Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh out of "The Hobbit"

[yovargas]

In mayn ways I think PJ would be better for The Hobbit than I tihnk he was for LOTR. It is a far less serious work than LOTR and I think his style would work.

It strikes me as so odd that people think of LOTR as somehow not "serious". What movie did everyone else watch? The vast majority was very serious in tone, serious enough to get enormous, near-universal critical acclaim. People talk as if the couple of minutes of Gimli humor are "PJ's style", as if Arwen's Fate, Boromir's Death, the Ride of the Rohirrim, and on and on and on, were just footnootes in a big slapstick action flick.

[truehobbit]

LOTR is my favorite movie. If tommorrow you went to a new restaurant and thought the chef made the single best meal of your entire life, what are the odds you'll go to a different chef the next day and find a meal just as good (or better)? It's possible...but if given the option, I'm gonna stick with the first chef.

I'd still go and try other restaurants. Something else might be just as good but in a different way. Though of course I'd be coming back to the first chef. However, I'd not be surprised if none of his other dishes was quite as good as this one - or if he never managed to make it quite that well again, or you are just not in the same receptive mood again. (In fact, that what tends to happen if you get something that seems heavenly in a restaurant - the next time you try to repeat the experience it's nowhere near as good - at leat that's my experience.)

[kams]

Aravar wrote:

Losing Howard Shore wouldn't bother me that much. I've never understood the enthusiasm for the score.
:llama::llama::llama::llama::llama::llama::llama::llama::llama::llama::llama::llama::llama::llama::llama::llama:
[putting up a llama-shield around that remark.]




more thoughts...

...whoever a new director might be (and I'm hoping WETA and Howard Shore sign on too), I hope he (or she) would be steeped in myth more than science fiction. Story/wonderment ahead of action/adventure.
Alfonso Cuarón?

[Aravar]

In mayn ways I think PJ would be better for The Hobbit than I tihnk he was for LOTR. It is a far less serious work than LOTR and I think his style would work.

It strikes me as so odd that people think of LOTR as somehow not "serious". What movie did everyone else watch? The vast majority was very serious in tone, serious enough to get enormous, near-universal critical acclaim. People talk as if the couple of minutes of Gimli humor are "PJ's style", as if Arwen's Fate, Boromir's Death, the Ride of the Rohirrim, and on and on and on, were just footnootes in a big slapstick action flick.

While I think Boromir's death was done well; Arwen's Fate was not particularly moving espcially once we got into ROTK.

For me the high point of ROTK was Théoden's speech at dawn. It captured the tone of the book completley.

What followed, the so-called Ride of the Rohirrim (forgetting of course that the Ride is from Dunharrow to the Rammas) was a silly, typically Holywood cavalry charge, albeit not as bad as the suicide charge down the precipice in TTT. And then we get the refight of the Battle of Hoth together with geek references to ROTJ.

The reason why people complain abpout Gimli is that every time the tone gets to the level that JRRT took it, PJ seems to have to undercut it with a one-liner as if it were a Bond film, and one starring Roger Moore at that.

[yovargas]

LOTR is my favorite movie. If tommorrow you went to a new restaurant and thought the chef made the single best meal of your entire life, what are the odds you'll go to a different chef the next day and find a meal just as good (or better)? It's possible...but if given the option, I'm gonna stick with the first chef.

I'd still go and try other restaurants.

Yeah, but when your favorite chef gets fired from your favorite restaurant so he can no longer make your favorite meal......

[Frelga]

As far as the performance of young Mr. Bloom, we have to remember he was right out of acting school when he took the role. (I seem to recall he originally auditioned for Faramir, too.) While his role was primarily that of super-cool elf warrior dude, I thought the dry sense of humor that Legolas displayed in Jackson's movie were in keeping with Tolkien's character.

I agree. That's why I said I was impressed with Jackson's directing. I actually went to see Pirates of the Carribean just so I could decide whether Bloom is a talented actor who was underused in LOTR, or a so-so actor whose director coaxed a good (IMO) performance out of him.

I also agree with Aravar that the Hobbit would be much more of a PJ kind of story, with moral themes that are not entirely beyond the ken of Holliwood sensibility and plenty of room for cool effects.

[eborr]

A couple of comments - I am agree with Aravar that the Hobbit is so much less of a serious work that P J style wouldn't upset me as it did on LOTR so much.

The other point is that LOTR could have been so much worse than it was - considerably so.

I am not PJ biggest fan by any means.

The other worry is how much do New Line care about the franchise, if they are cavalier enough to ditch Jacko then who might they appoint.

