tolkien biography movie

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• The True Story Behind the Movie <I>Tolkien</i>

The True Story Behind the Movie Tolkien

F rom a fellowship of school-age adventurers to the hellish landscape of the Battle of the Somme, the early life of J. R. R. Tolkien in many ways parallels the acclaimed fantasy novels that would make him one of the best-known writers of the 20th century. But in the mythical narratives of The Hobbit and the three volumes of The Lord of the Rings , a reader might either see an author taking inspiration from his memories or attempting to escape them.

Tolkien, a new biopic from director Dome Karukoski in theaters May 10, portrays the events of those early years. Starring Nicholas Hoult ( X-Men: Apocalypse ) as the young Tolkien and Lily Collins ( Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile ) as his future wife Edith Bratt, the movie shows the young writer’s friendships during his formative years, as well as his experiences on the front lines during the First World War, presenting them as inspiration for his works to come.

The movie was produced without the cooperation of the Tolkien family and estate, which said in a statement to TIME that it “did not approve of, authorize or participate in the making of this film.” Fox Searchlight Pictures, the movie’s distributor, explains that Karukoski conducted extensive research prior to filming, consulting experts as well as a wealth of public archival resources.

Here’s where the movie hews to reality and where it wanders into fantasy in depicting the life of J. R. R. Tolkien.

Was Tolkien born in Africa and later orphaned?

Yes. John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was born on Jan. 3, 1892 in Bloemfontein, which was then part of the Orange Free State before it was later annexed by the British, eventually becoming part of South Africa. Tolkien’s parents were British — his father Arthur Reuel Tolkien was a bank manager, and his mother Mabel Suffield Tolkien had been a missionary in Zanzibar. Tolkien’s father died in Africa when he was young, after which his mother took him and his brother to live in England.

Mabel died in 1904, leaving her sons in the care of a Catholic priest in Birmingham, as depicted in Tolkien, but not before enrolling the young Tolkien at Birmingham’s King Edward’s School, where he would meet some of his closest friends.

Did Tolkien form a literary society while in school?

In the film, Tolkien enters school and befriends the headmaster’s son as well as a group of literary young men who meet for tea to discuss art and ideas after classes. That “fellowship” helps spur Tolkien’s passion for literature and languages.

The real Tolkien did form a literary society with a group of school friends, just like in the movie. Dubbing themselves the “T.C.B.S.” for “Tea Club, Barrovian Society,” the group took its name from the members’ habit of meeting for tea at the Barrow Stores, according to the Tolkien Society . In the years after they graduated, the members of the group remained close and continued to write to each other and exchange literary work.

What were the circumstances under which Tolkien fell in love with Edith Bratt?

The film also hews closely to the general facts of Tolkien’s relationship with Edith Bratt. As in the movie, Bratt and Tolkien lived in the same boarding house, and when Tolkien was 16 and Bratt 19, they began dating. Tolkien’s guardian, Father Francis, eventually told Tolkien that he was forbidden to communicate with Bratt until he was 21, an order which put a stop to their relationship, at least for awhile.

What were Tolkien’s experiences fighting in WWI and the Battle of the Somme?

In the movie, Tolkien is shown stumbling through the trenches at the Somme, trying desperately to find one of his boyhood friends. Though the specific events of the battle were likely fictionalized in the film, Tolkien did in fact serve on the western front and fight in the Battle of the Somme. Just as in Tolkien , two of the four members of the T.C.B.S. were killed during the war, and Tolkien himself was sickened by “trench fever” and sent back to recover in England, according to the Tolkien Society.

Did Tolkien rekindle his relationship with Bratt after returning from war?

In the film, Tolkien and Bratt encounter each other again just before Tolkien is sent to join the fighting on the western front. When he returns, waking up in a hospital in England, he finds Bratt waiting for him.

The real story played out a bit differently. According to the Tolkien Society, the young Tolkien actually wrote to Bratt on his 21st birthday when he was still studying at Oxford, and they became engaged soon after. By the time Tolkien was fighting in the Battle of the Somme, he and Bratt were already married.

When did Tolkien write The Hobbit , and what inspired him to write it?

After returning from the war, Tolkien eventually became a professor at Oxford, where he gave lectures on philology . At the end of the movie, the professor sits down to begin writing what would become his signature fantasy series.

Tolkien actually did write The Hobbit while a professor at Oxford, though his real impetus for beginning the project may have been as much pure boredom as artistic inspiration. The author has said that the first memorable line of The Hobbit came to him while he was grading a stack of exam papers.

“I remember picking up a paper and nearly gave it an extra mark, or extra five marks actually, because one page on this particular paper was left blank,” Tolkien told the BBC in 1968. “Glorious! Nothing to read.”

“So I scribbled on it, I can’t think why, ‘In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit’.”

Correction, May 16, 2019

The original version of this story misstated the chronology of Tolkien’s attending King Edward’s School. He began attending the school before his mother died, not after.

Correction, Feb. 21, 2020

The original version of this story also misstated what kind of school King Edward’s School in England is. It is an independent school, not a state grammar school.

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"Now it is a strange thing, but things that are good to have and days that are good to spend are soon told about, and not much to listen to; while things that are uncomfortable, palpitating, and even gruesome, make a good tale, and take a good deal of telling anyway." — J.R.R. Tolkien, The Hobbit , chapter 3

Biopics often struggle with this same thing, how to portray the "good to spend" days of its subject, while gravitating towards the "gruesome." "Tolkien," directed by Finnish filmmaker Dome Karukoski (“ Tom of Finland ”), with a script by David Gleeson and Stephen Beresford , does a fairly good job of balancing the "good to spend" with the "gruesome," setting up the various influences and inspirations working on John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, a linguistic prodigy who would end up writing some of the best-selling fantasy books of all time. Flip-flopping back and forth between Tolkien's orphaned childhood/schooling years and a prolonged imagining of his experience during the Battle of the Somme in 1916, "Tolkien" approaches its subject with maybe a little bit too much reverence, but shows an interest in the development of Tolkien's ideas, his passion for philology (not the most cinematic of subjects), his love of myths and legends. The Tolkien estate has distanced itself forcefully  from "Tolkien," without having seen the film. There's not much here to object to, although certain things are missing entirely (Catholicism, anyone?) As an origin story, "Tolkien," has its moments of clarity and emotion. Some of it is oversimplified, even misguided. But the film cares about its subject, and cares about finding ways to portray "things that are good and days that are good to spend." 

Young Ronald (Harry Gilby) is first shown playing with swords during his idyllic childhood in Sarehole village. His love of myths is passed on to him from his mother Mabel ( Laura Donnelly ), who regales her two sons with stories of dragons and knights and gold. When Mabel dies, Ronald and his brother are orphaned, and become wards of Father Francis Morgan ( Colm Meaney ), who places them in a boarding house for children in similar circumstances. After a bumpy start at school, Ronald finds himself with three best friends, Christopher Wiseman (Ty Tennant), Robert Gilson (Albie Marber) and Geoffrey Bache Smith (Adam Bregman). They gather at Barrows after school and talk about their artistic pursuits, calling themselves the T.C.B.S. (Tea Club, Barrovian Society). This is the formation of Tolkien's cherished "fellowship," underlined by sweeping music in case you missed the connection. The young actors create a believable bond, as do the group of older actors who portray them once they reach college college ( Nicholas Hoult , with intense blue eyes and sharp cheekbones, as Tolkien, Anthony Boyle as Geoffrey, Tom Glynn-Carney as Christopher, and Patrick Gibson as Robert).

