NewLine and Jackson kiss and make up... The Hobbit parts 1 and 2 !!!

[Sauced]

ACADEMY AWARD-WINNER PETER JACKSON AND NEW LINE CINEMA JOIN WITH MGM TO PRODUCE “THE HOBBIT,” EAGERLY-ANTICIPATED FANTASY ADVENTURE EPIC

NEW LINE AND MGM TO CO-PRODUCE AND SHARE WORLDWIDE DISTRIBUTION RIGHTS

PETER JACKSON AND FRAN WALSH TO EXECUTIVE PRODUCE TWO FILMS BASED ON “THE HOBBIT”

Los Angeles, CA (Tuesday, December 18, 2007) Academy Award-winning filmmaker Peter Jackson; Harry Sloan, Chairman and CEO, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc. (MGM); Bob Shaye and Michael Lynne, Co-Chairmen and Co-CEOs of New Line Cinema have jointly announced today that they have entered into the following series of agreements:

* MGM and New Line will co-finance and co-distribute two films, “The Hobbit” and a sequel to “The Hobbit.” New Line will distribute in North America and MGM will distribute internationally.

* Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh will serve as Executive Producers of two films based on “The Hobbit.” New Line will manage the production of the films, which will be shot simultaneously.

* Peter Jackson and New Line have settled all litigation relating to the “Lord of the Rings” (LOTR) Trilogy.

Said Peter Jackson, “I’m very pleased that we’ve been able to put our differences behind us, so that we may begin a new chapter with our old friends at New Line. ‘The Lord of the Rings’ is a legacy we proudly share with Bob and Michael, and together, we share that legacy with millions of loyal fans all over the world. We are delighted to continue our journey through Middle Earth. I also want to thank Harry Sloan and our new friends at MGM for helping us find the common ground necessary to continue that journey.”

“Peter Jackson has proven himself as the filmmaker who can bring the extraordinary imagination of Tolkien to life and we full heartedly agree with the fans worldwide who know he should be making ‘The Hobbit,’” said Sloan, MGM’s Chairman and CEO. “Now that we are all in agreement on ‘The Hobbit,’ we can focus on assembling the production team that will capture this phenomenal tale on film.”

Bob Shaye, New Line Co-Chairman and Co-CEO comments, “We are very pleased we have been able to resolve our differences, and that Peter and Fran will be actively and creatively involved with ‘The Hobbit’ movies. We know they will bring the same passion, care and talent to these films that they so ably accomplished with ‘The Lord of the Rings’ Trilogy.”

“Peter is a visionary filmmaker, and he broke new ground with ‘The Lord of the Rings,’” notes Michael Lynne, New Line Co-Chairman and Co-CEO. “We’re delighted he’s back for ‘The Hobbit’ films and that the Tolkien saga will continue with his imprint. We greatly appreciate the efforts of Harry Sloan, who has been instrumental in helping us reach our new accord.”

The two “Hobbit” films – “The Hobbit” and its sequel – are scheduled to be shot simultaneously, with pre-production beginning as soon as possible. Principal photography is tentatively set for a 2009 start, with the intention of “The Hobbit” release slated for 2010 and its sequel the following year, in 2011.

The Oscar-winning, critically-acclaimed LOTR Trilogy grossed nearly $3 billion worldwide at the box-office. In 2003, “Return of the King” swept the Academy Awards, winning all of the eleven categories in which it was nominated, including Best Picture – the first ever Best Picture win for a fantasy film. The Trilogy’s production was also unprecedented at the time.

For more information about “The Hobbit” films, please visit www.TheHobbitBlog.com.
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[Krakrok]

For the love of gawd use real little people this time ala Willow (I know they won't but it'd be nice). Warwick Davis ftw!

[Polysorbate80]

A *sequel* to the Hobbit.....?

[Evildrider]

A *sequel* to the Hobbit.....?

The original idea that Jackson pitched was to break the Hobbit up into two movies.  That's probably what they are talking about.

Although I know he's producing, I wish and hope that he will also direct, or at the least get Sam Raimi on the job.

[Morat20]

What fucking sequal to the Hobbit? Are they talking "There's the Hobbit, which ends in Mirkwood, and then there's the Hobbit Part Two, which ends with Bilbo wandering back into Bag End", or are they inventing a sequal, or did Tolkien write some sort of damn Hobbit sequel I never heard of?

[Sauced]

What fucking sequal to the Hobbit? ... "There's the Hobbit, which ends in Mirkwood, and then there's the Hobbit Part Two, which ends with Bilbo wandering back into Bag End"

[schild]

I love movies about walking.

[Samwise]

The Hobbit is a much better book to base a movie on than the LotR series.  I'm pretty stoked about the fact that they're breaking it into two parts, too.

Here's hoping they keep the musical numbers from the book and get someone good to write the melodies.

Chip the glasses and crack the plates!
Blunt the knives and bend the forks!
That's what Bilbo hates -
Smash the bottles and burn the corks!

