Caps from the TE FotR "Extras" - The Eyes in un-digitally-graded Lothlorien

[mechtild]

~*~


More Frodo Screen caps coming up! -- a gorgeous set of Lothlorien Eyes. But, this time they are not from FotR itself, they are from the DVD "Extras"....



I thought I'd post a series of caps from which a favourite image comes, an image which I could never place in the finished films. Maewyn used it as a sig pic at TORc last year. "Where did you GET that from???" I had asked her, desperate to have a copy.

It was a very tight close-up, featuring The Eyes in extreme and glorious close-up. "Elvish" radiated from film-Frodo's face - a face beautiful and grave. His expression is one of perceptiveness, yet it also seems veiled. The lighting is so warm and dark, his eyes don't even look blue. They look like darkly gleaming orbs, like bottomless pools of luminous darkness. They are eyes into which I could fall and never stop falling.

As for the shot's origin, I thought Maewyn's screencap looked as though it came from 'Galadriel's Glade', but naturally coloured. The intense, magical blue grading they used for the "night time in Lothlorien" scenes had not been applied.

Looking through the DVD extras I saw that I had been right. But the shot came not from a TV special or a documentary, but from one of FotR's theatrical trailers, for heaven's sake! This face actually had been plastered all over movie screens before FotR came out. No wonder fans were in a frenzy!

These caps are from the first trailer on the disc, "Teaser One".

Actually, this disc of Extras has been a tremendous, unexpected boon to me, screencap-wise. Viewing it, I was thrilled to see so many familiar images in it, images I had seen forever in web galleries, but never having known where they came from.

Obviously, the "Extras" disc (which I had never owned) had to have been the source of a LOT of squeeing. Looking through the caps I made, it also struck me that the "Extras" were a gold mine for fanfic writers. I saw image after image that could have been illustrations for fanfics that were pouring out after FotR was released. The impact of that disc had to have been huge of the heated imaginations of fans.

Below, I will post my sequence of "Frodo of the Eyes Unfathomable". It begins with Frodo closing and opening his eyes, which is beyond exquisite. Ah, such lashes! The camera begins the shot very close, but it just keeps drawing nearer and nearer, as if echoing the viewers desire to enter into those mysterious depths.

(I could go on and on, as my readers know. This time, I'll let you provide the gushing descriptives. *grin*

Immediately below, I offer another little trip down Memory Lane. I have copied out a little inset article from a film book on LotR that I was browsing today at the library. In it, various co-stars talk about Elijah Wood's portrayal of Frodo:

Facets of Frodo


Ian McKellen:


In creating Frodo, Tolkien may well have been thinging back to the First World War and the lads went on a terrible journey form which many never returned. Elijah reminds me of those statues of idealized young man on was memorials throughtout the world: more sublime than human and with the complexion of molten marble. He is simply terrific.


Christopher Lee:

Elijah Wood will never grow old! With that almost Elfin face, he was Frodo. In his gentleness and sincerity -- and in his enormous enthusiasm as an actor -- he was simply perfect for the part.


Ian Holm:

Those remarkable, God-given eyes! That glorious, good-natured personality! Elijah's Frodo is a dazzling light in the doom and gloom of war and despair.


~ from The Lord of the Rings: The Making of the Movie Trilogy, by Brian Sibley, p. 153.

~ Caps from "Teaser One", from the TE FotR Extras:






















































Click HERE for table of Frodo and Elijah Wood Screencaps.



~ Mechtild

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Many thanks Mechtild :)

Close your eyes and make a wish *sigh*


The following is by Sara Teasdale 1884-1933 (slightly tweaked by yours truly) Mechtild has seen this before but I thought it fitted in here.

The Look

Merry kissed me in the spring,
Pippin kissed me in the fall,
But Frodo only looked at me
And never kissed at all.

Merry’s kiss was lost in jest,
Pippin’s lost in play,
But the kiss in Frodo’s eyes
Haunts me night and day.

Estë

[taerie.livejournal.com]

THAT was really cool! Never saw that poem before but the way you tweaked it really said it.
I love how each kiss suited the hobbit mentioned.
Well done.

Sara Teasdale's, The Look

[mechtild.livejournal.com]

Oh, Estë, was there ever a better use for this poem? Thanks so much for finding it, tweaking it, and noting the author and date. Thank you, too, Sara Teasdale for being an inadvertent Frodo admirer!

[elasg.livejournal.com]

THUD!!!! Oh, Wow! Este! Did you put that in the harem? (HOW did I miss it??!?!)

[mechtild.livejournal.com]

Isn't that a perfect use of a perfect poem?

[maewyn-2.livejournal.com]

Mechtild - I'm speechless! Eleven pics! I've only ever seen the one! I know I've said this before, but this was the very first Frodo pic I saved to my computer. It was the one that started my Frodo obsession. So, thank you very much for posting these! *adds to collection*

You've made my day, my friend! :)

[mechtild.livejournal.com]

Next up, Maewyn, will be another extended series of caps (8?) from digitally graded Lothlorien from another trailer for FotR. It's of Frodo closing his eyes and dropping his chin. I've seen one of the series before; Narya of K-D likes to post it. It's a wonderful study of his eyelashes. *sigh*

[maewyn-2.livejournal.com]

Is that the one with the shading that looks almost purple? I think I have a copy of that, captioned "Eyelashes". I can't wait to see your cap of it!

[mechtild.livejournal.com]

Yes, the purple-tinted ones.

*sigh*

Mechtild

[taerie.livejournal.com]

Was there ever anything more beautiful than that face?
Thank you!

[mechtild.livejournal.com]

My pleasure, literally, taerie.

[julchen11.livejournal.com]

My dear Mechtild,

I ‚found’ this post today and I’m so very touched.

“They are eyes into which I could fall and never stop falling.”

There’s NO doubt about it.

”Looking through the caps I made, it also struck me that the "Extras" were a gold mine for fanfic writers”

AND readers (like me) too …

Infact, those are the most mesmerizing eyes I’ve ever seen.

The comments of Frodo’s co-stars

Ian McKellen
“He is simply terrific.”

Christopher Lee
“… he was simply perfect for the part.”

Ian Holm
“Elijah's Frodo is a dazzling light in the doom and gloom of war and despair.”

Fact. Point. Amen.
Watching the movies, watching Frodo … I never could see Elijah, he brought Frodo to life and so it is … Frodo lives and will ever be in my heart

Thank you my dear for those wonderful screencaps, I’ve never seen them before and they are simply gorgeous. I can only but stare …

Another time you left me speachless.

*hugs you tight*

Love
Julchen

[mechtild.livejournal.com]

Thank you so much for posting to this entry, Julchen. I hadn't looked at these caps for many months, and it did my heart good to look at them again. I am so grateful I bought the theatrical version, even though I already had the EE. Had I not, I would never have seen this sequence. When I see a set of frames like this, it makes me wish they had done Lorien without digitally grading it in blues. Yet, that blue scene really is magical. I guess I want both versions!