'Lord Of The Rings' Watch: Otto Focus

Before playing Eowyn in December's Two Towers -- the second Lord of the Rings film -- Miranda Otto (What Lies Beneath) took a crash course in J.R.R. Tolkien. ''I cut out every line of dialogue Eowyn spoke and looked at everything that was said about her,'' says the Aussie native, 34, whose human character falls for Viggo Mortensen's Aragorn. How do humans compare with hobbits? ''They're perhaps more tempted and flawed than other races.'' Besides the trilogy, Otto studied dialects, horse riding, and swordplay. ''It was like Swiss finishing school,'' she says. ''The sword fighting was great fun, but I realized if I lost concentration I could lose an eye.''