Since these sequences are intercut with Tolkien a couple of years down the road, staggering through the trenches in France looking for Geoffrey through mounds of dead bodies, the burgeoning friendship of the boys has a feeling of "the doomed" about it. In the preface to the second edition of The Lord of the Rings, Tolkien wrote, "One has indeed personally to come under the shadow of war to feel fully its oppression; but as the years go by it seems now often forgotten that to be caught in youth by 1914 was no less hideous an experience than to be involved in 1939 and the following years. By 1918 all but one of my close friends were dead." "Tolkien" captures this really well.

Tolkien's romance with Edith Bratt ( Lily Collins ), another orphan living at the boarding house, leads to one of the highlights in the film, a long scene where the two converse about language, arguing about meaning vs. sound. This scene loops in the famous "cellar door" concept, beloved by Tolkien ("cellar door" is beautiful to say and hear, separated entirely from what it means). The script really digs into "cellar door," giving Edith's character some "oomph" in the process, while also managing to be a coiled-up late-Victorian-era love scene, the passionate meeting of two minds. The scene doesn't feel like a box being checked off towards a predestined result. It's really about something. Later, in another fun sequence, Edith introduces Tolkien to Wagner's "Ring Cycle" in an extremely unconventional way, providing some context to another one of Tolkien's inspirations. Derek Jacobi shows up as Joseph Wright, the eccentric philology professor at Oxford who takes Tolkien under his wing, spouting a long monologue about the word "oak." "Tolkien" is a movie about people who think about things. You buy it. 

On the flip side, the framing device of the Somme battle, dragging on endlessly, is where "Tolkien" goes awry, repeatedly. Tolkien's determination to find Geoffrey, all with the help of a soldier named Sam, devolves into hallucinatory scenes where Tolkien literally "sees" dragons and what would eventually become the Eye of Sauron and the Nazgûl, unfurling across the hellscape of No-man's-Land. This is a very reductive approach to literature (as well as the artistic imagination of Tolkien) and it has a couple of unfortunate results. First of all, any visual representation of these things will inevitably draw comparisons to Peter Jackson's film adaptations of Tolkien's books. Worse, presenting the Somme as explicit "inspiration" for Tolkien's magical world ends up diminishing both the battle and the books. 

If you're "into" Tolkien, you know the deep pool of fascination. He himself got bogged down in the works that made his name. When his publisher wrote him in 1938 to ask how the sequel to The Hobbit was coming along, Tolkien replied that the work was flowing but also "getting quite out of hand." His creation was running amok! Until the end of his life, he carried on correspondence with fans from around the world, answering their questions about Orcs and free will and the Elvish language, going on for 20 pages at a stretch. Many of these letters were never sent. They sat in desk drawers as piles of unfinished drafts. Reading the correspondence, you get the feeling that he is not really the the creator of Middle Earth. It's more like he is the lead excavator in an ongoing archaeological dig. That's what's so fascinating about him, how deep his creation went in him. I'm not sure it's possible to capture this on film. 

Sheila O'Malley

Sheila O'Malley received a BFA in Theatre from the University of Rhode Island and a Master's in Acting from the Actors Studio MFA Program. Read her answers to our Movie Love Questionnaire here .

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Tolkien (2019)

Rated PG-13 for some sequences of war violence.

112 minutes

Nicholas Hoult as J.R.R. Tolkien

Lily Collins as Edith Bratt

Genevieve O'Reilly as Mrs. Smith

Colm Meaney as Father Francis Morgan

Tom Glynn-Carney as Christopher Wiseman

Craig Roberts as Sam

Anthony Boyle as G.B. Smith

Patrick Gibson as R.Q. Gilson

• Dome Karukoski
• David Gleeson
• Stephen Beresford

Cinematographer

• Lasse Frank Johannessen
• Harri Ylönen
• Thomas Newman

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Tolkien review – affecting biopic of the Lord of the Rings creator

This refreshing origins story, starring Nicholas Hoult, traces the early life of JRR Tolkien as he makes friends at Oxford, finds love and faces the horror of war

A sweet innocence and high-mindedness pervade this movie from screenwriters David Gleeson and Stephen Beresford and the Finnish director Dome Karukoski. It’s about the early life of JRR Tolkien – who, like CS Lewis , became a staggeringly successful author but remained an unworldly Oxford don to the end of his days, never dreaming of the kind of mega-celebrity and super-wealth that writers such as JK Rowling or George RR Martin enjoy.

Nicholas Hoult plays the doe-eyed young John Ronald Reuel Tolkien, an orphaned boy at King Edward’s School, Birmingham, with a brilliant facility for languages who makes three good friends there (his “fellowship”) and falls shyly in love with the young woman at his boarding house, Edith Bratt ( Lily Collins ), but who is forced by his Catholic guardian into choosing between early marriage and going up to Oxford.

The story is told via flashbacks from his soldier’s existence at the Somme in 1916, worrying about his schoolroom comrades and agonising over the love he might have lost. There are various moments that are supposed to be goosebump-inducing premonitions of Tolkien’s future created world (at the Somme, he has a batman called Sam, played by Craig Roberts) and visions of dragons in the midst of the western front carnage. But the film, understandably perhaps, can’t reconcile his romantic and mythic vision of battle with the banal horror of the first world war.

I very much enjoyed the young Tolkien’s prewar ecstatic conversion to the world of philology at Oxford, with Derek Jacobi ’s sharp-tongued professor telling him to write a 5,000-word essay on the Norse influence on Sir Gawain and the Green Knight before teatime. (Sadly, the film doesn’t show him having to do that.)

This is a very male world and perhaps the inner life of Edith remains a mystery (as perhaps it might have been for Tolkien), but its earnestness and idealism are refreshing.

• Drama films
• JRR Tolkien
• Nicholas Hoult

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2019, Biography/History, 1h 52m

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Critics Consensus

Tolkien has the period trappings and strong performances of a worthy biopic, but lacks the imagination required to truly do its subject justice. Read critic reviews

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As a young student, J.R.R. Tolkien finds love, friendship and artistic inspiration among a group of fellow outcasts. Their brotherhood soon strengthens as Tolkien weathers the storm of a tumultuous courtship with Edith Bratt and the outbreak of World War I. These early life experiences later inspire the budding author to write the classic fantasy novels "The Hobbit" and "The Lord of the Rings."

