Tight security for The Return of the King

Hobbit mania has reached our shores in anticipation of the last in the Lord of the Rings trilogy, The Return of the King, which will be released in Malta on December 17 with the rest of the world.

Devotees of the trilogy will also have the chance to watch all three films back-to-back the night before at the Eden Century Cinemas, with The Return of the King showing at five minutes past midnight.

Based on J.R.R. Tolkien's series of novels completed in 1955, The Lord of the Rings will arrive in Malta under tight security just a few days before its release date.

KRS Film Distributors general manager Charles Pace said they will be personally delivering the prints to the cinemas to safeguard against piracy.

One consoling factor is that since the film is being jointly released worldwide, the chances of pirated copies surfacing at some Monti stall before its actual release are minimal.

"Of course the likelihood is that pirates of the film will start being sold on the Monti just a few days later, which is what happened with the previous two films," KRS manager Alex Pace said.

Both KRS officials are presently in the UK for talks with Entertainment film distributors, representatives for New Line Cinema, to discuss the details of the film's launch in Malta.

KRS is expecting The Return of the King, being touted as the best in the series, to be the biggest of all, surpassing admissions for the Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers.

The Fellowship of the Ring, which opened in December 2001 and ran for 15 weeks, had over 46,000 admissions. The Two Towers, released last December, ran for 12 weeks and was watched by over 41,000.

Despite the enthusiasm by local fans, however, neither film made it into Malta's top 10 box office hits of all time.

"We are sure the third film will surpass the previous two in terms of popularity and there's already a great buzz about it," Mr C. Pace said.

Critics who watched Monday's premiere in New Zealand said that the trilogy's wizardly director, Peter Jackson, had truly saved the best for last.

The Return of the King is the multi-layered tale of Hobbit Frodo and his bid to save the world by destroying a golden ring with magical powers.

Sauron's forces have laid siege to Minas Tirith, the capital of Gondor, in their efforts to eliminate the race of men. The once-great kingdom, watched over by a fading steward, has never been in more desperate need of its king.

It follows an astounding conclusion with the epic journey of men, hobbits, elves, dwarves and the rest of Middle-earth's creatures and cultures as they wage the ultimate fight for good against evil.

Its star-studded cast includes Elijah Wood, Orlando Bloom, Liv Tyler, Cate Blanchett, Christopher Lee, Ian McKellen, Viggo Mortensen and John Rhys-Davies.

Eden Century Cinemas this week started showing The Fellowship of the Rings and will next week re-release The Two Towers in anticipation of the climax in the trilogy.

The triple screening on December 16 is expected to sell at a special package price of Lm6.75