Useless Movie Trivia
The Lord of the Rings - The Return of the King

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The Lord of the Rings - The Return of the King - Aragorn Poster
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Memorable Quotes

Sam: [about the ring on the slopes of Mount Doom] Then let us be rid of it... once and for all... C'mon Mr. Frodo... I can't carry for you... but I can carry you! C'mon!

Denethor: No tomb for Denethor and Faramir. No long, slow sleep of death embalmed. We shall burn, like the heathen kings of old. Bring wood and oil.

The Mouth of Sauron: My master, Sauron the Great, bids thee welcome. Is there any in this rout with authority to treat with me?

Gandalf: [to Pippin] Now, listen carefully. Lord Denethor is Boromir's father. To give him news of his beloved son's death would be most unwise. And do not mention Frodo, or the Ring. And say nothing of Aragorn either. In fact, it's better if you don't speak at all, Peregrin Took.

Eowyn: I am no man.

Eomer: Now is the hour! Riders of Rohan! Oaths you have taken, now fulfill them all, to lord and land!

Elrond: Anduril, Flame of the West, forged from the shards of Narsil.

Legolas: The stars are veiled. Something stirs in the East. A sleepless malice. The eye of the enemy is moving. He is HERE.

Gimli: Certainty of death. Small chance of success. What are we waiting for?

Gimli: Well, this is a thing unheard of. An Elf would go underground, where a Dwarf dare not. Oh, I'd never hear the end of it.

Treebeard: [as they walk toward the tower] Hroom, young master Gandalf! I'm relieved that you've come. Wood and water, stock and stone I can master, but there's a wizard to manage here. Locked his tower.

Faramir: Where does my allegiance lie if not here? This is the city of the men of Numenor. I would gladly give my life to defend it's beauty... it's wisdom...

Gandalf: Of all the inquisitive Hobbits, Peregrin Took, you are the worst.

Merry, Pippin: You can search far and wide. You can drink the whole town dry. But you'll never find a beer so brown as the one we drink in our hometown. You can drink your fancy ales. You can drink them by the flagon. But the only brew for the brave and tru-u-u-ue comes from the Green Dragon!

Gandalf: This will be the end of Gondor as we know it. Here the hammer-stroke will fall hardest.

Aragorn: This day does not belong to one man but to all. Let us together rebuild this world that we may share in the days of peace.

Gandalf: There was no lie in Pippin's eyes. He told Sauron nothing of Frodo and the Ring. He is a fool, but an honest fool he remains.

Eowyn: He has just as much reason to go to war as you do. Why can he not fight for those he loves?

Pippin: But we have the white wizard. That's got to count for something.

Galadriel: And for you, Frodo Baggins, I give you the light of Earendil our most beloved star. May it be a light to you in dark places when all other lights go out.

Legolas: One that is cursed. Long ago the men of the mountain swore an oath to the last king of Gondor, to come to his aid, to fight. But when the time came, when Gondor's need was dire, they fled, vanishing into the darkness of the mountain. And so Isildur cursed them, never to rest until they had fulfilled their pledge.

Aragorn: What say you? What say you? I am Isildur's heir. Fight for me. And I will hold your oaths fulfilled. What say you?

Trivia

Most of the lines Legolas says in the Extended Edition scene of the Paths of the Dead are direct quotes from the book.

For the Special Extended Edition, the scene in which Pippin is looking for Merry after the battle on Pelennor Fields was digitally altered so that it appears to be night instead of day. According to Peter Jackson on the commentary track, this was done to make it appear that Pippin has been looking for hours instead of minutes, underlining the friendship between the two Hobbits. In the original edit, because it appears that Pippin has only been looking for a few minutes his reaction to finding Merry seems like he's overreacting.

The scene on the extended DVD version of the "Corsairs of Umbar" being attacked by the army of the dead includes several cameos. Peter Jackson is the one hit by Legolas' arrow. (In the commentary, he states that he performed 6 or 7 takes of the hit - without any padding.) Co-producer Rick Porras is seen with a "look of horror" as the ghostly hoard attacks at the very end of the scene.

A normal major motion picture averages about 200 effects shots. This film had 1488.

The final reel of the film to be completed was done so only five days before the world premiere in Wellington, New Zealand. The premiere was the first time that Peter Jackson had seen the completed film.