Rating: PG-13 (Some Sequences of War Violence)

Genre: Biography, History, Drama

Original Language: English

Director: Dome Karukoski

Producer: Peter Chernin , Jenno Topping , David Ready , Kris Thykier

Writer: David Gleeson , Stephen Beresford

Release Date (Theaters): May 10, 2019  wide

Release Date (Streaming): Jul 23, 2019

Box Office (Gross USA): $4.5M

Runtime: 1h 52m

Distributor: Fox Searchlight

Production Co: Chernin Entertainment

Cast & Crew

Nicholas Hoult

J.R.R. Tolkien

Lily Collins

Edith Bratt

Colm Meaney

Father Francis

Derek Jacobi

Professor Wright

Anthony Boyle

Geoffrey Smith

Patrick Gibson

Robert Gilson

Tom Glynn-Carney

Christopher Wiseman

Craig Roberts

Private Sam Hodges

Harry Gilby

J.R.R. Tolkien (Young)

Adam Bregman

Geoffrey Smith (Young)

Albie Marber

Robert Gilson (Young)

Christopher Wiseman (Young)

Laura Donnelly

Mabel Tolkien

Genevieve O'Reilly

Mrs. Faulkner

Dome Karukoski

David Gleeson

Screenwriter

Stephen Beresford

Peter Chernin

Jenno Topping

David Ready

Kris Thykier

Lasse Frank Johannessen

Cinematographer

Harri Ylönen

Film Editing

Thomas Newman

Original Music

Grant Montgomery

Production Design

Supervising Art Direction

Paul Cowell

Art Director

Colleen Kelsall

Costume Design

Kate Ringsell

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Critic Reviews for Tolkien

Audience reviews for tolkien.

Nicholas Hoult and Lily Collins lead the cast in the J.R.R. Tolkien biopic Tolkien. The film looks at the formative years of J.R.R. Tolkien's life; growing up in an orphanage and making lasting friendships that would inspire him. Both Hoult and Collins give strong performances, and director Dome Karukoski uses an interesting visual style that makes allusions to Tolkien's Lord of the Rings mythology. Still, the plot is pretty formulaic and doesn't hold that many surprises. Yet despite a few weaknesses, Tolkien is a compelling look at the man behind one on the most influential novels of the twentieth century.

I'll admit I had some interest when I heard that a Tolkien biopic was in the works, but now that I've actually seen it, I'm very unsure about who was supposed to want this movie? It's just an unbearably clichéd biopic that makes sure it ticks all the boxes a biopic for some reason must. I don't understand how this formula gets forced in to the real-life story of every person who has ever lived a time that was put to screenplay. It's so boring, and it's so done. Who was crying out for a movie that examined famed author J. R. R. Tolkien when he... went from mildly unpopular at fancy pants school, to mildly popular at fancy pants school? Not when he was writing the most famous fantasy series of all time. Not when he was at war (or at least not more than about a cumulative 6 minutes of flashforwards at war). Not his relationship with C. S. Lewis. Not even about going to codebreaking school. Nope, a young Tolkien whose not very likeable and rather lofty for someone who supposedly comes from such a poor background. It does touch on some references to his future writing, adding a little bit of a fantastical element, but it's so afraid of this, its best element, that really only seems to imply that old mate Jirt wouldn't have come up with a single idea for Lord of the Rings unless some sort of external stimulus for it fell in his lap. Another biopic cliché.

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Tolkien (2019 film)

• View history

Tolkien is a biographical drama about the early life of J.R.R. Tolkien , released in May 2019, by Chernin Entertainment and Fox Searchlight Pictures . It is directed by Finnish filmmaker  Dome Karukoski , with a screenplay by Stephen Beresford and David Gleeson . English actor Nicholas Hoult portrays Tolkien in his early twenties, with Lily Collins as Tolkien's future wife, Edith .

The rumor of an upcoming Tolkien biopic surfaced in November 2013. [2] Filming itself began in October 2017, in Liverpool , England , and its first trailer was released by TheOneRing.net in February 2019.

In the UK, Tolkien was released on May 3. In the United States, a limited release came May 7, and the final wide release on May 10.

The film portrays some of J.R.R. Tolkien 's childhood, the start of his love-life with Edith Bratt , his experiences in the First World War in 1916, and the forming of his interests in philology and fantasy conception. It features Tolkien's school-mates at King Edward's school that formed the Tea Club, Barrovian Society with him before the war, such as Robert Quilter Gilson and Christopher Wiseman .

A dragon , a Balrog 's face, and vague battle scenes from the First Age of Middle-earth are shown as a few of Tolkien's visions during his weeks of combat in the Somme Offensive .

Tolkien earned a total of $2.9 million worldwide in its opening weekend, finishing ninth in the box office. [3] In total, the film earned over $9 million worldwide. [4]

It currently holds a rating of 50% on the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, based on 199 reviews as of June 22, 2023. [5]

Tolkien (2019) - Trailer no. 1

Tolkien (2019) - Trailer no. 2

Tolkien (2019) "Off to War" clip

Tolkien (2019) Cast and Director pre-release interview

• ↑ TheOneRing.net | Thomas Newman to compose score for J.R.R. Tolkien biopic
• ↑ https://www.theguardian.com/film/2013/nov/22/jrr-tolkien-biopic-hobbit-lord-of-the-rings
• ↑ https://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?page=main&id=tolkien.htm
• ↑ Box Office Mojo
• ↑ https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/tolkien
• Lord of the Rings

Screen Rant

Tolkien true story: what the movie changed (& what happened next).

The Tolkien biopic is a respectful movie that attempts to honor J.R.R. Tolkien, creator of Lord of the Rings. But how accurate really is it?

Tolkien is a dramatized account of the true story of J.R.R. Tolkien, linguist and writer most famous for  The Hobbit and  The Lord of the Rings - but how accurate is it to real life, and what happened next? Every biopic has to strike a careful balance between truth and fiction. On the one hand, a filmmaker wants to create as accurate a representation of a historical figure as possible; on the other, life is not made to be a movie, and as a result the story inevitably needs to be adapted to create a cohesive, dramatic narrative.

In the case of  Tolkien , director Dome Karukoski had hoped to step away from biopics after  Tom of Finland . He was drawn into  Tolkien in spite of himself, due in part to his childhood love of Tolkien's fantasy books, and to a strong script that he felt gripped him. The narrative stresses the link between Tolkien's Middle-earth and his experience of the Battle of the Somme, and uses this as a launchpad to explore the writer's painful history.

Related:  Read Our Tolkien Review

But while all that's rooted in the truth, the movie takes several liberties, changing up events or downplaying key moments from Tolkien's story. What's more, with the film ending just as Tolkien first writers " In a hole in the ground, there lived a hobbit, " there's clearly a lot more that happened after.

J.R.R. Tolkien's Childhood Is Mostly Accurate (But Birmingham Wasn't That Bleak)

The beginning of  Tolkien is pretty much historically accurate, albeit dramatized ever so slightly. John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was born in 1892, the son of Arthur and Mabel Tolkien. Although the film doesn't stress it much, Tolkien was born in the Orange Free State in Africa; Arthur was a bank manager, and had been promoted to head the Bloemfontein office. When he was just three years old, Tolkien and his younger brother Hilary traveled with their mother back to England on what was supposed to just be a lengthy visit to their family. Tragically, Tolkien's father contracted rheumatic fever and died before he could join them. The Tolkien family, heartbroken and bereft, moved to Worcestershire. The Shire was very much the world Tolkien grew up in, the rural English environment where Tolkien's imagination first began to flourish. Until, as in the film, further tragedy struck and Tolkien's mother passed away.

