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arwentaurielitaril
Registered User
May 11, 6:21am
Post #1 of 10
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Preserve the Mystique of Middle-earth: Cast a Fresh Face for Arwen in 'The Hunt for Gollum
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Arwen Undómiel is an ethereal symbol of hope and immortality. To honor J.R.R. Tolkien’s vision and the legacy of the original films, we need an actress who can embody her timeless, otherworldly grace without the distraction of a pre-existing superstar persona. While we respect Anya Taylor-Joy’s talent, Hollywood’s recent trend of casting the same few 'blockbuster' faces in every major IP is breaking the immersion. We call for an end to this 'copy-paste' casting culture. Middle-earth was built on the discovery of new stars. We urge Warner Bros. and Andy Serkis to give a breakthrough opportunity to a talented newcomer who can truly 'become' Arwen. In other words, please do not make Seren and Arwen into the exact same character. We don't want to see a celebrity playing Arwen; we want to see Arwen herself.
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DGHCaretaker
Nargothrond
May 11, 4:17pm
Post #2 of 10
(213 views)
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We?
I'll get right on that for you.
Anya is a bit ethereal herself and seems to me a decent cast if Liv is no longer viable or available for the part.
"Hollywood" is in decline for reasons they refuse to admit to themselves. You won't have to worry much longer.
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Chen G.
Mithlond
May 12, 7:41am
Post #4 of 10
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It's unclear that "Seren" is Arwen
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So we might be getting ahead of ourselves. Plus, all we know is Anya circled the "Seren" role at one point: there may have been any number of other candidates in the wings we hadn't heard of.
Personally, just because they recast Aragorn I don't think they should or would open the recast floodgates. They HAD to have an Aragorn in this film, but Arwen? My bet is they'll sooner write around her than recast the role.
Also, Lord of the Rings did have big stars in minor roles: in The Lord of the Rings, it was actuallly...Arwen herself, with Liv being by far the biggest marquee name on the cast. I don't think its a bad approach: it's the David Lean style where most of the roles are taken by British character actors, and one or two are taken by matinee names. That just adds to the "event-ness" of the thing.
None of the other parts in the casting calls were codenames: that's more of an Amazon thing anyway.
(This post was edited by Chen G. on May 12, 7:42am)
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DGHCaretaker
Nargothrond
May 12, 1:25pm
Post #5 of 10
(187 views)
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...Liv being by far the biggest marquee name on the cast.
You'll have to defend "by far" against the likes of Christopher Lee, Ian Holm, Ian McKellen, Hugo Weaving, and Cate Blanchett who was already an Oscar-nominated actress at the time. The rest of the main cast had more credits than Liv's 16 credits (IMDB) prior to LOTR, and three of those for Daddy's Aerosmith.
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Chen G.
Mithlond
May 12, 3:32pm
Post #6 of 10
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The other actors you mention were respectable CHARACTER actors: but they weren't bankable. People wouldn't have said in 2001 "Let's go see that 'Lord of the Rings' movie, IAN MCKELLEN is in it."
Peter's two biographies go into some detail about how they mentioned to the studio that they thought Liv Tyler could be a good Arwen and how suddenly it became very important to have her in the movie. She was seen as a good substitute for not having managed to entice Sean Connery to join the movie: she was THAT famous, both in the US and especially in Japan. There was even a newspaper article that militated against casting her in much the same spirit that the OP does here: because she was TOO famous.
Notice, too, how prominent she is on the posters and in the trailers - and how high she's billed - in spite of how small her role is. Again, the biographies go into some detail, too, towards how much they tried to accomodate her, being that she was a celebrity of some repute. For instance, when they replaced Stuart Townsend, it was a real worry about whether she'd get along with Viggo and they had to call her and see that its fine by her.
(This post was edited by Chen G. on May 12, 3:34pm)
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Noria
Hithlum
May 12, 7:30pm
Post #7 of 10
(169 views)
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I agree that most of the known actors in LotR were considered character actors rather than big stars and that Tyler was probably the most famous at that point in time, essentially as a starlet. That is not to denigrate Tyler; she did fine.