Cut the cloth and tread on the fat!
Pour the milk on the pantry floor!
Leave the bones on the bedroom mat!
Splash the wine on every door!

Dump the crocks in a boiling bowl;
Pound them up with a thumping pole;
And when you've finished, if any are whole,
Send them down the hall to roll!

That's what Bilbo Baggins hates!
So, carefully! carefully! with the plates!

[Phildo]

Or, you know, they could just use the versions that were made for the cartoon in the 70s.  Which were awesome.

[Samwise]

[Triforcer]

This won't work.  Whose glistening, curled hobbit hair will Bilbo gently push back as he gazes deeply into the other hobbit's eyes?  Which hobbit will jump on his bed when he's feeling blue?  Without two male hobbits traveling together, we're left with hobbit/dwarf deviancy.   

[Ironwood]

Awesome.

But two movies ?

No wai.

[DraconianOne]

"I’m very pleased that we’ve been able to put our differences behind us, so that we may begin a new chapter with our old friends at New Line."

In other words - they've paid me the millions that they owed me from doing Lord of the Rings so I don't have to sue them anymore. 

I gather this is going to be the Hobbit and extra bits culled from Tolkien's vast array of Notes and Scribblings as well as material sourced from "The Silmarillion", "Unfinished Tales", "Lord of the Rings Online" and "Romancing the Stone".

[HaemishM]

I can see no good reason, narratively speaking, to make the Hobbit into two movies other than an absolute whore-like money grab. There's just no reason. One 3-hour movie should be more than enough.

But I'm sure we'll get 2 separate 3-hour movies, then a DVD release of those movies, then an extra-special 5-hour collector's edition of each with never-before seen, completely made-up scenes involving hobbit grooming or some such bugfuckery.

Seriously, JUST FUCKING GET AN EDITOR WHO WILL TELL YOU "NO." I loved the Lord of the Rings trilogy, but there is no reason to make 2 Hobbit movies, just like there was no reason for a 3-hour King Kong movie.

[Simond]

Oh, I don't know - there's a fair old bit of story there.
Part one: Everything up to & including escaping the Mirkwood elves (meeting up, leaving the Shire, trolls in the woods, up into the Misty Mountains, orcs/goblins, gollum & "What have I got in my pocket?", escape into Mirkwood, spiders, elves, and escape in barrel)s.

Part Two: Lake-town, the Lonely Mountain, Smaug, the theft, the Arkenstone, the death of Smaug, the siege of the mountain, the Battle of Five Armies, Bilbo returning home.

Throw in a little more side-details (Gandalf's 'errands'/"The Necromancer", what the dwarves were up to when Bilbo was playing riddle games, etc) and make the final battle epic enough and there's ample there for two 2 to 2 1/2 hour films.

[Ironwood]

It didn't even make a two part Graphic Novel.

You're reaching.

[Sauced]

It'll be interesting to see the reaction to certain parts of the story that have "been done" in the LotR movies.  Scary spiders?  Giant Birds saving the day?

Still, I want to see Smaug.  If MacKellan is back and they find a decent Bilbo...

[Numtini]

I can see some very good reasons to make the hobbit into two movies. There's a lot there. You've got all the journey parts and then you have a very extensive battle that even in the book feels a little rushed. The only question I'd have is where to end the first with a solid plot climax.

I hope they make a bundle and add a movie based on the scouring of the shire.

[WayAbvPar]

Still, I want to see Smaug.

PLEASE don't let them fuck Smaug up.

[Merusk]

I always forget about the bits after Smaug's death.  Probably because they suck. 

[Phildo]

This won't work.  Whose glistening, curled hobbit hair will Bilbo gently push back as he gazes deeply into the other hobbit's eyes?  Which hobbit will jump on his bed when he's feeling blue?  Without two male hobbits traveling together, we're left with hobbit/dwarf deviancy.   

How about a Bifur & Bofur dwarf sandwich?

[Tannhauser]

This is very good news.  Two movies!  I don't care what Jackson does, he has my full faith.  Sure the LOTR trilogy wasn't exactly by the book but you gotta take some artistic license. 

Woooo!

[Selby]

I don't know, I'm not so sure I can see it warranting 2 movies.  If there is tons of pointless character interactions and bodily humor that feels like filler and less of Tolkien's interesting delivery style, I will be disappointed.  But I'll still see it anyway and probably appreciate it for what it is since I know Jackson does respect the source material deeply.

Sure the LOTR trilogy wasn't exactly by the book but you gotta take some artistic license.

Just so they don't do what they did in the 2nd LotR movie and turn it entirely into The Battle For Helm's Deep when quite a bit more actually went on and was dealt with in a different manner.

[Samwise]

Jackson does respect the source material deeply.

I disagree.  Jackson made the LotR movies because he thought it was the lowest common denominator of popular fantasy.  I never got the impression he had any deep respect for the source material.

[schild]

Jackson fucking lived that source material. It's one of his favorite stories of all time and he's wanted to do it justice for years.

If he thought it was the LCD of fantasy, there would have been less boring walking. And the ents would have spent 1/12th the time on screen.

