Creatures of The Two Towers: Gollum

RICHARD TAYLOR on creating one of Middle-earth's strangest life form.

"The Two Towers brings with it a true understanding of who Gollum is.

"This little tiny hobbit called Smeagol who murdered his brother to get the
one ring, has, over a hundred years, had the goodness stripped out of him and it has left him not as a frail and elderly character, but a wasted and maniacal schizophrenic creature who is solely focused on the return of the ring to him.

"He's truly the greatest fantasy icon of the past 50 years and the world has a preconceived idea of what Gollum looks like -- the challenge was to bring that idea to the screen, which will please the fans of the book, and over and above that, create a compelling character who creates empathy and fear, disgust and delight in the audience at a level that can play alongside Elijah Wood [Frodo] and Sean Astin [Sam].

"He's an incredible merge of a number of different disciplines. It all starts off in the workshop with designs and marquetteing -- three dimensional sculptures, scannable marquettes -- but then it goes into the digital effects department and is built as a three-dimensional living, breathing creature.

"That creature still has to be driven by a performance. So the actor Andy Serkis really breathes the life into the performance which is facilitated with the craftsmanship of the animators.

"If we hadn't got Gollum right, it could be likened to having miscast Elijah Wood. Obviously Elijah is the perfect actor to play Frodo, but if Gollum hadn't
been as successfully realised as a character on screen, it would have been monumentally disastrous to the project."

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Herald feature: Lord of the Rings