Mabel Tolkien had become a professing Catholic in 1900, to the horror of the wider family, who cut off all ties. As a result, after the death of his mother, Tolkien had only the Catholic Church. Guardianship was assumed by Mabel's friend Father Francis Xavier Morgan of the Birmingham Oratory, and Tolkien moved to Edgbaston, where he was given rooms at Mrs. Faulkner's boarding house. Although Birmingham wasn't quite so bleak as the film paints it, the reality is that to the young J.R.R. Tolkien the city was a vision of Hell. It probably did inspire some elements of Mordor , and some scholars even believe Edgbaston Tower was the inspiration for the Dark Tower itself.

Tolkien's Relationship with Edith Bratt Had A Different Happy Ending

Although J.R.R. Tolkien was not alone, he was a very lonely boy, and as a result he couldn't help but connect with his fellow orphan  Edith Bratt . The film accurately portrays the initial stages of the two's courtship, right down to their love of going to teashops and throwing sugar cubes into the hats of passers-by. While Edith's experience at Mrs. Faulkner's is slightly dramatized, it fits with most accounts she gave of her time there. During the summer of 1909, Tolkien and Edith decided that they were in love. (Amusingly, the scene in which Edith dances in the woods for Tolkien - clearly inspiring the character of Luthien - happened years after their courtship, when they were happily married.)

Related:  Watch Our Tolkien Interview With Lily Collins

Unfortunately, as in the film, Tolkien's guardian disapproved of the relationship, and forbade Tolkien to act on it until he reached the age of 21. The two parted ways, and in the intervening years Edith moved to Cheltenham, where she got engaged to another man. But this is where the true story needs to be separated from the film's dramatized version; in reality, Tolkien wrote to Edith on the eve of his twenty-first birthday, professing his continued love for her. She replied saying she was already engaged, but her letter subtly implied that she had only done this because she believed Tolkien had long since forgotten her. Within a week, Tolkien had traveled to Cheltenham, where he met Edith on the railway platform. That very day, she returned the ring, and professed her engagement to Tolkien instead.

The two were married at the Catholic Church of St. Mary Immaculate in Warwick on 22 March, 1916, with Edith converting to Catholicism at Tolkien's insistence. Tolkien began his military service shortly after, and by June 1916 he had been transferred to France. As he wrote at the time, " Parting with my wife then... it was like a death. "

The Fellowship In Tolkien Is Incredibly Accurate

Tolkien tells the story of the T.C.B.S., or the "Tea Club, Barrovian Society," a group Tolkien was part of. It's largely accurate in its representation of the T.C.B.S., whose core members were Tolkien, Geoffrey Bache Smith, Christopher Wiseman, and Robert Gibson (however, there were more members both at the time and subsequently). These four continued to stay in contact until 1916, when the First World War tragically intruded. Tolkien and Christopher were the only survivors of the Great War, with Geoffrey dying in the Battle of the Somme. Heartbreakingly, Smith did indeed pen a final letter to his friend Tolkien in which he wrote:

"My chief consolation is that if I am scuppered tonight there will still be left a member [the T.C.B.S.] to voice what I dreamed and what we all agreed upon. For the death of one of its members cannot, I am determined, dissolve [the group]. Death can make us loathsome and helpless as individuals, but it cannot put an end to the immortal four! May God bless you my dear John Ronald and may you say things I have tried to say long after I am not there to say them if such be my lot."

As in the film, Tolkien encouraged Geoffrey's reluctant mother to publish her son's poetry, and he even wrote the foreword.

Related:  Watch Our Tolkien Interview With Nicholas Hoult

The Battle of the Somme Did Impact Tolkien (But He Wasn't Near Death)

More poets and writers were present at the Battle of the Somme than at any other conflict in history; in large part that's because the atrocity of it was seared into the minds of the soldiers and the officers, and they could only interpret its horrors through their imaginations.  Tolkien stresses this, showing J.R.R. Tolkien translating flamethrowers as dragons, and imagining - or perhaps partly hallucinating - monstrous forces over the battlefield. The film accurately presents Tolkien suffering as a result of the filthy and wretched conditions, coming down with Trench fever and Trench foot, barely surviving. While recovering at the hospital, Tolkien jotted down notes on his experience, and many of them were incorporated into the War of the Ring and the epic Fall of Gondolin .

However, there are some differences. Every officer was assigned a batman, an everyday soldier whose job was to serve with them.  Tolkien tells what appears to be an entirely fictional narrative in which J.R.R. Tolkien's batman Sam struggles to keep him alive. In truth, this event doesn't seem to have happened; still, Tolkien was indeed impressed by the everyday heroism of these loyal batmen, and in private correspondence he confessed that these soldiers were the inspiration for Sam Gamgee. Carpenter's  Biography quotes Tolkien as confessing, " My 'Sam Gamgee' is indeed a reflexion of the English soldier, of the privates and batmen I knew in the 1914 war, and recognized as so far superior to myself. "

Tolkien Changes How The Hobbit Was Conceived

Tolkien left the Army in 1920, and began a prestigious academic career that ultimately took him and his family to Oxford. He became well-known for a series of inspiring lectures on the Old English epic poem  Beowulf , and tended to start his lectures in dramatic fashion, silently coming into the room before fixing his students with a piercing gaze and loudly declaiming the poem in the original language. Most students swiftly assumed the word " hwæt ," which opens the poem, should really be translated as " quiet ." W.H. Auden was one of Tolkien's students, and remembered it having a dramatic impact; " The voice was the voice of Gandalf , " he reflected years later. The film modifies this idea a little, showing a drunken Tolkien making similar declamations while a student himself.

Tolkien 's ending shows the moment in which J.R.R. Tolkien began to write his first fantasy novel,  The Hobbit , but in truth it mangles the scene a little. According to Tolkien himself, the story began in a rather more whimsical fashion. He was marking exam papers at the time, and came to one page that had been left blank, the student evidently having been stumped by a difficult question. Amused, Tolkien decided to fill the space himself, and jotted down: " In a hole in the ground, there lived a hobbit. " He sat back in his chair and read the line, suddenly struck by it, and later joked he almost gave the student a mark for the blank page out of thanks.

Related:  What To Expect From Amazon's Lord of the Rings TV Show

What Happened After The End Of Tolkien

J.R.R. Tolkien formed a new Fellowship at Oxford, the Inklings, whose numbers included his dear friend C.S. Lewis. The Inklings made their mark on history, encouraging their members to read and complete their latest works; Tolkien's  The Lord of the Rings , Lewis'  Out of the Silent Planet and Charles Williams'  All Hallows Eve were all written with the encouragement of the Inklings. Tolkien himself was always rather bemused at the fame and adulation he received for his fictions, somewhat uncomfortable with the role they played in shaping popular culture. He and Edith moved to Bournemouth, where Tolkien missed his fellow Inklings' company, but where Edith reveled in becoming a hostess. In his biography, Humphrey Carter reflected that this act of sacrifice was probably JRR Tolkien's greatest demonstration of his love for his wife.

