Fox has released the first trailer for their J.R.R. Tolkien biopic starring Nicholas Hoult, and it’s clear they’ll be taking us on a unique journey.
Tolkien looks like it’s way more than your standard depiction of the life and times of a famous author (in this case, the mind behind The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit). No, this one appears to bridge the iconic author’s most pivotal life moments, namely his friends, girlfriend, and his experience in World War I with the stories he would write later in his life.
Update: In a second trailer released March 6, 2019, Tolkien tells his wife-to-be Edith about his fascination with language, hinting at what would become his Middle Earth universe. The trailer also focuses on World War I and how that affected the “fellowship” with his friends, who were creatives of their own.
Fans of Middle Earth (and, obviously, Tolkien) will see lots of interesting references to his fantasy series dispersed throughout both trailers, which gives the biopic a unique spin.
We’re thrilled to see that director Dome Karukoski and screenwriters David Gleeson and Stephen Beresford wanted to wow us with an original idea like this one. Watch the trailer below:
As Fox puts it, the movie “explores the formative years of the orphaned author as he finds friendship, love and artistic inspiration among a group of fellow outcasts at school. This takes him into the outbreak of World War I, which threatens to tear the ‘fellowship’ apart. All of these experiences would inspire Tolkien to write his famous Middle-Earth novels.”
Tolkien hits theaters this May. You may’ve see some familiar faces in that trailer besides Hoult — the movie co-stars Lily Collins, Colm Meaney, Anthony Boyle, Patrick Gibson, Tom Glynn-Carney, Craig Roberts, Laura Donnelly, Genevieve O’Reilly, Pam Ferris and Derek Jacobi.
The movie will be released May 10, 2019.
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