Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (2003)

This is the third film in the highly successful series

Summary

-Gandalf, Aragorn and their Army of Men descend into Sauron's territory to draw his attention away from Mount Doom, where Frodo and Sam are attempting to destroy the One Ring

Cast

-Noel Appleby: Everard Proudfoot

-Sean Astin: Sam

-Sean Bean: Boromir

-Cate Blanchett: Galadriel

-Orlando Bloom: Legolas

-Billy Boyd: Pippin

-Alistair Browning: Damrod

-Bernard Hill: Theoden

-Elijah Wood: Frodo

-Ian McKellen: Gandalf

-Viggo Mortensen: Aragorn

-Dominic Monaghan: Merry

-John Noble: Denethor

-John Rhys-Davies: Gimli

-Liv Tyler: Arwen

-Hugh Weaving: Elrond

-David Wenham: Faramir

Did You Know?

-Several hundred members of the New Zealand Army was brought in to serve as extras at the Battle of the Black Gate. They were so enthusiastic during the battle scenes that they got to keep the wooden swords and spears they used

-John Rhys-Davies was suffering from constant rashes due to his Gimli makeup. He didn't hesitate to throw his Gimli mask into the fire during the last day of photography

-Andy Serkis and Elijah Wood were both given prop rings by Peter Jackson and they both thought they had the only one

-Elijah Wood has the ability to stare for long periods without blinking. This came in handy during the scene where he is wrapped in the cocoon from the spider creature Shelob

-Shelob, the large spider in this movie, is based on types of spiders feared most by Peter Jackson, who is largely arachnophobic

-During the scene showing the destruction of Sauron's tower Barad-Dur, special care was taken to make sure that it looked nothing like the destruction of the World Trade Center. To do this successfully, the tower appears to disintegrate from the ground up, the sound made from breaking glass, so that it wouldn't look or sound as if it were exploding

-For the world premiere, 100,000 people lined the streets of Wellington, New Zealand. That's 1/4 of the city's population

-The scenes of the Battle of Pelennor Fields were filmed on a large field populated with rabbits. The location had to be heavily inspected for rabbit holes, which could pose a hazard to all of those who worked on the field

-When Merry and Pippin smoke their pipes at Isengard, Dominic Monaghan, who plays Merry, had to drink milk prior to the scene to keep from throwing up while smoking the pipe

-Orlando Bloom's heroic scene on Mumakil was done in one day on top of a pile of sandbags

-The set used for Minas Tirith was the same set used for Helm's Deep

-The model of Shelob was based on a New Zealand funnel web spider

-The first scene Andy Serkis filmed as Gollum was on Mount Doom near the Cracks of Doom while the last scene was where Gollum and Frodo fight and fall over the ledge

-The beacon system in this film is deeply inspired by history. During the Byzantine-Arab Wars, a system was created to alert those around of an enemy attack. If an attack from the Arabic people came on the border, the beacon fires would be spotted faster than a rider arriving, rulers in Constantinople would learn an attack was underway in hours instead of days. Around the same time, around the 9th century, Chinese rulers had a similar system. Their bonfires had wolf dung in them, which could rise to a high altitude without burning off.

-David Wenham's first day of shooting was the House of Healing scene

-Many black metal bands have taken names from places or characters in Tolkien mythology. Some of these include: Norwegian metal bands Gorogoth, Burzum, Morgul, Swedish metal band Amon Amarth (Mount Doom), Netherlands band Carach Angren (Isenmouthe)

-While filming the scene depicting Saruman's death, Sir Peter Jackson told Sir Christopher Lee how to react after being stabbed in the back. Lee is a decorated WWII veteran with the British Special Forces and he assured Jackson he was aware of what a man who was stabbed in the back sounds like

-On the last day of filming, each cast member received a prop significant to the role they played. Miranda Otto received one of the dresses her character Eowyn wore and her sword. Liv Tyler received the dress Arwen died in. Orlando Bloom received the bow used by Legolas

-In the scene where Shelob stings Frodo, the white foam coming out of Elijah Wood's mouth was caused by two Alka-Seltzer tablets he had hidden under his tongue and chewed up