Jamie Dornan will be leading The Hunt For Gollum, as Warner Brothers has announced the main cast for it’s upcoming Lord Of The Rings spinoff film.
Dornan, will play Strider, the chief of the Northern Dúnedain Rangers who will later be known in Middle Earth by his true name of Aragorn. He steps into the boots of Viggo Mortensen, who played the character in the original Lord of the Rings film trilogy. The announcement ends months of fan rumors and speculation as to who might step into the role, given that the film is set somewhat before the Lord Of The Rings films and would necessitate a younger actor.
The Hunt For Gollum will center on a side story from The Lord Of The Rings novel’s appendices about Strider and Gandalf’s desperate search to find Gollum before he inadvertently leads agents of the dark lord Sauron to the defenseless Shire, home of the hobbits.
The film sees Lord Of The Rings franchise veterans Ian McKellen, Andy Serkis, Lee Pace and Elisha Wood returning to their roles of Gandalf, Gollum, the elf lord Thranduil and heroic hobbit Frodo.
Serkis, who has several directorial credits and who served as a second unit director on both The Lord Of The Rings and the Hobbit films, with franchise brain trust Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh and Phillipa Boyens producing.
Joining the cast are Kate Winslet as Marigol and Leo Woodall as Halvard, another of the Dúnedain rangers. Both of these characters are new and not derived from author J R R Tolkien’s writings.
The Hunt For Gollum is the first of what could be a series of films extending the Lord Of The Rings franchise beyond the scope of just Tolkien’s Lord Of The Rings and The Hobbit narratives. Last month it was revealed that comic, talk show host and longtime Tolkien fan Stephen Colbert was working on a screenplay for a second film entitled Shadow Of The Past.
The Lord Of The Rings: The Hunt For Gollum is set to start shooting later this year with a release date scheduled for December 2027.
