To me it makes sense if it’s bookends, but I really don’t know.

So how do you feel knowing that you’ll be back on that set? And that you’ll be directed by Peter Jackson now, not Guillermo?
Oh man, it’s exciting. It’s exciting because it just feels like a ten-year anniversary in a way. A family reunion of sorts. And it’s incredibly unique that a large number of people who were involved with the Rings are involved with The Hobbit: on the crew, on a creative level, and a number of the cast. So it’s going to be very surreal. It’s a unique opportunity to revisit a major part of my life.

How did you feel when Rings ended for the first time? Dominic Monaghan has said that he entered a post-Rings slump.
Yeah, when principal photography was finished and in our minds the journey was over, I didn’t know really what to make of my own life anymore. My life was so defined by that place and those people and that experience.

It’s quite literally like another world that you were in.
Totally. So coming home, I just remember everything feeling kind of foreign. I didn’t really know what to do with my time. It was really bizarre. I was more exhausted than I’ve ever been in my life. I remember feeling like I didn’t want to do anything for a while.

Is that atypical for you?
I always feel like after a project, I definitely want to take a break. It’s always hard for me to jump right into something else. But that feeling was special, it was unique. I didn’t want to work for a while. I wanted to rest, I wanted to be home. But I also just didn’t have any perspective on my life anymore, what that was about. It’s kind of an unsettled feeling. It’s like existing in a place and then being ripped out of it when that place was your home, it was your everything to you for a long time. Sixteen months is a long time. I was 18 when I traveled to New Zealand, and I was about 20 when I left. That’s a fucking huge chunk. You know, major life-changing ages, too. Developmental age time.

Did you feel like you got typecast as Frodo?
Not as Frodo. I mean, I’m 30, but I don’t look 30. So I think that had more to do with it than Frodo necessarily. There’s obviously a very strong association with Frodo, but I think I felt like I was, if anything, more hindered by the fact that I looked younger than I was, and that people may not imagine me playing my age.

Source

Elijah Wood on his role in The Hobbit Films

Reprising his role as Frodo Baggins

TheOneRing.net confirms the way in which Elijah Wood shall begin his role as Frodo Baggins in the movies being made as I write this.

 

If you do not wish to read a spoiler to the movie please do not read further.

 

As readers of “The Hobbit” know, the tale of “The Downfall of The Lord of the Rings” and “The Hobbit or There and Back Again,” are contained in the fictional “Red Book of Westmarch.” In Peter Jackson’s LOTR films, the book is shown on screen and written in by Bilbo and Frodo and handed off to Sam Gamgee.

 

The fictional book, and either the telling from it or the reading of it, will establish Frodo in the films experiencing Bilbo’s story. Viewers are to learn the tale of ‘The Hobbit’ as a familiar Frodo gets the tale as well.

 

Since the speculation is now everywhere around the interwebs, TORn can confirm that as of now, the plans are to feature Frodo in the opening sequence of the films. It is unlikely that studio Warner Bros. or Team Jackson would change the script at this point in response to the web buzz so we may have just “spoiled” December 2012 for some, but we warned you.

 

In this vid from ontheredcarpet.com we see Elijah Wood talking about a bit of what fans will be seeing in the films to come.

http://www.ontheredcarpet.com/video?id=8210135

And here we have Elijah with Jimmy Fallon discussing The Hobbit Films.