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A review by linz
Anything You Can Imagine: Peter Jackson and the Making of Middle-earth by Ian Nathan
4.0
As a massive fan of The Lord of the Rings, both the books and the movies, I was excited to finally get my hands on a copy of this book. Although I knew I didn't know everything about the films and books, I thought I was pretty knowledgable about it and wasn't sure how much I could possibly learn from Anything You Can Imagine. The answer? So much!
Anything You Can Imagine is an incredibly well-researched book. The author is clearly a fan and was allowed into the inner sanctum during filming to see how things worked first-hand, something most fans of the movies would have given their left arms to experience.
The book starts from the very beginning, leaving almost no stone unturned during the journey of the making of these films. He delves into Peter Jackson's humble filmmaking beginnings and works up to Peter and Fran Walsh's decision to attempt turning The Lord of the Rings into a movie.
Things got a little slow during the first few chapters, which talked about all of the Hollywood politics that swirled around the rights before Peter was allowed to tackle the ambitious project, but it picked up as soon as he returned to New Zealand and we were allowed to jump into the actual making of the movies.
The interviews with the cast were interesting and even though I've watched the DVD extras on the Extended Editions of the movies and thought I'd read pretty much every interview available, there were things I didn't know, and I was ecstatic to learn even more about these films.
Things slowed down just a bit again after The Return of the King's triumph at the Oscars when the book again turned to Hollywood politics about trying to get The Hobbit films made, but it was nice to see a little behind-the-scenes of those movies, as well.
Getting to see behind the scenes of the making of my all-time favorite movies was definitely a treat and I have a greater appreciation of them than I did before, which I didn't even think was possible. If you're a fan of the movies and want to know more about how they were made, this is a book you definitely don't want to miss!
Anything You Can Imagine is an incredibly well-researched book. The author is clearly a fan and was allowed into the inner sanctum during filming to see how things worked first-hand, something most fans of the movies would have given their left arms to experience.
The book starts from the very beginning, leaving almost no stone unturned during the journey of the making of these films. He delves into Peter Jackson's humble filmmaking beginnings and works up to Peter and Fran Walsh's decision to attempt turning The Lord of the Rings into a movie.
Things got a little slow during the first few chapters, which talked about all of the Hollywood politics that swirled around the rights before Peter was allowed to tackle the ambitious project, but it picked up as soon as he returned to New Zealand and we were allowed to jump into the actual making of the movies.
The interviews with the cast were interesting and even though I've watched the DVD extras on the Extended Editions of the movies and thought I'd read pretty much every interview available, there were things I didn't know, and I was ecstatic to learn even more about these films.
Things slowed down just a bit again after The Return of the King's triumph at the Oscars when the book again turned to Hollywood politics about trying to get The Hobbit films made, but it was nice to see a little behind-the-scenes of those movies, as well.
Getting to see behind the scenes of the making of my all-time favorite movies was definitely a treat and I have a greater appreciation of them than I did before, which I didn't even think was possible. If you're a fan of the movies and want to know more about how they were made, this is a book you definitely don't want to miss!