Making something like The Lord of the Rings trilogy must have been the experience of a lifetime and then some, but Peter Jackson would pay a huge price to forget about the movies he made, and not for the reason you’d expect.
Since we’re less than a month away from Amazon’s The Rings of Power series, Jackson has become the talk of the town again — despite having had nothing to do with the show — and the topic of most of these conversations involves the process of bringing one of the most acclaimed cinematic works of all time to life.
Now, in a recent chat with The Hollywood Reporter, the director says his biggest regret is that he never got to experience The Lord of the Rings as an audience member.
“When we did The Lord of the Rings movies I always felt I was the unlucky person who never got to see it as a coming-out-of-the-blue film. By the time there were screenings, I was immersed in it for five or six years. It was such a loss for me not to be able to see them like everyone else. I actually did seriously consider going to some hypnotherapy guy to hypnotize me to make me forget about the films and the work I had done over the last six or seven years so I could sit and enjoy them. I didn’t follow through with it, but I did talk to [British mentalist] Derren Brown about that and he thought he could do it.”
Given how much Peter Jackson loves the world of Tolkien, and the meticulous and, at times, obsessive care he poured into the development of its adaptation, we’re actually inclined to believe him. But it’s a fortunate thing he didn’t go through with it, if it was possible at all, as he wouldn’t have been able to bring all of that filmmaking experience with him to The Hobbit trilogy then.
And besides, think about all those fond memories.