When Gandalf rides out, using the light of his staff to ward off the fell beasts so Faramir's team can get back to Minas Tirith, you see that Pippin is on the horse with him, even though there would have been no reason to bring him along. The reason is that this scene was originally filmed to coincide with Gandalf and Pippin's arrival at Minas Tirith, but was pushed further back as the story evolved.

The first shot of Sam's arm coming into frame holding Sting towards Shelob is actually Peter Jackson's arm.

Each of the cast members was given a gift on their last day of shooting, usually a prop that was significant to their roles. Miranda Otto received one of Eowyn's dresses and her sword, Liv Tyler received Arwen's "dying dress", Orlando Bloom got one of Legolas' bows.

The dead oliphant carcass used in this film is reportedly the largest prop ever built for a motion picture.

In the Extended Edition, the Mouth of Sauron is played by Australian actor Bruce Spence. Spence's real mouth was digitally enlarged to underscore his role in Sauron's service, as well as further give the character an un-human aspect.

Peter Jackson's children appear twice in the film: in Gondor, when the horsemen leave the city, and in Sam's wedding.

The Grey Havens scene had to be shot three times, much to the dismay of the actors, who had to be crying for most of the scene. On the first try, it was discovered in viewing the dailies that Sean Astin was wearing the wrong shirt under his cloak. After shooting the scene a second time, the negatives were inadvertently exposed to light during processing, causing a white haze over the entire day's footage. It was finally captured successfully on the third try.

Sean Astin's daughter, Alexandra Astin, plays Sam Gamgee's daughter, Elanor. Sarah McLeod's daughter, Maisie McLeod-Riera, plays Sam and Rosie's son Frodo.

Andy Serkis and Elijah Wood were given prop rings used in the movie by director Peter Jackson. They each thought they got the only one.

The film was originally going to end with a voice-over epilogue by Cate Blanchett's character, Galadriel, detailing the fate of the fellowship of the ring after the events of the movie.

Broke the international box office record for an opening weekend, bringing in nearly $250 million.

'Billy Boyd' (Pippin) sang and composed the tune for the song in Denethor's hall (Tolkien wrote the lyric).

The last spoken line of the movie - "Well, I'm back." - is also the last line of the book.

In the crowd shot of the scene of Aragorn's ascension you can see the blue banner with the silver swan of Dol Amroth being waved. The prince of Dol Amroth, Imrahil, isn't a major character in the story but is the one who discovers that Eowyn is still alive after her slaying of the Witch King.

While filming Saruman's death scene (now on the extended DVD), Peter Jackson tried to tell Christopher Lee how to react and breathe after he was stabbed in the back. Lee, a WWII veteran with British special forces, assured the director that he knew what a man sounded like when stabbed in the back.

The end-credit portraits of each of the lead actors appearing alongside their name was the suggestion of Ian McKellen. The sketches were created by production designer 'Lee, Alan (II)' from production stills, although what is seen on the movie is actually a slight morph between the sketch and the original photograph.

Lawrence Makoare plays both the Witch King and the orc Gothmog. At one point the two characters exchange dialogue, and later Eowyn fights both (she injures Gothmog, who is then killed trying to attack her, and she kills the Witch King).

The "oil" that Denethor pours over himself and Faramir was a combination of water and glycerin, to achieve an appropriate glistening effect. Because this soaked the wigs and costumes, this scene had to be filmed in a single take.

The model of Shelob was based on a New Zealand tunnel web spider.

In the scene when Denethor burns Faramir on the pyre, the pyre could not truly be on fire because Gandalf's horse would not go near it. To solve this, the crew reflected a real fire onto a pane of glass in front of the camera so that it looks as though the pyre is burning.

In the extended cut of the film, the song during the Houses of Healing sequence is sung by Liv Tyler.

According to a magazine article, Peter Jackson hated the Army of the Dead; he thought it was too unbelievable. He kept it in the script because he did not wish to disappoint diehard fans of the book trilogy.

Dominic Monaghan was allergic to the elven cloaks the Fellowship wore. Before scenes were shot, Peter Jackson used to joke around and say "Are we ready to go? Does Dom have his cape on?"

To create realistic galloping horses for the largely CGI horseback army, they took some footage of a horse in a motion-capture suit.

When Frodo is writing the book, the top of the page notes that Sam was elected Mayor of Hobbiton.

The movie tied with Ben-Hur (1959) and Titanic (1997) to win the most Oscars (11) in a single year.

