J.R.R.Tolkien & Middle-earth

A 2001 BBC documentary presented by Kirsty Wark as part of Omnibus documentary series on 22 December 2001.

To coincide with the release of the first film in The Lord of the Rings trilogy, this programme profiles the Oxford professor whose fantasy stories placed him at the centre of a worldwide phenomenon. Including archive footage of Tolkien, readings from his works and contributions from contemporaries and biographers.

A BBC TV Programme originally broadcast on 30 March 1968.

John Ezard meets with J. R. R. Tolkien at his home, walking with him through the Oxford locations that he loves while hearing the author's own views about his wildly successful high-fantasy novels. Tolkien shares his love of nature and beer and his admiration for 'trenchermen' in this genial and affectionate programme. The brief interviews with Oxford students that are dotted throughout reveal the full range of opinions elicited by 'The Lord of the Rings', from wild enthusiasm to mild contempt.

Tolkien fell in love with Edith Bratt when he was 16. They were then separated for five years because his guardian refused to allow him to contact Edith until he was 21. They married on 22 March 1916, just before Tolkien departed to serve in France during World War I, and remained a close and devoted couple until Edith's death in 1971. Tolkien had the name 'Luthien' engraved on her headstone and then, when he died in 1973, was buried in the same grave and had the name 'Beren' added to the memorial. Tolkien described the epic love story of the Elvish princess Luthien and the mortal Beren in 'The Silmarillion'. In the universe of 'The Lord of the Rings', it is considered to be the greatest romance of the Elder Days.

A 2014 Arte France Documentary Directed by Simon Backès.

For many people, the English writer JRR Tolkien (1892-1973) is above all the author of the Lord of the Rings, the film series directed and produced by Peter Jackson from 2001 to 2003. But what most people are unaware of is that this immensely successful novel is only the tip of a monumental corpus, started in the 1910s, and which Tolkien pursued to the day he died in 1973.

This documentary goes back to the origins of this tremendous creation and, at the same time, it is an opportunity to rediscover the surprising personality of its author. Who was this quiet and scholarly man who taught languages and old English literature at Oxford? How was this gigantic project born?

Going back and forth between ordinary reality and an immaterial and fabulously rich reality, the story offers to reveal the meaning of Tolkien’s life as a marvelous adventure of the mind.