My guess is that many of the better directors would be unhappy trying to create something which if it does not play homage to PJ vision would have to be very distinct.

Another consideration - whilst the LOTR is very much and English book, the Hobbit is moreso.

[MithLuin]

While his role was primarily that of super-cool elf warrior dude, I thought the dry sense of humor that Legolas displayed in Jackson's movie were in keeping with Tolkien's character.

I thought Bloom's weakest moments were the goofy facial expressions after Gandalf's and Boromir's death. I recall Bloom saying something about Elves being immortal and have never witnessed death. I thought, "Legolas would have never seen his comrades die in skirmishes with orcs?"

Yes, well, there's that....

I think Orlando took the "I'm an elf" thing very seriously, and tried to get into that mindset. Most of the time, he pulled it off well, so that he was the most convincing elf in the movies. But I think he shot wide on the battle-death thing; either you are a trained warrior, or you are green - you aren't both!



There is plenty of "new" stuff for the Hobbit movie - we get lots of dwarves (so dwarven culture?) and the Lonely Mountain...and a dragon! I mean, plenty that isn't just repeat.

But...we start with Bag End and Bilbo...and we have Gandalf and Gollum. There should be some continuity there. I would love for Ngila Dickson and Howard Shore and WETA to stay on board, but don't mind either way about PJ.

[Alatar]

[axordil]

It goes without saying that the top end of movie business is home to very few small egos. People who are emotionally invested in winning at any cost, no matter how Pyrrhic it might be, are routinely found in executive suites there. They get fired, and rehired somewhere else, for some time.

Financing movies is like sausage-making. Don't watch it happening if you want to keep liking the finished product.

[TORN]

Here's a prediction (unfortunately, my predictions usually fail by force of having been made -- it's the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle of predictions, so to speak) --

In a 3-way deal (among MGM, New Line and Zantz), MGM will acquire all rights to making and distributing the Hobbit and PJ & Co. will do the film. New Line earns some bucks and gets some kind of production credit, Zantz earns some extra bucks and gets his own production credit, and MGM gets its tentpole and avoids looking bad at having front-run PJ at the helm.

[Inanna]

Alatar....

Financing movies is like sausage-making. Don't watch it happening if you want to keep liking the finished product.

Speaking of sausages... this is my Advisor's favourite analogy... How a published paper is like a sausage and you learn nothing about doing research if you don't push your head into the sausage factory.

I guess Movies are worse -- far more people, for one thing.

I think if anyone else makes the Hobbit, he/she will be very-very-very severly handicapped by our vision of the Shire, Bilbo, Gandalf and Gollum. Extremely. It will be either "Bloody hell, this is not how it was" or "Look! he copied that from PJ, he did. JERK!!"

I had a lot of "THATs not how it was" moments in TTT and ROTK.... (my fav is FOTR), but overall I liked PJ's adaptation.

[axordil]

I think if anyone else makes the Hobbit, he/she will be very-very-very severly handicapped by our vision of the Shire, Bilbo, Gandalf and Gollum. Extremely. It will be either "Bloody hell, this is not how it was" or "Look! he copied that from PJ, he did. JERK!!"

That's the problem. It's pretty much a no-win situation for anyone else: either you deliberately challenge what is in many ways a definitive rendering (and in the four cases mentioned, I think it's fair to call PJ's vision definitive for most) or you reuse it. PJ could get away with rehashing what he had done and expanding on it. Anyone else...why would they want to? Unless it's a no-talent hack or a new and hungry kid.

[Primula Baggins]

From Ian McKellen's updated E-Post:

The LOTR fans are already expressing a sense of betrayal. On my own account, I am very sad as I should have relished re-visiting Middle Earth with Peter again as team-leader. It's hard to imagine any other director matching his achievement in Tolkien country. We will have to await developments but being an optimist I am hoping that New Line, MGM and Wingnut can settle outstanding problems so that the long expected "Hobbit" is filmed sooner rather than later.

So Ian McKellen, who knows PJ well, has not given up hope that PJ will direct The Hobbit.

Link: http://www.mckellen.com/epost/lotr/061122.htm

[kams]

Thanks, Alatar. I love DorkTower.

You know, over at TORN, frodobaggins1986 wrote an entire script. Get a bunch of fans from New Zealand to show up on PJ's doorstep with their own lovingly, painstakingly made costumes, a hand-held videocam and the script....


[Ringing on PJ's door. PJ puts down his yogurt and looks up.]
PJ: "I'm coming! I'm coming!"


[He puts in his contacts, leaves the comb untouched at the mirror and ambles to the door.]
PJ: "Good morning!"


