Slamdance gets infusion of 'Lord of Rings' mania

PARK CITY — History was made at Sundance's kid-brother festival this past week. For the first time in Slamdance's 11-year existence, eager movie watchers actually camped out overnight to buy tickets for the off-spin film event.

And, yes, you guessed correctly: They were indeed "Lord of the Rings" fans.

While addressing the sold-out audience before her movie's world-premiere Friday at midnight, the director told the happy campers who braved the freezing Park City air, "I salute you."

Carlene Cordova's documentary "Ringers: Lord of the Fans" spent the next couple of hours saluting J.R.R. Tolkien and the celebrated work he created 50 years ago — a phenomenon that has inspired hippies and cyber geeks, influenced artists in literature, movie and music industries, and entertained and entranced millions in multiple generations.

Among them were three adults who huddled in a two-man tent all Thursday night so they could buy tickets to the latest "Lord of the Rings"-related production.

Dressed in a white dress with a cape, an intrinsic ring and holding an elf banner, Galadriel — otherwise known as Jami Granger of Salt Lake City — didn't think twice about risking hypothermia outside of Treasure Mountain Inn, Slamdance's headquarters atop Main Street.

Granger is, after all, "a Ringer," a label given to the most dedicated of "Lord of the Rings" fanatics akin to the "Trekkies" label for Star Trek diehards.

"It involves 'Lord of the Rings.' How can I not?" she said. "I'm a little sorta addicted."

Only if you consider "addicted" to be owning an Aragorn and Arwen Ken-and-Barbie doll set, an elf-princess sword letter-opener and professionally framed LOTR movie posters in a Tolkien collection worth more than $1,000.

Of course, as you learn from the feature-length documentary, Granger might be placed on the bottom rung of addicted Ringers. A young man who calls himself "Grimlock" spent five months hand-making his own metal "Mithril" — a dwarf-worthy chain-mail protection outfit like Frodo's — leading up to his five-night stay outside of a Los Angeles theater before one of the trilogy's releases. He laughed that he was having a "dry spell from women," so he needed something to do.

One Ringer travels all over and takes pictures of her "Lord of the Rings" figurines. She hopes to visit Oxford, England, to get a photo of them on Tolkien's grave. Other Ringers have re-created the movies on the Internet — one using characters made of little marshmallow treats called "Lord of the Peeps" and another using simple stick figures mimicking every move on Middle-Earth.

Movie narrator Dominic Monaghan, who plays beloved hobbit "Merry," describes the overwhelming devotion of "Ringers," saying 6.5 million Web sites pop up when doing an Internet Google search for "Lord of the Rings." He reiterates the enormous success director Peter Jackson's trilogy had at the box office (billions made and counting) and at the Oscars (a record 11 Academy Awards in 2004).

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