It broke another record by winning all the Oscars for which it was nominated (11 out of 11). The previous record was nine out of nine by The Last Emperor (1987) and nine out of nine by Gigi (1958).

In February 2004, became second film to break the $1 billion mark in worldwide box-office revenue (Titanic (1997) was the first).

The scene of the Rohirrim charging the Pelennor had to be filmed 52 times before the crew were satisfied with the take. During this process, about 60 of the 280 horses participating had to drop out for various reasons.

To get enough extras for the Battle at the Black Gate, a few hundred members of the New Zealand army were brought in. They apparently were so enthusiastic during the battle scenes that they kept breaking the wooden swords and spears they were given.

The deformed Orc leader Gothmog is only mentioned once in the original novel of "The Lord of the Rings" - identified only as by name and as the Lieutenant of Morgul. His race is not given; it was the filmmakers choice to make him an Orc. The name Gothmog is shared with the leader of the Balrogs in Morgoth's army in "The Silmarillion", Tolkien's history of Middle-Earth centuries before the events in "The Lord of the Rings".

Won the Science Fiction Achievement Award (Hugo Award) for Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form in 2004. This makes it the first work to take the top film honors in both the Oscars and the Hugos. The "profane acceptance speech" Gollum made for the MTV Movie Awards won the Hugo for Best Dramatic presentation, Short Form.

Special care was taken to make sure that the destruction of Sauron's tower of Barad-dur did not resemble the destruction of the World Trade Center. For this reason, it disintegrates from the ground up, and the sound was made from breaking glass, so that it would not sound or look as if it were exploding.

Like Billy Boyd earlier in the film, Viggo Mortensen also composed the tune and sung the part to the song Aragorn sings at his coronation. The translation of the Elvish words runs "Out of the Great Sea to Middle Earth I am come. In this place I will abide, and my heirs, unto the ending of the world." This is, according to the lore of Middle Earth, the same verse Elendil sung when he first arrived in Middle Earth from N�menor.

A scene was cut from the finished film that showed Eowyn (Miranda Otto) stripping away her regular clothes and then dressing herself in the armor of a Rohan warrior.

The runes on the helmet worn by the Mouth of Sauron, when transliterated, say "Lammen Gorthaur". Lammen means voice, and Gorthaur, which is mentioned in the Silmarillion, means Dread Abomination, another title by which Sauron was known. The complete phrase, "Voice of the Dread Abomination", identifies the speaker as the Mouth of Sauron.

The last scene shot during principal photography was a scene where Aragorn was dressed by Gondorian Soldiers in his armor before his coronation. The soldiers were played by people from the wardrobe department but the scene was eventually cut. Some behind-the-scenes footage of its filming can be seen in the Extended DVD extras.

During one of the shots filming the charge of the Rohirrim, a horse rider fell off the back of his horse. All the horses that came behind him miraculously managed to either miss or avoid him.

The scene where Aragorn's army assembles in front of the Black Gate of Mordor was shot in a desert that was used by the army as a training field. Because it was still littered with mines and bombs that hadn't gone off, the army had to sweep the field with metal detectors to make the danger for the actors and extras acceptable at least.

Since John Rhys-Davies suffered constant rashes from wearing the Gimli make-up, the make-up department gave him the opportunity to throw his Gimli mask into the fire on his last day of pick-up photography. He didn't hesitate a moment to grab and burn it.

The first Orc that Aragorn is seen killing on the Pelennor fields is played by Viggo Mortenson's son Henry.

Viggo Mortenson and Billy Boyd were standing off-camera during Sam's wedding scene, pretending to be wedding guests in order to help Sean Astin's performance. After Sarah Mcleod threw her bridal bouquet to Boyd, Mortenson gave Boyd a passionate kiss. The filming of the scene (and the kiss) appear on the extended version extras.

Body count: 836

Great caution was taken for the scene where Faramir is dragged back to Minas Tirith on his horse. The filmmakers were afraid that the horse might suddenly start to run, dragging David Wenham behind it so a release system was built into the saddle. Wenham held a handle in his right hand, and if the horse started to run, he could simply pull it and be released from the stirrup. Fortunately, they ended up not needing it.

Goofs

Near the beginning of the film as the camera flies towards Rohan you can see the smoke pouring back into the chimneys rather than out of them.

After Eowyn decapitates the Witch King's fellbeast, the severed head disappears.