"Those friends who knew Ronald and Edith Tolkien over the years never doubted that there was deep affection between them. It was visible in the small things, the almost absurd degree in which each worried about the other's health, and the care in which they chose and wrapped each other's birthday presents; and in the large matters, the way in which Ronald willingly abandoned such a large part of his life in retirement to give Edith the last years in Bournemouth that he felt she deserved, and the degree in which she showed pride in his fame as an author. A principal source of happiness to them was their shared love of their family. This bound them together until the end of their lives, and it was perhaps the strongest force in the marriage. They delighted to discuss and mull over every detail of the lives of their children, and later their grandchildren."

Edith passed away in November 1971, and JRR Tolkien joined her just 21 months later. They were buried in the same grave.

More:  Why The Tolkien Estate Has Disowned The Biopic Movie

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Tolkien (2019)

Genre: biography / drama, duration: 111 minuten, alternative title: a light in the darkness, country: united states, directed by: dome karukoski, stars: nicholas hoult , lily collins and pam ferris, imdb score: 6,8  (46.373), releasedate: 3 may 2019.

Tolkien plot

"A Life of Love, Courage & Fellowship." The biographical story about the writer of the world's most beloved fictional world Middle Earth, JRR Tolkien. This film explores the orphaned author's formative years when he finds friendship, love and artistic inspiration between a group of outsiders at school.

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J.R.R. Tolkien

Edith Bratt

Father Francis Morgan

Professor Joseph Wright

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Geoffrey Bache Smith

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• 10564 messages

Wist niet zo goed wat ik van deze film kan verwachten. Wellicht is dit dan voor de echte Tolkien fans, want ik kan hier niet zoveel mee. Ja de biografie maakt duidelijk waar zijn inspiratie vandaan is gekomen, maar daadwerkelijk fascinerend vind ik het niet. Een vriend van mij vertelde ten tijden van The Lord of the Rings films dat Tolkien nogal uitgebreid van stof is en in zijn boek(en) een complete bladzijde besteed aan het omschrijven van bijvoorbeeld een eikenboom. Waardoor de manier van vertellen best wel stroperig/kruiperig is. Net zoals deze film dus. Ik hoopte dat deze Tolkien biografie boeiender zou zijn, maar dat ligt hoogstwaarschijnlijk aan mezelf omdat ik er een beperkte of andere kijk op heb. The Fellowship of the Ring staat in mijn top 10 van favoriete films aller tijden en van deze film/biografie had ik iets anders verwacht, maar ik weet dus niet zo goed wat. Helaas was het een karige ervaring voor mij. Wat ik gezien heb is een ietwat saaie film over een vriendengroepje met een vleugje romantiek, stukjes WOI en af en toe wat fantasie. Het is vooral een overbodige film geworden voor mij.

Didn't really know what to expect from this movie. Perhaps this is for the real Tolkien fans, because I can't do much with this. Yes, the biography makes clear where his inspiration came from, but I don't find it really fascinating. A friend of mine told me at the time of The Lord of the Rings films that Tolkien is quite extensive and spent a complete page in his book(s) describing, for example, an oak tree. This makes the way of telling quite viscous/creepy. Just like this movie.

I was hoping this Tolkien biography would be more engaging, but that's probably just me because I have a limited or different view of it. The Fellowship of the Ring is in my top 10 favorite movies of all time and from this movie/biography I expected something different, but I'm not really sure what. Unfortunately it was a scant experience for me. What I've seen is a somewhat boring film about a group of friends with a touch of romance, pieces of WWI and the occasional fantasy.

It has mostly become a superfluous film for me.

• 8752 messages

“Things aren't beautiful because of how they sound. They're beautiful because of what they mean.” Sterke film over het leven van Tolkien. Vooral de manier waarop de makers met taal en de kracht van verbeelding omgaan vond ik een sterk punt, en de acteurs weten de soms wollige teksten ook vol overtuiging te brengen. Hoult, Collins en alle acteurs in de bijrollen, allemaal zijn ze fantastisch op dreef. De band tussen de vier vrienden wordt sterk uitgewerkt, en ook de band tussen Tolkien en zijn latere vrouw Edith is een sterk subplot. In het laatste gedeelte worden de oorlogsjaren van Tolkien behandeld, en ook dit gedeelte werkt. We hadden bijna geen Lord of the Rings/The Hobbit gehad… Dit laatste gedeelte heeft een fijn soort melancholie over zich, en het is interessant om te zien op welke manier Tolkien iedere keer weer een nieuw puzzelstukje krijgt in zijn zoektocht naar zijn stem als schrijver. We weten allemaal waar het uiteindelijk toe leidt.

“Things aren't beautiful because of how they sound. They're beautiful because of what they mean.”

Strong film about the life of Tolkien. I especially liked the way in which the makers deal with language and the power of imagination, and the actors also know how to deliver the sometimes woolly texts with conviction. Hoult, Collins and all the supporting actors, they're all doing great. The bond between the four friends is strongly developed, and the bond between Tolkien and his later wife Edith is also a strong subplot.

The last section covers Tolkien's war years, and this section also works. We had hardly had Lord of the Rings/The Hobbit… This last part has a nice kind of melancholy about it, and it's interesting to see how Tolkien gets a new puzzle piece every time in his search for his voice as a writer . We all know where it eventually leads.

• 4479 messages

In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. Ik kan niet eenvoudig uitleggen hoe belangrijk de boeken van Tolkien voor me geweest zijn. Ik was zeven of acht toen ik ze voor het eerst las, en ik heb ze talloze keren herlezen, zowel Nederlands als Engels. Drie exemplaren van elk deel versleten over de tijd heen, ondanks de fraai geborduurde omslagen die mijn moeder ervoor gemaakt had. En later dan nog de Silmarillion, en de Letters. Genoeg om onmiddelijk talloze fouten, romantiseringen en opleukingen in het verhaal van deze film te zien - het is veel meer iets als 'gebaseerd op' dan 'echt gebeurd'. Maar waar ik daar normaal gesproken echt over val, heb ik er in dit geval tot mijn eigen verbazing vrede mee, en dat komt wellicht voor een heel groot deel door de breekbare manier waarop Hoult zijn rol speelt, de authenticiteit (uch) waarmee de andere rollen gespeeld worden, de mooie locaties. En het helpt natuurlijk ook dat Edith door Lily Collins gespeeld wordt - en als je haar foto op de wikipedia vergelijkt, lijkt ze er nog wel een beetje op ook. En wellicht is het ook wel ok, om het levensverhaal van een van de grootste sprookjesschrijvers ooit zelf ietwat sprookjesachtig te houden. Het heeft wel een zekere poetische balans in zich. Wel jammer van de droombeelden in de loopgraven, dat vind ik dan wel echt weer een misser. Hoe onvoorstelbaar moet het geweest zijn, om in die tijd te leven, die verschrikkingen mee te maken, en dan daarna toch weer terug te moeten in een normaal burgerlijk bestaan. Wat zijn we toch verwend eigenlijk, in de tijd waarin we nu leven - waar we ons zorgen maken over minder op vakantie kunnen, minder geld over te houden om mee te feesten. Toch wel iets anders dan drie van de vier vrienden weg, twee dood en een in het gekkenhuis.

