The sudden and quite expected sorta-shuttering of New Line opened the door for a dollop of doubt as to whether The Hobbit was going to happen – with Guillermo del Toro, Peter Jackson or anyone directing. Fortunately, studios, even dead ones, still like making money, so the two-part prequel to The Lord of the Rings will happen, and del Toro will direct for the two-headed New Line/MGM beast.
On one hand, I’m incredibly excited to see del Toro bring his fevered imagination to Jackson’s version of J.R.R. Tolkien’s universe; on the other, I hate to think of him being tied down for the next four years in New Zealand. There’s no production start date yet, but I doubt he’ll have time to squeeze in Saturn and the End of Days or the much-hoped-for Lovecraft adaptation, At the Mountains of Madness. Then again, how do you say no to Peter Jackson? The answer: you don’t (unless he gets handsy).
We’ve known for a while (I think) that the second part of The Hobbit will deal with the sixty-year period leading up to The Fellowship of the Ring, which could be kinda tricky in terms of anticlimax. But between del Toro, Jackson, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens, they should be able to figure that out.
Expect to see part one of The Hobbit in theaters by late 2011.
19 comments
snipes should be a hobbit. bust him out the jail.
"But between … Jackson, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens they should be able to figure that out. " Umm, these guys couldn't figure KING KONG out, a movie about a giant ape. I hold little hope they're gonna be able to do this cash-grab 2nd hobbit movie any justice. Sure they did the LOTR movies, but those movies had the books as their backbones.. this 2nd hobbit movie has $$$ up its ass crack.
I guess this means not to expect Hellboy 3 until say 2014 or so. But this is still about the best news ever.
While I enjoyed the King Kong remake (I don't see how they "failed" to grasp it. Ape gets captured, ape kills then falls to death) for what it was, I do agree that the second Hobbit film is, in a word, pointless. It's just to make money. I don't care to know about the sixty years leading up to LOTR, as nothing significant occurred with the any of the characters. What are they going to show? Bilbo getting older and upsetting the community with an unwavering love for Mattlock or Diagnosis Murder? For our sakes, let Del Toro do "The Hobbit", and just nix the second film altogether. That way he can give us movies that matter.
I'm totally excited about this. And a big part of that excitement springs from the fact that these movies grossing the GNP of a small European nation could do more to enable Guillermo to do At the Mountains of Madness with a proper budget than any other forseeable set of circumstances.
nice little shot of homophobia
I sure hope there's a guy with eyeballs in weird places.
YOU SNEAKY BASTARDS!!!! NO NEW "YOU GOT IT ALL WRONG"!!!I DECLARE SHENANIGANS!!! Oh yeah, and cool about the hobbit….king kong remake sucked because it was WAY too hokey…and i concur about the second hobbit movie, but in Del Toro and Jackson we trust
*Geekgasm* DelToro interpreting Tolkien! What's not to love? Just wish Star Wars prequels had been passed off to someone equally as talented.
I think this is a great idea. I could sense that Jackson would have phoned this in if he directed. Plus Del Toro is gonna work his ass off. Win win. So why do i still feel empty inside? I think I need a girlfriend. I implore all of the hundreds of foxy ladies who read CHUD.com to date me. I know you sexy minxes like to visit this site and see how 'they got it all wrong'. Also, I expect anal on the second date.
Yeah, about this second film that has no source or book, as people keep wrongly assuming. Get off your lazy arses and do some digging. The period this second film covers is detailed in Tolkien's Unfinished Tales, including the hunting of Gollum and how Gandalf sparked off the hunt in The Hobbit because he suspected that the One Ring was out there. It's all there, folks. GO read a book sometime instead of smugly passing judgement without doing your research.
This is the best news ever. LOTR stopped being cool with ROTK, so there's no way GDT could ruin The Hobbit for me… AND it means no HB III for many, many years at least! This situation is total win!
Excellent news, this will look fantastic, hopefully GDT will be able to pick his own cast rather than have MGM do it for him. Plus with jackson out of the directing picture, it'll be meaner, leaner, darker and have far less teary-eyed-staring-into-the-middle-distance. I loved LOTR but there was a bit too much bre-staring for me. GDT excelsior!
I figured this would be the case, and I am more then soiling my knickers with glee. I know the prospect fo having a Hobbit 2 is something of a cash cow gone awry, but at the same time… plotting the script with char's that are established, a "world" already fleshed out and the open ended ability for these guys to sit back and have a field day imagining the "what if"'s mean it may end up plotless,pointless, unneccessary fluff but it'll be the glitziest, gloriest, most mind blowingly fun fluff you ever tasted. And THAT is ok with me. There is enough "story" in the original trilogy to compensate.
Me thinks Del Toro might be a bit overrated. He tolerates poorly rendered creature effects, relying on story to compensate for the disbelief rendered with puppets and animatronics. He's also a bit heavy handed and uses a slow pace for most of his films. These things will kill a travelling adventure fantasy. The look of these films, the rendering of the creatures so as to suspend disbelief and a faster pace are going to be paramount. I'm interested to learn how they'll make this story less adolescent than the source without being too heavy handed.
Me thinks Del Toro might be a bit overrated. He tolerates poorly rendered creature effects, relying on story to compensate for the disbelief rendered with puppets and animatronics. He's also a bit heavy handed and uses a slow pace for most of his films. These things will kill a travelling adventure fantasy. The look of these films, the rendering of the creatures so as to suspend disbelief and a faster pace are going to be paramount. I'm interested to learn how they'll make this story less adolescent than the source without being too heavy handed.
Umm.. caberau… I'm guessing the VFX budgets on these films will be slightly higher than his previous work. With the added bonus of the VFX company being owned by the producer.
Yeh we got the news here in New Zealand that Del Toro is going to move here to NZ for 4 years while filming and production takes place. Which for me is a good sign, shows the same level of commitment as we had from Jackson with the LOTR. Personally i cant think of anyone better to direct than Del toro 🙂
"I hate to think of him being tied down for the next four years in New Zealand" — I don't think he will be. He can deliver sooner.. I think. I'm still reading The Hobbit so I don't know if the story's full of fantastic creatures and stuff like that, which is something that'd make the project take longer in production
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