Yet another day that you’ve all been waiting for in anticipation, although not quite as much. Our quest, much as it had the previous day, did not begin well. But this time it was not because of some strange idea to change the time on random days, but because of something much stranger in some aspects and much more normal in others.
Strange because it is not so common a thing back home, but an extremely common thing here. It was raining. Raining like someone had decided global warming wasn’t enough. New Zealand must be flooded sooner! But to real matters.
Despite the rain, despite the cold, we journey onward to the next point on the map of Middle Earth. We continued on our scenic drive, limited only by traffic, on to Rivendell. Despite the beauty of the elfin kingdom we could only last so long in the pouring rain. Note that in The Fellowship of the Ring it never rains in Rivendell.
But. Our first step, as before, was to locate the correct location. This proved much easier then before. Not only were there newly posted signposts and official maps declaring, Rivendell, but seeing as Rivendell included so many scenes in so many locations, just about every tree and blade of grass you could identify was in the movie.
But to be more specific. Our quest for Rivendell began in a glade, spotted with overgrown bushes in various stages of green and brown. Hiding back behind the glade was a plethora of towering trees that would make the Californian Red Woods proud. One tree stood out particularly from the rest, mostly because of the fact that it was actually separated from the rest of the forest. Whether this particular tree was in the film or not is yet to be known.
After that we continued on to a little path where we happened upon a sign, which not only described a bit of Rivendell but gave some specific pictures and quoted a short scene that had been cut from the movie and was not even added back into the extended addition. The scene is as follows:
“Quite and still, please. Quite and still!” The female’s voice rings out though the bush of Kaitoke, and suddenly the only sounds to be heard are cicadas, the gentle breeze on the trees, and the splashing of a near waterfall in the dappled sunlight.
Gandalf the Grey, in serious though, emerges from inside the Last Homely House. As he reaches the ancient stone steps, Elrond hastens up to him.
“Gandalf! Gollum has been seen!”
The wizard pauses for a moment, then turns to Elrond his eyes clouded over with concern. “Speak nothing of this.”
Together the pair descend in silence to the waiting Fellowship in the leafy glade below.
But for the specific scenes. If you will turn to your movie The Fellowship of the Ring. The scene on our DVD scene selection is titled, Rivendell. Shocker there. These scenes continue on for a good ten minutes if not more. I unfortunately can not really point out any specific scene, however, most simple backgrounds lacking anything extraordinary were filmed at the park. But to point out a kind of specific.
As the film enters the Council of Elrond one sees a tree (manufactured) a waterfall (who knows where that came from) various buildings (they were actually at the park when we got there, no wait) and then the bushes in the foreground of the shot. The bushes (and buildings originally) were somewhere along the path we walked on.
Might as well point out that the beautiful scene between Aragorn and Arwen was not filmed here (not even close), but in a hotel. You’re currently thinking; Yeah, right. But it was. It was filmed in the luxurious hotel gardens. Very luxurious. Very expensive. Especially the expensive part.
I must mention one more part of the Rivendell we saw that I know was in the first movie. If you climb down the path and down a ledge you will find yourself on a small, rocky beach, looking out over the rushing waters of a random river. If you were to walk to the edge of the beach and look upstream, you would see the location where a building was built on stilts so Frodo and Bilbo could look out into the forest when they met in Rivendell.
Onward with our quest! We boldly ventured from the bright and prosperous Rivendell into the very heart of Mordor, which was some two or three hours away. Your DVD, ladies and gentlemen. No need to look very far this time. If you wish, you can even skip going to your DVD menu and just start watching the first movie. If you will recall (or watch), Lady Galadriel, elf queen of Lothlórien, retells the tale of Sauron’s reign over Middle Earth.
Men and elves alike rise up against him in a horrible battle. Wait! Pause! Backup. The VERY first scene that flashes onto your screen of the battle is the scene. Just about everything else was graphics. The scene where Isildur’s father is killed and thrown against a rock might also be at the location we saw, but I don’t know. Anyway.
So. For those of you lacking a TV and/or a movie. The scene is an army (you can only see a small portion of the army in the scene) of men, marching through a wasteland. So, yeah. That’s what we saw. A wasteland of jagged black rocks. Except it was covered in snow.
The scene of the Mordor battle was in fact filmed at a ski field, so obviously it must have been filmed in summer. We were however, at the ski field (on top of the mountain) in spring. So there was a lot of snow.
We now move forward and backward at the same time. We move forward in the movie, forward in Middle Earth’s history and forward by walking (literally there were two scenes filmed several yards away from each other). And we move backward…actually I don’t know how. But I’m sure we did somehow!
Alrighty. Extract your DVD and put in…um…The Two Towers (a new movie, how exciting!), the first disc if you have the extended version. At least I think it’s the first disc. Yeah. The scene is titled The Taming of Sméagol (uh…the scene is extended so if you don’t have the extended version, I don’t know if it’ll be on there).