[Selby]

I never got the impression he had any deep respect for the source material.

I had no idea until I watched all of the extra features on the expanded editions of LotR.  He justifies the hell out of what he did and why and went into all kinds of details and dilemmas that only someone who had read the series more than just a few times would have had.

[Samwise]

If he thought it was the LCD of fantasy, there would have been less boring walking. And the ents would have spent 1/12th the time on screen.

I just put that down to him being a hack.     I liked the ents in the book, but the movie version of them sucked balls.

I'd be interested in hearing his justification for the radical plot change he made around the end of Two Towers.  You know the one I'm talking about.

[Abagadro]

The expiration date on bitching about deviations from the LOTR books went by about 3 years ago.

[Samwise]

New of PJ doing another Tolkien movie reset it.   

Bitching aside, the LotR movies were watchable, and I think odds are good Hobbit will turn out even better.  Kids' stories always seem to make the transition to the screen much more readily.

[Soukyan]

New of PJ doing another Tolkien movie reset it.   

Bitching aside, the LotR movies were watchable, and I think odds are good Hobbit will turn out even better.  Kids' stories always seem to make the transition to the screen much more readily.

LoTR is a children's book. 

In any case, I think splitting the hobbit into two good work well. Someone mentioned it earlier, but I'll rehash it, the first part will end with them floating down the river in barrels. Good call there. That's totally a Peter Jackson cliffhanger.

[Ironwood]

LoTR is a children's book. 

Please to be not smoking the crack.

[Morat20]

The expiration date on bitching about deviations from the LOTR books went by about 3 years ago.

That's why no one wants to fucking adapt books. Because of the motherfucking fans. And god knows, there are no fans as petty and twisted as LoTR fans. I have a friend that hasn't watched the damn things because Bombadil isn't in them. Seriously. That's his entire bitch.

The movies made a gazillion dollars, won't a gazillion awards, proved to the entire goddamn world that a "fantasy movie" can have mass appeal, proved to the entire goddamn world that you CAN take a heavy trilogy with a bunch of fucking walking and turn it into a movie that isn't a snoozefest AND people will watch, and it "sucks" in the eyes of the true fans because it doesn't have Tom Fucking Bombadil in it.

Here's the deal -- movies are an entirely different medium than books. ENTIRELY different. As such, no book can be converted directly into a movie. It would suck. Even the fans would agree it sucks.

Heck, I'll give a simple example -- the Dresden Files. One of the running jokes in the book is that Harry Dresden (main character) is like 6'5" or something ridiculous like that, and drives around in an old Beetle. So whenever the author wants levity, he makes a bit of a joke about big wizard cramped up in his tiny car. (It's not quite as lame in the book, but that's basically the joke).

When it got converted to a TV series, the Dresdon actor was just as tall as the Dresdon character -- but they ditched the Beetle in favor of a jeep. Why? Because in the book the author chose whether or not to make the joke by whether or not he wrote it. In the TV series, the joke happens every time the actor gets in and out of the fucking car -- even if the actual moment is supposed to be dramatic, sad, serious, whatever.

That's the problem with converting a relatively simple concept to film. Doing something like LoTR -- where so much of it is exposition, long dialogue that would take forever to speak, snips of poetry, implication, and various monologues or narrations is considerably more complex.

PJ made a watchable and good film out of material that was horribly difficult to turn into film. He did so while remaining relatively true to the spirit and ideas behind the book. The price for getting a watchable movie that captured the basic concepts of the book was, effectively, the loss of Tom Fucking Bombadil and accepting character changes designed pretty much to encapsulate stuff that was previously captured in narrative or bits of bad Elvish poetry.

[Samwise]

LoTR is a children's book. 

If you're misusing "children" to mean teenagers (which usually get classified as "young adult" when talking about reading levels), I might agree with you.  Otherwise, you're crazy.  I read pretty far above my grade level as a kid, and I still couldn't make it through LotR until I was 15 or so.  I think I was about 8 when I read The Hobbit.  There's a pretty huge gap there.

proved to the entire goddamn world that you CAN take a heavy trilogy with a bunch of fucking walking and turn it into a movie that isn't a snoozefest.

The famous "they're movies about walking" rant that you're referencing was written by someone who had never read the books but thought the movies were a snoozefest.  FWIW.

[Soukyan]

LoTR is a children's book. 

If you're misusing "children" to mean teenagers (which usually get classified as "young adult" when talking about reading levels), I might agree with you.  Otherwise, you're crazy.  I read pretty far above my grade level as a kid, and I still couldn't make it through LotR until I was 15 or so.  I think I was about 8 when I read The Hobbit.  There's a pretty huge gap there.

I was being facetious. I, too, did not read the LoTR trilogy until my teens, but I believe Tolkien himself wanted it to be a "kids" book. In any case, I was just making a funny.

[Samwise]

Oh, thank God.   

My recollection is that LotR was originally conceived as a straightforward sequel to The Hobbit (i.e. another children's book), but ended up evolving into something else entirely over the 12 years it took him to write it.