Since I didn’t know who Anya Taylor-Joy was, I’m indifferent to her casting, or not. After looking her up, it seems to me that she is just about as famous as Tyler was back in the day, maybe with more acting chops.
I kind of think that Arwen could be a fairly major character in this film because I would expect that it will feature the story of Arwen and Aragorn in some form of fashion. A built-in canon romance. I’m hoping that the movie will be about more than just the actual hunt for Gollum.
The sun yet shines
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Otaku-sempai
Elvenhome
May 12, 7:53pm
Post #8 of 10
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I kind of think that Arwen could be a fairly major character in this film because I would expect that it will feature the story of Arwen and Aragorn in some form of fashion. A built-in canon romance. I’m hoping that the movie will be about more than just the actual hunt for Gollum.
Arwen's role (if any) might depend on how far back the film is going to go into Aragorn's backstory. The major events in the history of Aragorn and Arwen are canonically covered well before Gandalf recruits the Ranger in the search for Gollum, from shortly after Aragorn turns 20 to the same year that he (as Thorongil) leaves the service of the Steward Ecthelion of Gondor (Third Age 2951 to 2980). Of course, the film could take liberties with the timeline even beyond what would be appropriate due to the time compression we saw in the previous movies.
“Hell hath no fury like that of the uninvolved.” - Jenny Blake Isabella
(This post was edited by Otaku-sempai on May 12, 7:57pm)
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Chen G.
Mithlond
May 13, 12:56pm
Post #9 of 10
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There essentially are no "movie stars" anymore
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Anya had been in some popular films and won some acclaim, but I'm wholly unsure she's really a star in the old-fashioned sense. People like Tom Cruise (of the old guard) and Sydney Sweeney (from the "new" guard) can still bring an audience to the theatre, but even that really depends on the project.
I actually would enjoy Anya in the context of Tolkien. She's done plenty of period movies (essentially my yardstick for "does this actor feel right for Middle-earth" which is ostensibly a Medieval-set movie-series) and she's part British and can do a convincing accent. Adding a pinch of star power - also via the brilliant Kate Winslet - is not a bad thing.
But I really think we're jumping to conclusions (1) assuming Arwen should or would be in this and (2) that the part that Anya was up for was indeed Arwen and she had indeed signed-up for it. Neither of these assumptions are particularly supported by...anything, really.
I think that they'd sooner write Arwen out than to recast her. Aragorn they couldn't write around, obviously. But Arwen? In a GOLLUM MOVIE? Definitely possible. I also find it hard to believe they'd cast an actress with such a unique - and not terribly Tyler-ish - physiognomy as a version of the same character that Tyler played. I mean, you look at their new Aragorn and, depending on the picture, he can look VERY Viggo-ish. Anya? I dunno.
(This post was edited by Chen G. on May 13, 1:04pm)
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Otaku-sempai
Elvenhome
Sat, 1:35pm
Post #10 of 10
(81 views)
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Arwen Undómiel is an ethereal symbol of hope and immortality. To honor J.R.R. Tolkien’s vision and the legacy of the original films, we need an actress who can embody her timeless, otherworldly grace without the distraction of a pre-existing superstar persona. While we respect Anya Taylor-Joy’s talent, Hollywood’s recent trend of casting the same few 'blockbuster' faces in every major IP is breaking the immersion. We call for an end to this 'copy-paste' casting culture. Middle-earth was built on the discovery of new stars. We urge Warner Bros. and Andy Serkis to give a breakthrough opportunity to a talented newcomer who can truly 'become' Arwen. In other words, please do not make Seren and Arwen into the exact same character. We don't want to see a celebrity playing Arwen; we want to see Arwen herself.
Of course we do not know whether Arwen will appear at all in The Hunt for Gollum, much less who would be cast for her. I do half-expect both King Elessar and Queen Arwen to cameo at the end of the Stephen Colbert project Shadow of the Past, with Viggo Mortensen and Liv Tyler reprising their roles as the Fourth Age rulers of the Reunited Kingdom.
“Hell hath no fury like that of the uninvolved.” - Jenny Blake Isabella
(This post was edited by Otaku-sempai on Sat, 1:36pm)
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