Sam and Frodo are in woe as the travel across the deserted wastelandish rocks that precede The Dead Marshes and Mordor. For those with the DVD, start that scene and pause immediately. For those without the DVD, but in possession of the VHS, Frodo and Sam have just climbed down Sam’s elven rope. And…the scene changes (the fog should have cleared. If it hasn’t, keep going). And hold it. We were there! We didn’t actually know it at the time, but after comparing photos we realized that this was actually right next to Mead’s wall, which was the location of another scene we were looking for. I’ll get to that in a second.
If you’re still a little confused, Sam says a moment later, “Mordor. The one place in Middle Earth we don’t want to see any closer. The one place we’re trying to get to. It’s just where we can’t get.” Some time in that dialogue it switches to what they’re looking at and then goes back to the little valley with the river at the bottom.
Oh, and a bit of trivia. So, you see the duo climbing up those rocks in the scene after they climb down Sam’s rope. Those rocks look like they extends for a long time, right? Wrong! If they were to move back just a couple feet, they would go plummeting to their doom. It’s a cliff, people! Must have been a bit scary filming that.
Well, on to the wall. So, the real reason that we were at this ski field was to see Mead’s wall. Hah! You don’t even need to change scenes. Fastforward. Keep going. Keep going. Wow, that’s a long scene. Keep going. And stop (yet again, extended scene. I don’t know what you have). You’re looking at an overhead scene that’s looking down on Frodo and Sam, asleep. Gollum will start talking in a moment, saying (in a really raspy voice I might add), “They’re thieves. They’re thieves. Filthy little thieves.” And so on. Woe to Gollum.
So, let this scene play out as long as you want. That wall Gollum is climbing down and the ground Sam and Frodo are sleeping on consists of Mead’s wall and the area around it (yet again covered in snow when we saw it). Unfortunately, it was snowing when we did this, so we didn’t bring out our trusty little laptop to match everything up. Therefore, we’re a little blurry about where this was exactly. But you get the idea.
Ah, and also. When Gollum says, ‘They’re thieves’ for the second time, you get a shot looking up at him at the top of a wall. This wall is not Mead’s wall. I don’t know if it’s graphics or what, but we didn’t get to see it wherever it was.
So, back to me! I climbed up on the wall on a nice flat surface that we thought might have been the filming location and got a couple photos just like any good tourist (and there were a bunch of sledders who I’m sure were rolling their eyes at us). Where we took the photos probably isn’t where it was filmed but it was really hard to even get up on that flat surface it was so slippery. So, that’s okay.
It was cold. It was windy. I wish we had gone back. But the roads were too bad for our tiny little car. I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again. It was cool.
Pant, pant. I think I’m writing too many of these really long journal entries. What happened next? Ah. I don’t remember. No, wait. I remember. Okay, this one is going to be short guys.
We were originally going to go to two scenes, but we ended up only seeing one, but I’ll describe them both. The first is after Sméagol/Gollum has been captured by Sam and Frodo (way, way after. It’s the scene right after everyone starts heading for Helm’s Deep). Sméagol is clawing his way down a river, trying to catch a fish. Sam calls out, “Hey, stinker, don’t go getting too far ahead!”
Frodo turns to him and asks, “Why do you do that?”
And then they start arguing (by the way, the scene is on the first disc (for extended version people) of The Two Towers. The scene’s called, The Forests of Ithilien). So, yeah. We didn’t see that river.
But, we did see a waterfall. Hah, I don’t even have to look up this scenes name. It’s called The Forbidden Pool (second disc of The Two Towers). For those still confused, it’s after Frodo and Sam have been captured by Feramir . Feramir takes Frodo out to this really big waterfall that splashes into a pool where Sméagol’s hanging out. The line you’re looking for is Feramire saying, “To enter the forbidden pool bears the penalty of death.” (and then Sméagol starts singing about fish later).
So, where they’re standing is who knows where, but we saw the pool. And I can tell you, it doesn’t look like anything in the movie. However, we did sit around it and eat lunch, even though a lot of the rocks in the pool in the movie aren’t there any more for whatever reason.
So, we did get out our laptop, but it didn’t help much. The pool just doesn’t really look like anything in the movie. It’s too green and there’s not enough rocks. It also decided to rain, joy. But, it was a decent lunch, not too crowded.
And then the path back to the car wasn’t too long, which was good because we kept running back and forth to get things. Oh, and we did look at the falls from an overhead view and a straight on. There was a nice little lookout that we hung out at a little bit. But we weren’t sure which side the overhead shots were filmed on. This side or the other side? Well. I wouldn’t have guessed these falls were in the movie, if I hadn’t been told. Wait, maybe it’s a conspiracy!
