New Tolkien documentary coming Dec 5th – I’m in it!
Tolkien – Die wahre Geschichte der Ringe is a multi-station public broadcasting cooperation between Arte, ZDF, and phoenix. In its about ninety minutes of runtime directors Jean-Christoph Caron (head of documentaries with ZDF/ARTE) and Matthias Schmidt take a deep dive into places and spaces that inspired J.R.R. Tolkien – and also discredit some of the alleged ones. A roster of internationally respected Tolkien scholars bring their expertise to the screen and their individual perspectives on aspects of Tolkien’s life and works. It will be made available publicly on Dec 5th, 2024, via the station websites and is in German, French, and English.
World premiere at Caligari Filmbühne Sept 13, 2024
Last Friday Tolkien fans had the chance to see the documentary on the big screen at one of Germany’s most beautiful cinemas, the Caligari Filmbühne in Hessia’s capital Wiesbaden.
The award-winning cinema with its 1950’s aesthetic often works with one of Germany’s largest public broadcasting stations, the ZDF, as it has large offices in the state capital. Originally opened in 1926, the Caligari takes its name from The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari, a classic of the silent film era.
It was lovely to see that the second-largest Tolkien society in the world, the German TS, had managed to have about fifty of its members turn up to see the premiere besides the general public. The foyer was filled with the voices of people who often had not met in many a year and it was absolutely splendiferous to have a few minutes to chat before and after the film, usually with a glass of wine or beer in hands! I should possibly mention that I am an honorary member as I was the founding chairman of it 😁
Anyway, the road to this evening was very long. I received an email from Jean-Christoph Caron in December 2022, mentioning that he was working on a certain “Tolkien project.” We agreed to chat on this in January 2023 and until then I had the opportunity to watch another of the documentaries Caron had done: James Bond – or rather – his origin story and the author behind this particular spy, Ian Fleming.
Now, this documentary is in three parts (1/ 2/ 3), it is all in German, but let me tell you that both the aesthetical style and the actual content presented felt really good to me. And we all know that there are not many truly decent documentaries out there that really concentrate on Tolkien’s life and/ or works with a substantial level of information.
Note: There is an English version of the main James Bond documentary.
These three documentaries ran to almost two hours of time. Everyone who knows a little how decent documentaries work, how they are done, particularly with public broadcasting stations, and the lack of funds most stations have to deal with (so they cannot come up with fancy and swanky scenes mostly from the films because the costs for the rights are prohibitive) will appreciate both the runtime of the Ian Fleming documentaries and their style.
There is no accounting for taste and you might appreciate a different aesthetic. However, the illustrations done by Ali Soozandeh are very much up my alley. Do have a look at his production company’s roster and the topics they are working with – truly impressive! P.S. I might simply be attuned to Baskhi’s rotoscoping and am reminded of it with these films.
I do have to say that I have become fairly cynical with almost all ‘business’ ventures Tolkienian. For a simple reason: in the two last decades hordes of people wanted to cash in on the brand without doing any actual work. Not only that – in many cases these people wanted to let the volunteers, the fans, do the work without any recompense. So I am always wary when someone asks me: “You are the Tolkienist. I have an idea. Would you like to chat on a project I am planning?”
The list of experts involved
Usually, it does not take me long to figure out whether someone has a genuine interest in all things Tolkienian. And talking to Jean-Christoph Caron I rather quickly had this particular impression – that he was “new” to this field of research/ genre/ fandom but was incredibly fascinated by it and doing the work. And when he started to hint at names and listened to my suggestions as well I was fairly convinced this was off to a great start.
When I received a seven page manuscript with questions on a wide range of themes on Tolkien’s life and works that actually made sense and were obviously the result of proper deliberation before meeting up for the interview I was optimistic.
- Vincent Ferré. Curator to the exceptional French Tolkien exhibition, editor to the French Dictionnaire Tolkien and more; with Sorbonne Nouvelle.
- Dimitra Fimi. Tolkien, Race, and Cultural History as well as A Secret Vice: Tolkien on Invented Languages (with Andrew Higgins); co-director with the Centre for Fantasy and the Fantastic, University of Glasgow.
- John Garth. Tolkien & the Great War; Worlds of Tolkien.
- Stuart Lee. Keys of Middle-earth; Companion to Tolkien. University of Oxford.
- Thomas Honegger. Walking Tree Publishers; Fastitocalon. University of Jena.
- Martin Monsch. Switzerland in Tolkien’s Middle-earth.
- Johannes Dillinger. Oxford Brookes University.
- Annika Röttinger. Something Has Gone Crack”: New Perspectives on J.R.R.Tolkien in the Great War (with Janet Brennan Croft).
- Adrián Maldonado. National Museums of Scotland.
- and myself….
Nota bene This is an absolutely selective list of what these people have done; do have a browse at the links provided!
Not a review, unfortunately
As the documentary is not yet publicly available I cannot give away too much of its content. I can list the people mentioned above as some of the experts did mention their interview dates on social media without revealing the project as such – I had done so in March 2023. And you may imagine with the people listed what places we will be talking about… Interviews were done over the course of many months, including visits to the Somme and the Swiss Alps.
Right now I can only highly suggest to keep Dec 5th, 2024, in mind. Or simply subscribe to the free Tolkienian newsletter the Roving Ranger so I can keep you in the loop. Yes, I am part of this documentary so I may be considered biased – but I think I can promise in this particular case this is seriously worth watching.
Annika Röttinger & Marcel Bülles with the documentary premiere (c) Tobias M. Eckrich
Picture credits Bertolhütte/ Cabane de Bertol. Jack3, CC BY-SA 3.0 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/, via Wikimedia Commons; Group photo (c) Tobias M. Eckrich; Caligari photo (c) Marcel R. Bülles
