Translation of the Lord of the Rings Japan press conference

The press conference of the LotR was held at the Empire Hotel in Wed. Feb.20, Hibiya, Tokyo. The following Six members of the cast attended the conference: Elijah Wood, Liv Tyler, Orlando Bloom, Sean Bean, Dominic Monahan, and Barry Osborne. 30 TV cameras and 50 cameras were placed and more than 400 reporters were gathered.

Reporter: Could we have a word from each of you?
Barry Osborne: Thank you for coming today. We are greatly moved by such a warming welcome. We are very proud about this movie. It is an honor for me to be able to come here today with the members of the cast. Im glad I did.

Orlando: This is such marvelous welcome, thank you very much! The making of this movie was a long journey and took us a lot of effort, but Im glad I have come to Tokyo. In spite of all the work, it was a lot of fun making the movie and I hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

Liv: Hello! This press conference is actually one of the largest scales ever and Im a bit nervous. Im glad I come back again to Tokyo. We are proud of the job weve done, so I hope you guys enjoy the movie.

Elijah: Hi! Its flattering that so many people have come today. Its the first time for me to come to Japan, and the journey felt almost as long as the making of the movie. Im excited over my first visit to Japan. I hope you enjoy the movie as much as we did.

Dominic: If I were to choose a country for the movie campaign, I have no doubt I would have answered Japan! We like sushi and the Japanese culture that much. This movie is simply great, so hope you enjoy it.

Sean: Its an honor for me to come here today. Im the last to speak so I wont repeat, but I do feel the same as them. Actually its my first time for me to come to Asia and Im very excited. Enjoy the movie!

Reporter: How did you actually go over such tough physical and mental tasks? Could you tell us what was the hardest thing to cope with and what did you do to relax yourselves?
Sean: It was indeed a tiresome and long shooting and we all got tired. There were many combat scenes and the weather was terrible, I wanted a break so bad sometimes. But as the title says, this is a movie of a fellowship. The staff as well as the cast members worked together as one and thats we could overcome this tough filming.

Elijah: Yeah, it was exactly as Sean said it. It was great experience where our passion and Peter Jacksons passion collided with each other. When we were emptied, Peter gave us new energy. We could establish a great relationship among us in spite of our tough schedule. Thats why we could support each other. Sometimes you kind of get too concentrated that couldnt just see the others, but then you keep your distance and try to look around you. Peter constantly reminded us what we were doing, so that we could continue the filming. But it was an unbelievably tough job.

Liv: There were so many talented and creative people involved in the movie we could make great job within the vast wilderness of New Zealand. It was a different experience from a usual filmmaking. It was a constant challenge to creativity everyday. I enjoyed both going out and have fun with the members and finding new features to my character. When we got stuck we helped each other out, and also the fact that there were staff members who really know the world of Tolkien was a great support for us.

Orlando: New Zealand is such a beautiful country. Peter really took the best of it, and he made it one of the most important characters in this movie too. We used our spare time on what you can only do in New Zealand: surfing, climbing This movie was a large scale, special project. Im very lucky I could take part of this. There were hard times like the night shoot lasted for 9 weeks, but the energy and concentration the staff kept all during the filming made it really fun for me. The filming of this movie was my own adventure.

Reporter: To Orlando. I read in a magazine that you saw Kurosawas movies and you actually try to express the sprit of the samurai in you role. What was the movie and what part of it did you take in?
Orlando: I was very influenced by The Seven Samurais. Elves are very focused beings. They have super human powers, they are strong, and have keen senses and swift movements. When I was thinking how I was to do it, I saw The Seven Samurais. So I saw that they always stand up straight and always react rapidly to any hardships, so I took in those caracteristics from the samurais.

Reporter: To Mr. Barry. Since you were not part of the original Peter Jackson team, how did you get to collaborate with him?
Barry: I had worked with a member, the Art Director, of his team and with other staff members. This movies scale was unprecedented in all history. More than 2000 crews and the shooting groups were divided into 3 so that we could keep filming, nonstop. Peter was directing with the most important shooting but there were other chiefs in every group. There were a group filming from the sky, a group filming combat scenes, miniature, well actually the models they were using werent mini at all, so we called it big-ature, and there were four groups involved in the shooting. And Peter alone was putting it all together. That was a large-scale and difficult job to do, so I think he needed experts like myself. Thats why I became part of this project.