In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit.

I cannot simply explain how important Tolkien's books have been to me. I was seven or eight when I first read them, and I've reread them countless times, both Dutch and English. Three copies of each volume have worn out over time, despite the beautifully embroidered covers my mother had made for them. And later the Silmarillion, and the Letters.

Enough to immediately see numerous errors, romanticizations and embellishments in the story of this film - it's much more like 'based on' than 'actually happened'. But what I normally really like about that, in this case, to my own surprise, I'm at peace with it, and that's probably in large part due to the fragile way Hoult plays his part, the authenticity (uch) with which the other roles are played, the beautiful locations. And of course it also helps that Edith is played by Lily Collins - and if you compare her photo on the wikipedia, she looks a bit like it too.

And perhaps it is also okay to keep the life story of one of the greatest fairy tale writers ever somewhat fairytale-like. It does have a certain poetic balance to it. It's a pity about the dream images in the trenches, I really think that's a miss. How unimaginable it must have been to live in those times, to experience those horrors, and then to have to go back to normal bourgeois existence again. How spoiled we are, in the time we live in now - where we worry about less vacation time, less money to party with. Something different than three out of four friends gone, two dead and one in the insane asylum.

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J.R.R. Tolkien

By jake rossen | aug 10, 2020.

AUTHORS (1892–1973); BLOEMFONTEIN, SOUTH AFRICA

There aren't many 20th century authors whose popularity could match that of English fantasy icon J.R.R. Tolkien (1892-1973). The mind behind The Lord of the Rings and various other works set in Middle-earth has inspired generations of creators and helped establish the high-fantasy genre as one of the most powerful in the marketplace today. He's earned armies of admirers and spawned plenty of imitators over the decades, but few, if any, have managed to rival his accomplishments. For more on Tolkien’s compelling life and work, keep reading.

1. J.R.R. Tolkien was a soldier in World War I.

John Ronald Reuel Tolkien was born in Bloemfontein, South Africa, on January 3, 1892. His family would move to Birmingham, England, in 1896 after his father died, and Tolkien's mother would pass away just a few years after that. From there, Tolkien ended up living with relatives and in boarding homes under the supervision of a priest. He eventually earned a first-class degree at Exeter College in 1915, studying English Language and Literature . Afterwards, he enlisted for duty in the British Army and was placed in the Lancashire Fusiliers infantry regiment during World War I, where he was involved in the Battle of the Somme in 1916. Tolkien was released after contracting "trench fever," a bacterial disease carried by lice that causes fever, muscle pain, headaches, and enlargements of the spleen and liver. Before heading into the war, Tolkien married Edith Bratt , whom he had known since he was 16.

2. J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis met at Oxford University.

In 1925 , a 33-year-old Tolkien became a professor of Anglo-Saxon at Oxford University, notably lecturing on works like Beowulf . There, Tolkien started a writer’s group, The Inklings, where he later fraternized with C.S. Lewis. The future The Chronicles of Narnia author was also a professor, and the two smoothed out some initial dislike to form a friendship. Both men were fascinated by Norse mythology and used their meet-ups with The Inklings to encourage one another to pursue their fiction work.

3. J.R.R. Tolkien didn’t think The Hobbit was a children’s book.

While at Oxford, Tolkien began working on the book that would kick off the Middle-earth saga, The Hobbit , which centers on Bilbo Baggins, a diminutive hero who endures a series of adventures along with a troupe of dwarves and the wizard Gandalf. When the book was published in 1937, it was considered by some to be written for children, though Tolkien said that wasn’t his intention. In a nod to his future efforts offering illustrated maps for his Lord of the Rings saga, Tolkien also created over 100 drawings to add dimension to his first novel.

4. J.R.R. Tolkien’s wife inspired his characters.

Tolkien clearly drew inspiration for his Lord of the Rings series from studying mythology and fantasy fiction. But he also found his muse in his wife, Edith Tolkien. One day, according to a feature on Newsweek , Tolkien watched as Edith danced in a wooded area in Yorkshire. As the war pressed on, Tolkien was soothed by his wife’s grace. Struck by her beauty and elegance, Tolkien began writing a story about an Elvish princess named Lúthien and her love, Beren. The tale was so important to the couple that the characters' names were engraved on their joint headstone.

The story of Beren and Lúthien eventually found its way into The Silmarillion , a collection of tales that gave more detail to the world of Middle-earth. An expanded version, simply titled Beren and Lúthien , was published as its own standalone book in 2017, more than 40 years after Tolkien's death.

5. J.R.R. Tolkien was a terrible driver.

In 1932, Tolkien purchased a Morris Crowley automobile. Because cars were still a relatively new phenomenon, Tolkien had not had much of an opportunity to practice controlling the vehicle. By all accounts, he was a terror behind the wheel, driving on flat tires, crashing into stone walls, and speeding through intersections.

6. J.R.R. Tolkien’s son, Christopher Tolkien, carried on his father’s legacy.

Born in 1924, Christopher Tolkien was said to have assisted in his father’s work at a very early age. As a child, he would point out mistakes in bedtime stories and was tasked with reviewing The Hobbit for errors. Later, Christopher drew the main Middle-earth map for The Lord of the Rings . When J.R.R. Tolkien died in 1973, Christopher became the executor of his father’s estate, seeing to it that unpublished works like The Silmarillion saw the light of day. Christopher passed away in 2020 at the age of 95.

7. The J.R.R. Tolkien movie based on his life was disavowed by his estate.

In 2019, Fox Searchlight released Tolkien , a biopic based on the author's life, starring Nicholas Hoult, from the X-Men franchise, as J.R.R. Tolkien and Lily Collins as wife Edith. The film examines Tolkien’s wartime experiences and his efforts to create his fictional worlds. But the Tolkien estate was unhappy with the movie, saying in a statement that it didn’t approve or authorize it and had no involvement in the production.

J.R.R. Tolkien’s Middle-earth reading order.