FANS: "Fans, at your service!"
[Thirteen short and one rather tall Fan all come inside, hanging their lovingly, painstakingly made cloaks on the pegs by the door.]


PJ: "Well, this is an unexpected party."


Fans: "We're mooting for a movie. "


PJ: "I beg your pardon?"


Fan1: "Forget New Line! We'll just make "The Hobbit" ourselves. "
Fan5: "We consider you a prisoner in the dungeons of the Necromancer!"

Fan2 [pushing in front of Fan5]: "Frodobaggins1986 here has the script, Fan12 over here has the handy-cam. And we rooted through WETA's garbage bins before coming over here for some really great stuff."


Fan3: "Plus we've spend hundreds of our own money on Sideshows props."
Fan4: "Yeah, between us we have enough orc maquettes that we can have a great faraway shot of them coming over the hill for the Battle of Five Armies."
Fan3: "Yeah. We've got three Gimli's so with a little bit of paint..."


PJ: "I beg your pardon?!"


FANS: "We are here to make the movie!!"


Fan9: "Odd sort now, isn't he? Keeps begging us and stuff."
Fan13: "Changed his glasses but maybe he should be fitted for a hearing aid."
Fan11: "This is the right guy, right? Mark on the door looked right when we came here."
TallFan: "Excitable little fellow. Gets funny queer fits."


PJ: "Confuscate and bebother these fans. What mark? And can't you see that I don't own the rights and so can't make the movie?"


Fan8: "And I assure you there is a mark on this door-the usual one in the trade, or used to be. Director wants a good job, plenty of Excitement and reasonable Reward, that's how it is usually read."


Fan9: "We're here to show you it can be done. Make our script and shop it around..."
Fan7: "It's not like you haven't done that before."
TallFan: "Got any pickles and cheese? I'm hungry."
Fan6: "...maybe Bryan Singer is available."


"Pardon me," PJ said, "if I have overheard words that you were saying. I don't pretend to understand what you are talking about, or your reference to directors, but I think I am right in believing" (this is what he called being on his dignity) "that you think I am no good. I will show you. I have no signs on my door-it was painted a week ago-, and I am quite sure you have come to the wrong house. As soon as I saw your funny faces on the door-step, I had my doubts. But treat it as the right one. Tell me what you want done, and I will try it, if I have to walk from here to the East of East and fight the wild Were-worms in the Last Desert. "


FANS: "Hear! Hear!"


PJ continuing: "First I should like to know a bit more about things," said he, feeling all confused and a bit shaky inside, but so far still lookishly determined to go on with things. "I mean about the handy-cam and the maquettes, and all that, and and so on and further."


"Bless me!" said TallFan, "haven't you got an Internet connection? and didn't you read our posts? and haven't we been talking about all this for years?"


Fan4: "We gotta start now! Our moot only lasts the weekend. "
Fan12: "Philippa around? I've got a couple of script questions."
Fan7: Great Elephants! Did I forget my replica of Sting?
Fan2: Fan4: Fan11: "We brought ours!"

TallFan: "Let us begin."


PJ: "So soon? but it is dark."


"We like the dark," said the Fans. "Dark for dark business! There are many hours before dawn."



thankee to Pearly Di for the edit. Gotta mind my p's and l's.

[TheTennisBallKid]

ttbk

[Alatar]

Fantastic Kams!

[Primula Baggins]

Shirriff note: The discussion of the music in LotR adaptations has been split into its own topic, by request.

Link: http://www.thehalloffire.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=751

[Pearly Di]

Kams, that was FABULOUS!

It's Philippa Boyens, btw. My first name is Philippa, and it's spelt the same way.

[Whistler]

From the Internet Movie Data Base (IMDB):

As Lord of the Rings fans mounted a protest following word that New Line had dropped Peter Jackson from consideration as director of The Hobbit and another Lord of the Rings prequel, producer Saul Zaentz has given assurances that Jackson will indeed direct the two films. A German website, Elbenwald.de, posted an interview with Zaentz, who acquired the rights to the works of the late Rings writer, J.R.R. Tolkien, in 1976 (the Saul Zaentz Company owns Tolkien Enterprises), in which Zaentz says, "It will definitely be shot by Peter Jackson. ... Next year The Hobbit rights will fall back to my company. I suppose that Peter will wait because he knows that he will make the best deal with us. And he is fed up with the studios: to get his profit share on the Rings trilogy he had to sue New Line. With us, in contrast, he knows that he will be paid fairly and artistically supported without reservation." (The preceding quotation is a translation that appeared on TheHobbit-Movie.com from the German interview posted on Elbenwald.de.)

Go figure.