Welcome to the Council of Elrond!

Moviefone has released its list of the top best 25 movie sequels which includes The Two Towers and The Return of The King. Check out the list here to see where they rank.

The stage version of the Lord of the Rings is due to open in London on 19th June. Guardian reporter Tanya Gold spent some time with the cast and crew and you can read her article here.

May 14th is Cate Blanchett’s birthday. She was born in Melbourne, Australia in 1969 and is 38 years old today. You can read Cate’s CoE bio here. There are pictures of Cate here and of Cate in the role of Galadriel here.

Many happy returns Cate.

The results of the Visual Effects Society 50: the 50 most influential visual effects films of all time, has been announced. Heading the list was Star Wars with Fellowship of the Ring at 19, Return of the King at 33 and The Two Towers at 36. You can read the full list here.

Tolkien Weekend 2007 will be held on 19th and 20th May at Sarehole Mill, Birmingham, UK. The theme of the weekend is Hobbiton. Events will include, excerpts from Farmer Giles of Ham performed by Shire Productions, guided walks, a Tolkien treasure trail and a costume competition. There is further information at the event website here.

Silver Leaves is the official journal of The White Tree Fund. Its purpose is to educate, raise awareness, support charitable initiatives, and entertain. Silver Leaves is looking from submissions from established scholars, authors, and artists as well as from those new to the publishing world.

For more information about submitting to the first issue of Silver Leaves, please go to whitetreefund.org

Chance Thomas wrote the music score for Lord of the Rings Online: Shadows of Angmar. Five years of researching Tolkien’s work led to, “ the formulation of an authoritative Tolkien Music Style Guide, which translated the literary research into concrete musical terms.”. You can read more about his work in this interview at the article at Gamedaily.

After more than 80 hours immersed in Turbine’s multiplayer ‘The Lord of the Rings Online’, New York Times writer Seth Schiesel has written a review of the game. He seems very happy with the way the game plays , and in its ability to bring the player into the story without changing the main characters . You can read the full review here.

Howard Shore’s music for the Fellowship of the Ring topped a recent poll run by UK radio station Classic FM to find the nations favorite film music. You can view the top 50 movie soundtracks here.

Thorin’s not budging from his negotiating point, and neither is Bard. A Battle seems inevitable. Come and join us in the Book Club on May 7th, as we move on to Chapter XVI of the Hobbit, and see what Bilbo does to try and remedy the situation before the fighting starts.