Tolkien’s enduring legacy is his Middle-earth saga, which places a heavy focus on the efforts of hobbits Frodo, Sam, and others to confront the Dark Lord Sauron and prevent him from obtaining the One Ring that would give him dominion over the world. The saga grew to encompass several titles beyond The Lord of the Rings and can be read in the order in which they were published:

• The Hobbit (1937)
• The Lord of the Rings; The Fellowship of the Ring (1954)
• The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (1954)
• The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (1955)
• The Adventures of Tom Bombadil and Other Verses from the Red Book (1962)
• The Silmarillion (1977, posthumous)
• Unfinished Tales (1980, posthumous)
• The History of Middle-earth (1983-1996, posthumous)
• The Children of Húrin (2007, posthumous)
• Beren and Lúthien (2017, posthumous)
• The Fall of Gondolin (2018, posthumous)

Most Notable J.R.R. Tolkien Quotes:

• “If you really want to know what Middle-earth is based on, it’s my wonder and delight in the earth as it is, particularly the natural earth.”
• “Deep roots are not reached by the frost.” (From The Fellowship of the Ring )
• “Courage is found in unlikely places.” (From The Fellowship of the Ring )
• “Not all those who wander are lost.” (From The Fellowship of the Ring )
• “Short cuts make long delays.” (From The Fellowship of the Ring )
• "The war made me poignantly aware of the beauty of the world."

Tolkien (2019)

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England, early 20th century. The future writer and philologist John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (1892-1973) and three of his schoolmates create a strong bond between them as they share the same passion for literature and art, a true fellowship that strengthens as they grow up, but the outbreak of World War I threatens to shatter it.

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J.R.R. Tolkien

• Born January 3 , 1892 · Bloemfontein, Orange Free State [now in South Africa]
• Died September 2 , 1973 · Bournemouth, Dorset, England, UK (bleeding ulcer and chest infection)
• Birth name John Ronald Reuel Tolkien
• Height 5′ 8½″ (1.74 m)
• English writer, scholar and philologist, Tolkien's father was a bank manager in South Africa. Shortly before his father died (1896) his mother took him and his younger brother to his father's native village of Sarehole, near Birmingham, England. The landscapes and Nordic mythology of the Midlands may have been the source for Tolkien's fertile imagination to write about 'the Shire' and 'hobbits' in his later book the Hobbit (1937). After his mother's death in 1904 he was looked after by Father Francis Xavier Morgan a RC priest of the Congregation of the Oratory. Tolkien was educated at King Edward VI school in Birmingham. He studied linguistics at Exeter College, Oxford, and took his B.A. in 1915. In 1916 he fought in World War I with the Lancashire Fusiliers. It is believed that his experiences during the Battle of the Somne may have been fueled the darker side of his subsequent novels. Upon his return he worked as an assistant on the Oxford English Dictionary (1918-20) and took his M.A. in 1919. In 1920 he became a teacher in English at the University of Leeds. He then went on to Merton College in Oxford, where he became Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon (1925-45) and Merton professor of English Language and Literature (1945-59). His first scholarly publication was an edition of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (1925). He also wrote books on Chaucer (1934) and Beowulf (1937). In 1939 Tolkien gave the Andrew Lang Lecture at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland titled: "On Fairy-Stories". Tolkien will however be remembered most for his books the Hobbit (1937) and the Lord of the Rings (1954-55). The Hobbit began as a bedtime story for his children". He wrote Lord of the Rings over a period of about 14 years. Tolkien also discussed parts of his novels with fellow Oxfordian and fantasy writer CS Lewis during their 'meetings'. He was trying to create a fantasy world so that he could explain how he had invented certain languages, and in doing so created 'Middle-earth'. However among his peers at Oxford his works were not well received as they were not considered 'scholarly'. It was after LOTR was published in paperback in the United States in 1965 that he developed his legendary cult following and also imitators. Tolkien was W. P. Ker lecturer at Glasgow University in 1953. In 1954 both the University of Liege and University College, Dublin, awarded him honorary doctorates. He received the CBE in 1972. He served as vice-president of the Philological Society and was a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. He was made an honorary fellow of Exeter College. Despite the immense popularity of his books today Tolkien did not greatly benefit from their sales. His son Christopher Tolkien was able to publish some of his works posthumously after his manuscripts were found. - IMDb Mini Biography By: Sujit R. Varma
• J.R.R. Tolkien was an English writer, poet, philologist, and professor who is best known as the author of the classic high-fantasy works The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Silmarillion. Tolkien never expected his stories to become popular, but by sheer accident a book called The Hobbit, which he had written some years before for his own children, came in 1936 to the attention of Susan Dagnall, an employee of the London publishing firm George Allen & Unwin, who persuaded Tolkien to submit it for publication. However, when it was published a year later, the book attracted adult readers as well as children, and it became popular enough for the publishers to ask Tolkien to produce a sequel. The request for a sequel prompted Tolkien to begin what would become his most famous work: the epic novel The Lord of the Rings (originally published in three volumes 1954-1955). Tolkien spent more than ten years writing the primary narrative and appendices for The Lord of the Rings, during which time he received the constant support of the Inklings, in particular his closest friend C. S. Lewis, the author of The Chronicles of Narnia. Both The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings are set against the background of The Silmarillion, but in a time long after it. Tolkien at first intended The Lord of the Rings to be a children's tale in the style of The Hobbit, but it quickly grew darker and more serious in the writing. Though a direct sequel to The Hobbit, it addressed an older audience, drawing on the immense backstory of Beleriand that Tolkien had constructed in previous years, and which eventually saw posthumous publication in The Silmarillion and other volumes. Tolkien's influence weighs heavily on the fantasy genre that grew up after the success of The Lord of the Rings. The Lord of the Rings became immensely popular in the 1960s and has remained so ever since, ranking as one of the most popular works of fiction of the 20th century, judged by both sales and reader surveys. Tolkien wrote a brief "Sketch of the Mythology", which included the tales of Beren and Lúthien and of Túrin; and that sketch eventually evolved into the Quenta Silmarillion, an epic history that Tolkien started three times but never published. After Tolkien's death, his son Christopher published a series of works based on his father's extensive notes and unpublished manuscripts, including The Silmarillion. - IMDb Mini Biography By: Pedro Borges
• Spouse Edith Bratt (March 22, 1916 - November 29, 1971) (her death, 4 children)
• Tweed jacket and pipe
• Tolkien's mother introduced him to Latin, French, and German. While at school (mostly at Oxford) he was taught or taught himself Greek, Middle English, Old English (also called Anglo Saxon), Old Norse (also called Old Icelandic), Gothic, Modern and medieval Welsh, Finnish, Spanish, and Italian. Other languages of which he had a working knowledge include Serbian, Russian, Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, Dutch, and Lombardic. In addition to these languages, Tolkien invented 14 different languages and assorted alphabets for his Middle-earth dwellers.
• The only actor from Peter Jackson's film adaptations of "Lord of the Rings" to have actually met J.R.R. Tolkien is Christopher Lee. Lee was very fond of Tolkien's books and Tolkien himself even said that Lee would have been a good choice for the role of the wizard Saruman.
• Was extremely annoyed when 'The Lord of the Rings' was published in the mid-50s as three different stories, because he had never intended the tale to become a trilogy.
• Said in an interview that the character Faramir was the Lord of the Ring character who was the most like himself.
• While writing the Lord of the Rings, he originally intended for Aragorn to marry Éowyn, but later decided to have her marry Faramir and created the Arwen character for Aragorn.
• "American English is essentially English after having been wiped off with a dirty sponge." - from a letter in 1953 to Robert Murray, a Jesuit priest, in the book, 'The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien' (1981)
• 'The Lord of the Rings' is of course a fundamentally religious and Catholic work; unconsciously so at first, but consciously in the revision. That is why I have not put in, or have cut out practically all references to anything like 'religion,' to cults or practices, in the imaginary world. For the religious element is absorbed into the story and symbolism.
• It's a job that's never started that takes the longest to finish.
• I cordially dislike allegory in all its manifestations, and always have done since I grew old and wary enough to detect its presence.
• ...The Hobbits are just rustic English people, made small in size because it reflects the generally small reach of their imagination - not the small reach of their courage or latent power.

