|
|
|
|
|
|||
|
Day 5 Shire Reckoning: Mersday, Foreyule 9th. -- Wellington, Isengard, Mt. Victoria, Lothlorien.
Rough start today. Headed down to the bus only to find out that I needed a picnic lunch. With 10 minutes before the bus left I took off to find an open restaurant that sold take-away stuff early on a Sunday morning. 3 Blocks away I find an open Subway! Huzzah for American franchises! Dash in grab two sandwiches and run all the way back. Make it to the bus with a whopping 2 minutes to spare. Go me. (actually go 'living in Colorado where the air is much thinner than Wellington') Bus heads to Mt. Victoria and we are looking for the site of the 'get off the road' shot, Where the hobbits hide from the Nazgul. After climbing a ridiculously steep hill the reminded me a lot of San Francisco, we get to the park and start climbing up the paths. We finally get to the site and it is amazing! It is instantly recognizable. Only frustrating thing is that I can't get a good shot because everyone is crowding the path and they are not moving after they get their pictures... Then everyone starts pressing forward and so no one can get a decent shot because there are hordes of people in their way...sucks. If only folks were less selfish....but just proves human nature and that Kant was too idealistic. But digital magic is a good thing (heheh).
We swing really quickly by Stone Street Studio and Weta Workshops, not much to see on the outside, but man I wish I could get inside!
Head back down to Harcourt Park (?) where they filmed the Isengard scenes between Gandalf and Saruman before Saruman cuts all the trees down. A small surprise. There are some sword demo guys awaiting and they put on a neat sword demo which I got some quick shots of (unfortunately, left Video camera on the bus). They teach some quick staged combat moves to volunteers and let folks play around with the swords.
For Broadband folks (4 Meg Quicktime files) I do enough of this stuff on my own so I wander off to find filming sites in order to avoid a repeat of the Mt. Victoria scene. Find the places on my own and get some really nice shots of multiple areas....took one that will serve as a really nice background plate, have to work up some mischief with that later.
Then we head quickly to Fernside where they filmed the departure of the Fellowship from Lothlorien. This place is just gorgeous. They have pictures there so you can compare the location during filming to the way it looks now, and as beautiful as the location is, the set dressers did a hell of a lot of work. But still the place is very recognizable and I got some great pictures and shot some really nice looking footage. There is no doubt this is Lothlorien.
Back on the bus, you can tell everyone is tired. Everything is very quiet. ROTK soundtrack is going as we head back to Wellington. Everyone is ancy to get back to the hotel to prep for the party...some folks want to try and do shopping....but it is Sunday after 4. I don't think many folks realize that. A group of folks is surfacing, that I will call the "Mumbly Grumbles". These are the folks that complain about everything and anything. Wish they would just stay home. Led by their champion "Pocahantas", these folks are complaining so much I wonder how they make it through their day to day lives. Anyway, back at the hotel to change and get ready for the Return of the Ringers party that TORN is throwing. Should be a blast and I'm totally looking forward to it. ---------------------------------- Just got back from the "Return of the Ringers" party. Took a Cable Car to the top of the Cable Car Skyline Restaurant. Which was very cool. A little slow, but beats the heck out of trying to climb that hill. (sorry for the tense changes but I was really tired when I originally wrote this and wanted to preserve it the way it was written) The place is packed out but it looks like what I can expect from a TORN Ringers gathering. Except there appear to be Vikings or Anglo-Saxons of some sort fighting in the street...full chain mail and shields and all. About a dozen women to every guy...all decked out in excellent costumes or finery. I know as soon as I get there that I'm probably going to get into trouble with Penny...so many good looking women...must.....cage.....eyes. (In reality my wife really doesn't care, and likes checking out all the different costumes anyway). There are some tremendously awesome costumes...it has gotten my dander up and my brain is working on how to make a decent Uruk costume on the cheap. Next time....I will have a costume! Lots of little finger food to nibble on and some killer drinks. I try something new called KGB...Vodka with Lemon type thing...very very good. Had a fantastic time talking to folks from the tour, especially Laura and Liz and Eron and Linda. Really nice folks. Liz wore a pretty neat elf costume, pointy ears and all. Got some fantastic pictures of a lot of the costumes.
Throughout the night, cast and crew were making appearances. The party was really hot and I walked outside to catch some cool air, heading out I run into Lawrence Makoare and Bruce Hopkins coming in. Didn't get real close to Makoare which is unfortunate, because I wanted to see how big he is in person. Went and told a guy who was in a great Theoden outfit that they were there so he could get some pix. Also told Liz and Laura who were pretty much ecstatic and ran out and got pix. Later, Lawrence and Bruce, took the stage with none other than Sir Ian McKellan! Now how cool is that?
Afterwards they retreated to the V.I.P. Area which also had the silent auction...so I wasn't able to check anything and got outbid. So it goes. Then Richard Taylor and Gino Acevido(sp?) from WETA and Sean Astin showed up. Most cool! Sometime in there John Noble showed up, but I kind of missed that, because I had a nice talk with Gino about WETA and King Kong and airbrushing. Then got into a long convo. About the studio system and financing and how premiere's work with Linda, she is very very knowledgable about these things. She knows a ton from the studio point of view, cleared up a lot of gripes I had, actually. They should make a lot of that knowledge more publically known so we fans didn't think we were being hung out to dry. Linda and Eron are very cool. They are dressed normally, but claim to still be in costume, because they have come to the party as the Valar and are simply choosing to appear as regularly dressed folks. Pretty funny. But I'm getting very tired and the party has thinned out a great deal. It was almost 12:30 and we have a long day tomorrow with the red carpet premiere and all so...time to go. On the way out we swing by for a last drink. Catch a sight of Liz and Laura flirting with an older guy...WTF! DENETHOR! This guy is an amazing actor for 1 immediately apparent reason. He is the exact opposite of Denethor (who is a prick). He signed autographs for folks who won the charity auctions and Penny and I got a great picture with him.
We then left the party and walked back to the hotel with a really nice American couple. The woman had a fantastic Eowyn outfit on, but I don't remember their names. :(
On the way back we stop to look at the Cave Troll mounted on the side of a building....there it is big as all get out and I missed it.....I guess I'm Pippin at the end of the Council of Elrond...."Where are we going?"
Duh. Tomorrow the Premiere! Mike Out. |
| ||
Day 6