The Lord of the Rings (movie series)

The Lord of the Rings is a set of three fantasy movies: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001), The Two Towers (2002) and The Return of the King (2003). The movies were based on J. R. R. Tolkien's book The Lord of the Rings.
The plot of The Lord of the Rings is about the war of the peoples of the fantasy world Middle-earth against a dark lord known as "Sauron." At the same time they try to destroy a ring which would give Sauron a lot of power if he got it, but the only place to destroy the ring is deep into Sauron's land Mordor.
The movie trilogy was directed by Peter Jackson. The screenplay was written by Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, and Peter Jackson. It was distributed by New Line Cinema.
These were the first live-action Lord of the Rings movies made. They were filmed in New Zealand from October 1999 to December 2000, and released separately in December 20012003 by Warner Bros.
The movie trilogy
The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002)
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
Cast
The cast includes:
Elijah Wood as Frodo Baggins
Ian McKellen as Gandalf
Viggo Mortensen as Aragorn
Sean Astin as Samwise "Sam" Gamgee
Dominic Monaghan as Meriadoc "Merry" Brandybuck
Billy Boyd as Peregrin "Pippin" Took
Orlando Bloom as Legolas
Craig Parker as Haldir
John Rhys-Davies as Gimli and the voice of Treebeard
Sean Bean as Boromir
David Wenham as Faramir
Liv Tyler as Arwen
Ian Holm as Bilbo Baggins
Andy Serkis as Smeagol/Voice and motion-capture of Gollum/Voice of Witch-king of Angmar
Christopher Lee as Saruman
Bernard Hill as Theoden
Miranda Otto as Eowyn
Karl Urban as Eomer
Brad Dourif as Grima Wormtongue
Marton Csokas as Celeborn
Cate Blanchett as Galadriel
Hugo Weaving as Elrond
John Noble as Denethor
Sala Baker as Sauron/"Maggoty-Bread" Uruk/Stunts
Harry Sinclair as Isildur
Lawrence Makoare as Lurtz/Gothmog/The Witch-king of Angmar/Stunts
Paul Norell as the King of The Dead
Bruce Spence as the Mouth of Sauron
Joel Tolbeck as Orc Lieutenant
Nathaniel Lees as Ugluk/Stunts
Bruce Hopkins as Gamling
John Bach as Madril
Bruce Phillips as Grimbold
Alistair Browning as Damrod
Jed Brophy as Sharku/Snaga
Bret McKenzie as Figwit
Peter McKenzie as Elendil
Sadwyn Brophy as Eldarion
Ian Hughes as Irolas
Mark Ferguson as Gil-galad
Changes from the book
Compared to the book, the Lord of the Rings movies differed in many ways. The plot and motivation of the characters changed, and parts of the story were cut. A few changes that many consider major include: "The Old Forest", "In the House of Tom Bombadil", and "Fog on the Barrow-Downs", from The Fellowship of the Ring; "Many Partings", "Homeward Bound", & "The Scouring of the Shire" from The Return of the King. These were left out, and other passages changed, because of dramatic flow and practical limits on what could be presented in three movies. The scripts are not exactly true to the story in the volumes of the book, yet have most of its most important elements.
Trivia
Together the three movies were nominated for 30 Oscars at the Academy Awards. They won 17 Oscars, 11 of which were for Return of the King.
The 3 movies cost 281 million dollars to make.
Much of the filming was done in New Zealand, but some areas were made using computers.
Each movie has a Special Extended Edition DVD which has a longer version of the movie.
Together the movies are longer than 11 hours.
All together the movies have more than 3,500 special effects.
Each movie was released a few weeks before Christmas in 2001, 2002, and 2003.
The movies made nearly 3 billion dollars.