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The Invention of a Desert Tongue for ‘Dune’

Language constructors for the movies started with words Frank Herbert made up for his 1965 novel but went much further, creating an extensive vocabulary and specific grammar rules.

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By Marc Tracy

In Denis Villeneuve’s sci-fi “Dune” movies, Indigenous people known as Fremen use a device to tunnel rapidly through their desert planet’s surface.

The instrument is called a “compaction tool” in Frank Herbert’s 1965 novel, “Dune,” on which the films are based. But the professional language constructors David J. Peterson and Jessie Peterson wanted a more sophisticated word for it as the husband and wife built out the Fremen language, Chakobsa, for “Dune: Part Two,” which premiered earlier this month.

They started with a verb they had made up meaning “to press” — “kira” — and, applying rules David Peterson had devised for the language before the first movie, fashioned another verb that means “to compress” or “to free space by compression” — “kiraza.” From there, they used his established suffixes to come up with a noun. Thus was born the Chakobsa word for a sand compressor, “kirzib,” which can be heard in background dialogue in “Dune: Part Two.”

For language constructors — conlangers, as they are known — such small touches enhance the verisimilitude of even gigantic edifices like the “Dune” series. If the demand for conlangers’ work is any indication, filmmakers and showrunners agree.

“There’s a very big limit to what you can do with anything approaching gibberish,” said Jessie Peterson, who holds a doctorate in linguistics. “If you just shouted one word in gibberish, that would probably be fine. If you shouted a phrase of two words, OK. But if you tried to do a whole sentence structure in gibberish, it would fall apart very quickly. If somebody needed to respond or repeat information, it won’t cohere.”

Other languages are a significant part of the “Dune” films as well. For “Part One,” David Peterson devised a chant for the emperor’s fearsome military forces, the Sardaukar, and the sign language of discreet hand gestures employed by the central Atreides family.

In “Part Two,” Chakobsa is spoken — and often subtitled — extensively, not just by Fremen played by Javier Bardem and Zendaya, but also by outsiders like Rebecca Ferguson’s Lady Jessica and Timothée Chalamet’s Paul Atreides, the movies’ main character, who first wishes to travel to Arrakis to learn Chakobsa and by the end of the second movie delivers an entire monologue in the language.

Constructed languages (as opposed to so-called natural ones like English, Dutch or Japanese) date back roughly 1,000 years. J.R.R. Tolkien conceived several tongues for the Middle-earth of his celebrated books, including the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy. (He called language construction his “secret vice.”) “The Klingon Dictionary,” based on the speech of the pugilistic people in “Star Trek,” was published in 1985.

More recently, conlangers expanded on the languages in George R.R. Martin’s “A Song of Ice and Fire” books for the series “Game of Thrones” and “House of the Dragon.” (David Peterson is responsible for the Dothraki that the actor Jason Momoa delivered as Khal Drogo.) They also crafted vocabulary and grammar for the Na’vi who live on Pandora in James Cameron’s “Avatar” (2009) and “Avatar: The Way of Water” (2022).

“Before the movie even came out, there was already information about the language released to the fans — a survival guide to Pandora, with full glossary,” said Christine Schreyer, a professor of anthropology at the University of British Columbia as well as the constructor of Kryptonian for the 2013 Superman movie “Man of Steel.”

In the Petersons’ hands, Chakobsa has a specific grammatical structure. Like Latin, it regularly employs declensions, so even proper nouns sound slightly different depending on whether they are the subject or object of a sentence. And there are roughly 700 basic vocabulary words — a figure that does not include the myriad other words possible through adjustments that make kirza into kirzib or lija (to eat) into lijjin (a snack).

As with “Game of Thrones,” they had something to work with: dozens of words from the original “Dune” novel. Herbert’s Fremen — a nomadic desert people — in many ways resemble the Bedouin (though in others they recall the Native Americans of Herbert’s own Pacific Northwest), and their language had some obvious Arabic touches. It sounds roughly like Arabic without certain sounds, such as pharyngeals like the “h” sound you make when fogging a piece of glass, according to David Peterson.

Karin Ryding, a professor emerita at Georgetown University who has studied Herbert’s use of Arabic, said that in graduate school in the late 1960s, she and her colleagues read “Dune” together: “It was a secret among us that we all enjoyed this particular science-fiction novel and its references to Arabic.”

Certain titles Paul uses among the Fremen are particularly resonant: “Muad’Dib,” a desert mouse known as “the one who points the way,” is similar to the Arabic word for a respected kind of teacher, while “Lisan al-Gaib,” or “the voice from the outer world,” recalls the Arabic for “hidden tongue,” Ryding said. Paul is also called the “Mahdi,” an Arabic term for a messiahlike figure in Islam. (“Kwisatz Haderach,” the messianic appellation used by a different group in the “Dune” universe, is derived from Hebrew.)

Herbert intended these linguistic resonances to communicate the connections between our world and the world of his novels — which is our world some 20,000 years in the future. “If you want to give the reader the solid impression that he is not here and now, but that something of here and now has been carried to that faraway place and time,” Herbert said in a 1981 biography, in a passage Ryding quoted in an academic paper, “what better way to say to our culture that this is so than to give him the language of that place.”

Critics have questioned the decision by the filmmakers (including the Petersons) not to retain some of the linguistic vestiges of modern-day cultures that the novel uses. In the novel, for instance, the Fremen rebellion against their foreign overlords is referred to as a “jihad”; in the movie, it is called a “holy war.” Warner Bros., which produced the latest “Dune” films, declined to comment.

The choice not to import more modern-day resonances “dilutes Herbert’s anti-imperialist vision,” Haris A. Durrani wrote in The Washington Post upon the release of “Dune: Part One.” Manvir Singh argued last month in The New Yorker, “The world we see in ‘Dune’ was never meant to be fully sealed off from the one we know.”

David Peterson said that in constructing Chakobsa for “Dune: Part One,” he strove to accommodate the book’s Fremen vocabulary while building a fuller, coherent language.

Beyond that pre-existing glossary, which amounted to a collection of words, Peterson’s loyalty, he said, was to how language actually functions and develops. And the notion that a language 20,000 years in the future would retain substantial touches of a contemporary tongue, he argued, defies what we know about linguistics.

“There is very little understanding,” Peterson said, referring to the general public, “that languages change over time, that every aspect of language changes: how it is pronounced, what the words mean, the grammar.”

He added, “The entire recorded history of language is 6,000 years.”

Marc Tracy is a Times reporter covering arts and culture. He is based in New York. More about Marc Tracy