Elijah Wood Says Frodo Felt Like "No Time Had Passed" on The Hunt for Gollum

Elijah Wood says playing Frodo again felt like no time had passed. He told Deadline that the experience was "beautiful and surreal."

Wood reprised the role earlier this year on the set of The Lord of the Rings: The Hunt for Gollum, directed by Andy Serkis. Serkis also returns as Gollum. Principal photography, the main shoot in which most of the film's scenes are filmed, has now wrapped.

Wood described stepping back into the character as a kind of time travel. Being on set in costume and in the hobbit feet brought back muscle memory, he said. "Suddenly 27 years are gone and you're back in it again," he told Deadline. The first Lord of the Rings film came out in 2001, so the gap is a little over a quarter of a century.

The film reunites Ian McKellen as Gandalf, Wood as Frodo and Lee Pace as Thranduil. New cast members announced for the project include Anya Taylor-Joy, Kate Winslet, Jamie Dornan and Leo Woodall.

The story follows Aragorn, who must capture Gollum before Gollum can reveal to Sauron where the One Ring is hidden. It is set between the events of The Hobbit and The Fellowship of the Ring, so it sits earlier in the timeline than the films many fans know best.

Warner Bros. Pictures will release the film worldwide on December 17, 2027. That date gives the production about a year between the end of shooting and the cinema release, a typical stretch for a large visual-effects film to be finished and marketed.

For fans, the news is a clear marker on the calendar. Wood's remarks offer a glimpse of what it was like to return to a role he first played in the early 2000s, and the film now has a fixed date for audiences to circle.