Kindness of Strangers

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Even if you’re not a huge fan of the movies, no trip to New Zealand is complete without a little Lord of the Rings touring. For those uninitiated readers, all three movies were filmed in one fell swoop in the country, and the result has been an upswing in tourism and interest in the films. Lord of the Rings tours proliferate like Ring Wraiths in these parts, with most focusing on different filming locations. We decided to tour Hobbiton, New Zealand’s largest LOTR attraction, which is really home to The Shire. New Line Cinema requested that all sets be destroyed, but the owners of the sheep farm, where The Shire was filmed, negotiated to keep a few pieces intact, making it the only place in the country where the public can see the remaining set pieces. (Allegedly, New Line asked for a second park lot to be built on-site after the contract was signed, and the owners didn’t demand a revision of the contract; the movie studio appreciated the show of good faith.)

Hobbiton is located outside the town of Matamata. As you stroll down the sleepy main street, a sign reading, “Welcome to Hobbiton” greets you, with a creepy, totally inaccurate concrete statue of Gollum in the foreground. Asian tourists maraud the streets like bandits, snapping photos of anything and everything — even us, sitting in a cafe. Needless to say, we were a little concerned about the tour, with cost $58 NZ (about $35 US), and which our guidebook warned us was stripped of the marvelous Hobbit Hole exteriors (due to copyright laws) and was really just a working sheep farm.

We loaded a bus nicknamed Gandalf and started the tour (luckily, it was only us and four Germans). “There’s the high school”, the driver pointed out, on the right. Soon, we were deep into Hobbiton facts. Over 1,000 people auditioned to be Hobbit extras, 300 were selected, and 16 of those were from Matamata. Everyone signed a confidentiality agreement that they wouldn’t reveal their involvement in the film until the release of the third movie. In a town this small, where the local high school was being showcased on a $58 tour, I couldn’t imagine keeping that kind of secret.

We drove through rolling green hills dotted with white sheep, the kind of landscape we’ve been motoring past for days, but suddenly everything felt magical. The filming location was discovered during an aerial location scouting trip, and it met the requirement of what The Shire must look like: rolling green hills; a large, symmetrical tree; and a lake. A contract was negotiated with The Alexander Family, who continued farming their sheep during filming on another piece of the 1,250 acre property. This working farm was quickly transformed into a Hollywood movie lot. A road was constructed by the New Zealand army onto the site. Peter Jackson rented out the neighbor’s house (they were compensated with an all-expense paid trip to anywhere…in New Zealand), and the day’s film was couriered to Wellington and back every 24 hours.

What struck me immediately about the property was how much it looked like the movie. There is no doubt that CGI effects were extensively employed in the films, and that often filming locations were often “stitched” together. But to look at this stretch of sheep farm is to look at The Shire. I was afraid that I’d be disappointed, that it would look nothing like I imagined, but I was enchanted. We toured the property with an old Kiwi who was obviously enamored with the films and the books. He spouted off countless production facts from memory, everything from how the bridge was constructed, to how the garden plants were grown. Jackson employed a full-time nursery to tend to the plants, and cabbages were injected with hormones to keep them looking fresh. In need of an oak tree that didn’t exist on the property, a dead one was deconstructed from Matamata, “rebuilt,” and suited with artificial leaves imported from Taiwan. Our guide, who obviously loved his job, shared his favorite moments from past tours: there had been Hobbit proposals, six-foot Scandinavians dressed as Frodo, and Japanese girls in blond wigs to resemble Rosie.

The highlight of the tour is the Hobbit holes. They are basic facades, none of them extending beyond a few feet; all of the interior shots were filmed on a sound stage in Wellington. Although their exteriors have been stripped, it is still unexpectedly exciting to see the plain, white faces peeking out of the green hillside, their roofs now teeming with sheep, knowing that you’re walking in the footsteps of movie history. Of course we posed for a photo in Bilbo’s doorway.

Finishing the tour, I had incredible admiration for the level of detail, expertise, and sheer determination that was invested in these films. The amount of work that went into The Shire was mind-boggling – and that was but one small portion of the films. I felt the same way walking out of Weta Cave, the Wellington-based production studio who shares a longtime collaborative partnership with Jackson and is responsible for all the technical elements of LOTR. Whereas Hollywood generally subcontracts their production work, Weta Cave is totally interdisciplinary, providing expertise in everything from costuming to sword making to computer graphics. It is located on a residential street, comprising no more than a few modest buildings, and you can’t help but think, “All of that came from here?”

There’s nothing I’d like to do more than curl up on a couch and watch the movies from start to finish.