The Lord of the Rings: How Peter Jackson Dodged Censorship

The Lord of the Rings saga

The Lord of the Rings is a film trilogy directed by Peter Jackson. Based on the novels of the same name, written by JRR Tolkien, the film series relates the adventures of two hobbits destined to destroy the One Ring to be able to. Accompanied by other characters each representing their own species, they form the community of the ring. It all takes place in the fictional world of Middle Earth.

Real commercial success, films grossed almost three billion dollars when they are released in theaters. Considered one of the most ambitious projects in the history of cinema, the trilogy was awarded with seventeen Oscars out of thirty nominations. The cast features Elijah Wood and Sean Astin in the lead roles of Frodo Saquet and Sam Gamegie. There are also actors already known to the general public such as Orlando Bloom, Ian McKellen, Cate Blanchett or Sean Bean.

Peter Jackson avoids censorship

But to achieve this success, Peter Jackson had to fight! Threatened by Harvey and Bob Weinstein, who were considering the adaptation in another way, the director deliberately leaked the scripts in order to be able to make his trilogy. A rather daring but effective stratagem which the director seems to be accustomed to. Master in the art and the way to achieve his ends, Peter Jackson never lacks ingenuity to bring his ideas to life. The saga of Lord of the Rings features many fights with particularly bloody scenes. But it was out of the question for the director that his work would be subject to censorship. Thereby to avoid severe cinema classification and censorship for violence, Peter Jackson resorted to a simple but effective ploy: change the color of the blood! Goodbye red blood, hello black. It was enough for the director to give black blood to his evil creatures so that everything looks less violent visually. A genius idea since the three films were released in theaters with the PG-13 classification, which simply “strongly” recommends support for children under 13 years old.