Reporter: What do you think, Sean, about your role as Boromir who represents the evil among Men?
Sean: What this role represents, I think, a warning when the Man gets the power, and when his will turns to evil, how he ends up. The strongest and most important thing is spiritualism, and not materialism at the end. Also Boromir is showing to the society the danger of taking the wrong choices. One of the main themes of the movie is Hope. I think what its trying to say is that you may be weak by yourself, but by getting together the power increases and how one should live up in such a dangerous situation.

Reporter: What if you really had the Ring, Elijah? What would you use it for?
Elijah: I always wanted to be invisible, so Id put on the Ring and visits lots of places, like Dineyland after its closed and get into the rides.

Liv: A monster is gonna get you! Its scary!

Elijah: I know, but still, I want to be invisible and do a lot of things.

Reporter: The movie received 13 Oscar nominations. How do you feel about it?
Liv: Im so excited about it! But most of all Im glad for the staff members; their hard work was recognized and nominated. The filmmaking, costume design, We get to be in the middle of spotlight, but the people who really made the film are the staff members, including Barry. Im glad for them.

Dominic: They were the ones who made all the research for 7, 8 years in New Zealand before the shooting, getting all these ideas for the location Take a look at the costume. They were the ones who thought how they should be differentiated from the Dwarves and Men. Besides, this movie took all the three at the same time. This movie is here because of their great effort. Im glad that it was recognized like this and Im wishing them the best of luck.

Barry: Im very glad to be recognized like this. We take pride in what we did and we are confident in our job. Im glad that not just us, but also many other people think the same. We were told that we couldnt make such a large-scale movie at first. The story itself was great, but they thought it impossible to film it all in New Zealand or the post-production will be impossible. But here we are, the movie is done, recognized and even nominated. This means that our decision taking was right and Im glad we made it.

Elijah: Its so surreal! Its like a dream. I didnt feel I was acting. I actually felt rather like living the life of Frodo during the filmmaking. It was like we lived together to make one big thing, and that was quite familiar. When it was the Premiere, I still couldnt believe it. Given that it was a long period of shooting and a large-scale movie, everything was tough, but Im glad that all the effort that every one of us made was recognized.

Reporter: If you were to play a different part, who would you choose?
Dominic: Arwen!! (laughs)

Elijah: He didnt appear much in the first one and he is even tortured, but I would have chosen Gollum. I always liked that character since I was a kid.

Liv: The white horse I rode. He didnt have to go through all the suffering during the filmmaking (laughs). We really did suffer a lot, though it was a great experience.

Orlando: Id choose Viggo. Not Aragorn, but Viggo himself (laughs)

Barry: Peter Jackson (laughs) Hes like a god. Hes pretty much like Saruman, I mean like Christopher Lee. It would have been a lot more fun with him. Hes good at learning foreign languages. He speaks Japanese pretty well.

Dominic: The hobbits stand-ins Kellen. Their movements were like a mirror to us, every move, every gesture he made help us make up our hobbits character. I get to know him personally during the shoot and hes the first that pops into my head when asked who.

Reporter: How did you interpret your roles as hobbits, since they start as cheerful but as the story goes along their characters become more complex?
Elijah: Hobbits are cheerful, but the filmmaking was so much fun so it wasnt hard for me to interpret that role. We actually had two months of rehearsals where we got to know each other and that helped us build this sense of fellowship and work it out as a team together. As the story goes along, it overtakes rather serious and dark scenes but each role meets their own fate and the way you approach to it becomes very different from the other hobbits. We didnt really discuss about our roles, but whenever we all four got together; we could be the happy hobbits again. It was a great experience, all of it.

Dominic: The four hobbits are very innocent guys just as it is written in Tolkiens books. Their destinies change dramatically once they step out of the Shire. They are very different characters, but they all grow up in the story, by loving, encouraging and respecting each other. Thats something you dont get to do often, I mean it is one of the unique experiences we had in this movie. It was a lot of fun.

Reporter: Barry, how do you feel about this press conference? Barry: I had a great time and Im thankful for so many people attending here. Besides the Japanese press sheet is so refined, I gotta take this with me.

Liv: Oh, so am I taking this with me!

Barry: I hope all the fans can enjoy the film as much as we did in making it. Thank you very much for coming here today.