“People started thinking about New Zealand, wanting to visit New Zealand en masse in a way that they never would have without those films. Tolkien’s novel “The Lord of the Rings,” combined for 30 Academy Award nominations and 17 wins and earned nearly $3 billion in worldwide box office receipts. Before COVID-19, nearly one in five visitors said their decision to come to New Zealand was influenced by the hobbit films. “I knew I wanted to work in tourism with ‘Lord of the Rings,’” she said. Twenty years after the epic’s conclusion, the international interest Jackson’s trilogy sparked in New Zealand — including Malone’s — continues.

Source: Los Angeles Times December 01, 2023 22:13 UTC