The Dead Don’t Hurt is Viggo Mortensen’s newest film containing an Easter egg that only true fans of Lord of the Rings may notice. In one scene, Mortensen appears wearing medieval armour such as a breastplate, helmet, and belt, but something is missing: his sword. This led him to ask permission to use his character’s sword and add that extra piece to the costume.
Mortensen recounted in an interview with GQ magazine, “We had everything for this sequence with a knight. We had found this great, spirited horse, the right kind of saddle, and we made a medieval kind of blanket, and we had the costume for the knight.” Everything was perfect except for the missing sword, and Mortensen didn’t want to use just any sword, ultimately deciding to ask for permission to use the original Aragorn sword.
After talking to Peter Jackson, the Lord of the Rings director, he had to ask the movie company, who ultimately approved the use of the sword as it was not going to be a significant focus of the scene and would likely go unnoticed. In Mortensen’s words: “That’s why we did it, just because it seemed right. It was kind of a last-minute accident.”
The Dead Don’t Hurt premiered last year at the Toronto International Film Festival and is now available in theaters. In other news about Lord of the Rings, Mortensen has shared his thoughts on returning to the LotR universe. At the same time, Ian McKellen has expressed his interest in reprising his role as Gandalf in the new LotR spin-off, provided he is still alive
Read the full article on NME here: Read More