Maybe it’s just my own chronic morbidity and melancholia, but I really do think about it a great deal and quite often in the small hours of the night when, it is said, the greatest numbers of people die.

Watching the completed version of The Two Towers for example, I was very conscious of scenes – sometimes whole sequences – that I had seen being filmed or edited but which hadn’t made it into the final cut.

I believe it would be unrealistic to expect a film that takes The Lord of the Rings and translates it, page by page, to the screen.

You may have problems to solve but for every problem there is always a solution. It’s a positive-and-negative thing: you can’t have a problem without there being a solution. There always is. Your job is to find it…

Watching the completed version of The Two Towers for example, I was very conscious of scenes - sometimes whole sequences - that I had seen being filmed or edited but which hadn't made it into the final cut.

The biggest challenge was trying to convey the story of the making of a film that isn't finished yet - and which won't be finished until the third film, The Return of the King, reaches our cinemas towards the end of 2003!

Maybe it's just my own chronic morbidity and melancholia, but I really do think about it a great deal and quite often in the small hours of the night when, it is said, the greatest numbers of people die.

The older we get, the swifter time seems to pass and the quicker memories seem to fade.

I've been thinking, Christopher Robin,' said Pooh, 'which do you like best: old friends or new?'Christopher Robin thought and, after a long time, said: 'Well, I like new friends because you never quite know what they'll do next. But I like old friends, too, because, however long you've known them, you are always discovering things you didn't know before.