Thursday, June 16, 2022

Voice Cast Announced for The War of the Rohirrim

New Line Cinema and Warner Bros. Animation has finally revealed a little more information after announcing The Lord of the Rings: The War of the Rohirrim animated movie back in February. Now we have the voice cast and how they plan to bridge it a little bit to the Lord of the Rings Trilogy.

Brian Cox (Succession) will provide the voice for King of Rohan, Helm Hammerhead who leads his people from by using their ancient fortress Hornburg as protection (later renamed Helm's Deep). Luke Pasqualino (Snowpiercer) will voice Lord Wulf, the leader of Dunlending seeking revenge for the death of his father Freca. Gaia Wise (A Walk in the Woods) will voice Hammerhead's daughter Hera who will "lead the resistance against a deadly enemy intent on their total destruction."

Mirando Otto (Lord of the Rings trilogy) will reprise her role in animated form as Eowyn who will narrate the tale. Other members of the voice cast are Lorraine Ashbourne, Yazdan Qafouri, Benjamin Wainwright (Gangs of London), Laurence Ubong Williams (The Capture), Shaun Dooley (The Witcher), Michael Wildman (Emmerdale Farm), Jude Akuwudike (Manhunt), Bilal Hasna and Janine Duvitski (Benidorm) whose characters were not provided.

The image above is concept art provided from the film showing Helm Hammerhead and might be based on a bit from The Lord of the Rings: Appendix A. Click this link for the quote if fine with a significant story spoiler.

The film will be directed by Kenji Kamiyama (various Ghost in the Shell movies) from script by Jeffrey Addiss and Will Matthews (The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance) with Executive Producer Philippa Boyens and Producer Joseph Chou (Blade Runner: Black Lotus). Main difference between executive producer and producer is one brings the money to the table while the other handles the day to day to make sure that money is spent well. Alan Lee and John Howe (creators of all that wonderful LOTR and Hobbit trilogy art used to promote film and seen at end of Return of the King) along with Richard Taylor (led the special effects team on LOTR trilogy) will also be involved.  The film is aiming for an April 12, 2024 theatrical release so have a long wait.

Of interest to me is most of the cast are virtual unknowns, unusual for major Hollywood animated film release. Personally I have always thought paying "A-list" actors for voice roles was silly when many highly capable voice actors and new actors are available and likely to do as good or better job. In animation story is king, A movie can do well with meh art and voice but will always fail if the story is bad. Most of the time its because its impossible to get an animated film's voice A-list cast in a room together because of other things they are doing and their window of availability to do the voice work is often measured in hours so it becomes a case of get what they can, while they can. This is why when asked how was it working with the other actors on the animated film, their answers are usually very wordy versions of "I didn't." Hopefully the director will take advantage of good chance they can get this cast in the room together to bounce off each other which will make scenes come alive more than just acting at a page and microphone

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