Orlando Bloom's eyes are brown, but as Legolas, his eyes are changed to blue using CGI. In close-up outside the Black Gates, his eyes are CGI blue, but in a shot immediately following with Gandalf in the foreground and Legolas in the near background, his eyes are clearly brown.

The two doors of the Black Gate continue to open as Aragorn and the others ride away from the approaching Orc army. When Aragorn rides as he shouts, "Sons of Gondor, of Rohan, my brothers... when the age of men comes crashing down," at the top of the screen the "closed gate" is visible.

Sam rolls down Shelob's back, then he grabs Sting and takes a stance against Shelob. In the next wide shot, Sam stands ready and Shelob positions herself at the stairway. Frodo's wrapped body is not lying anywhere to be seen.

After Pippin draws his sword, the next shot is of Orcs running to the right of the screen. As that shot opens, click five or six frames in and two crewmembers are seen between the Orcs on the right of the screen, click a few more times and more crew members are visible in the middle, between the Orcs.

When Gollum drops the lembas from the bridge, you see the leaves it was wrapped in falling away, and the wafers fall generally straight down. However, when Sam finds it later, the lembas is still mostly wrapped in the leaves, with only a few morsels broken off and laying around unwrapped.

Nearing the end of the film where we see Frodo, Sam, Pippin and Merry having a drink at the Green Dragon, Frodo places four mugs on the table. The first sequence has two green mugs on the right and two brown mugs on the left. The second shot shows the mugs with a brown and green mug on each side of the table. Frodo puts the other brown mug in front of Merry, but in the next shot the other brown mug is in front of Pippin.

When Sam cuts Shelob's silk from around Frodo's face, it is completely cleared of silk in the close-up shots but remains covered with silk from the nose down in the long shots.

In a quick shot of Gandalf holding Pippin while riding Shadowfax in front of the Black Gate you can see Billy Boyd's double's face.

When Frodo finishes writing the book, he reaches for the stab wound on his shoulder with the writing quill in hand. Then Sam walks in and in the next shot, Frodo's hand is still by his shoulder, but the quill is gone.

While Denethor is eating in the citadel hall and is asking Pippin if he knows how to sing, he has a smear of red wine/sauce/blood on his chin. In a subsequent shot, Denethor turns to the camera and the smear is gone. It then reappears as he looks back to Pippin.

Gollum sprinkles crumbs of the Lembas bread on Sam to incriminate him. When Sam gets up, the crumbs are gone. Then, they reappear when Gollum points them out.

When Pippin takes the seeing stone from Gandalf's sleeping arms, he replaces it with a pitcher. This pitcher is absent when Gandalf wakes up.

While Eowyn delivers the decapitating blow to the Witch King's Fell Beast, the path of her sword swing does not come close to matching the location of the eventual sword strike on the beast's neck.

When Eowyn is fighting the Witch King, the strap holding her helmet is buckled, however, when she pulls off her helmet, there is no strap on it at all.

Before the final battle at the Black Gate, Aragorn cuts the head off of Sauron's emissary. In the next scene, the emissary's horse, body, and severed head are nowhere to be seen (Extended Edition).

At the end of the movie when the four hobbits are at the Green Dragon and Sam works up the nerve to approach Rosie, Frodo has all 10 of his fingers. Gollum had bitten off the finger Frodo placed the One Ring on at Mount Doom.

After Frodo throws Gollum off a cliff after his initial encounter with Shelob, he is walking down a trench toward the orc tower. Shelob then sneaks up on him and stabs him in the torso with her stinger. However, Frodo is wearing a Mithril vest, (which deflected a spear in The Fellowship of the Ring) so it (Shelob's sting) shouldn't have hurt him.

When Pippin takes the Palantir from the water, he touches it with his bare hands, however it remains inactive. But later, it activates as soon as Pippin touches it.

The door to Bag End, the house where Bilbo then Frodo then Sam lives, is supposed to be much taller then any hobbit, but in the final scene, Sam and Rose both have to stoop over to get inside.

Through the course of the movie, Frodo's face is very dirty. When unconscious in the spider web, it has become totally clean. But once he is freed of the spider web, it is dirty again.

Box Office Info for the USA

Budget: $94,000,000

Opening Weekend: $72,629,713

Gross: $377,027,325

Filming Dates: October 11, 1999 - December 22, 2000.

Filming Location