You know, I’d be pretty happy if they kept this one as a kids film, rather than like the darker Rings films were. A two-part, multi-hour version doesn’t sound like I’ll get my wish.
personally, just hoping they do a better job with the dwarves than they did with Gimli in the trilogy. Cause Disney already did the comic effect in Snow White.
Posh. Gandalf was like 2000 years old (well, “embodied”) at the time of the War of the Rings. I don’t think he’d look much younger 60 years earlier.
The problem is he’ll look a decade older 60 years later. Of course, the huge prosthetic nose probably renders that moot.
I just hope the sequel isn’t this.
I hope Otto Preminger is available to play Thranduil! 
I hope this turns out better than Jackson’s job at producing the Halo movie.
I think the Halo problems were more with microsoft vs. the studios - not sure if PJ was involved.
Here is an interview with MGM CEO Harry Sloan:
http://hollywoodinsider.ew.com/2007/12/mgm-ceo-on-the.html
Brian
And part of me just knows they’re gonna re-image it, setting it Las Vegas, & adding car chases & rocket launchers.
OG h’ep us!
Some evil part of me is saying, “that would be awesome!”
<SLAPS squeegee with a Big Rubber Basketball Shoe>
'Cause you don’t deserve to be slapped with a Trout.
Please, please let me rebuild the Shire–in the same place in New Zealand. Please.
I’m interested to see if the elves will be the silly, merry creatures they were in the book The Hobbit – as opposed to the grim warriors of LOTR.
For a second there, I thought you were talking about de-aging Ian Holm enough to play Bilbo.
There’s been speculation about that actually, Thudlow, but realistically probably not.
heh.
I’m so tempted to create a “Rewrite The Hobbit! In Vegas! With car chases and rocket launchers!” thread. But my fear of literary rejection is much too strong.
And my fear of trouts erm…Big Rubber Shoes as well.
Ooooooooo
What would the problem with that be? He’s not supposed to have aged while possessing the ring anyway.
“Bilbo Baggins will be back in The Hobbit 2: The Revenge!”
Okay, as neat as it is for Peter Jackson and company to be producing The Hobbit, I just don’t see how two movies can be squozen out of the book. The Rankin-Bass version managed to include pretty much everything except Beorn in only 78 minutes, and that’s including musical numbers. Filming *The Hobbit * as two movies is categorically nuts, so I hope to god that’s not the plan. It’s The Hobbit! Not The Hob and The Bit! It’s There and Back Again, not There and There 2: Back Again!
On the other hand, if they’re planning to film both movies simultaneously, they must be using at least some of the same characters and sets. There’s several thousand years’ worth of stories in Middle-Earth to choose from, but only a very few of those include hobbits… I would hope they’d at least use some of Tolkien’s material rather than writing a completely original storyline.
A consideration possibly worthy of note: even more than LOTR, *The Hobbit * has no female characters. If the scriptwriters wish to remedy this matter as was done with Arwen’s role in the trilogy, this would require some dramatic plot tinkering. Is my female Dwarf-sense tingling? (Long story short: I was once bitten by a radioactive female Dwarf, which gave me the ability to grow a beard and seduce male Dwarves-- though I do neither of these things unless absolutely necessary. With great power comes great responsibility.)
One possibility for a second movie using sets and characters from The Hobbit: a series of short (Peter Jackson-short, anyway) reminisces as told by Sam to his kids, which could incorporate material left out of LOTR like Tom Bombadil and the barrow-wights. Perhaps it could also include a visit from King Elessar and some suggestion about the state of affairs in Fourth Age Middle Earth.
Another wild possibility, totally off the top of my head: in the theatrical release of LOTR, the death of Saruman and Wormtongue was not depicted. What if the second movie, using sets from The Hobbit, were actually an expanded version of The Scouring of the Shire? It could be done, I tell you! Frodo wouldn’t be there, obviously, but he didn’t do much during that situation anyway. Post-LOTR, Sam, Merry and Pippin would be confronted by a strange foreign influence who is purchasing land in the Shire through intermediates, and manipulating events to defame the three heroes while financially supporting the political aspirations of the greedy, ambitious Sackville-Bagginses. Gandalf is gone and the roads to the East are guarded by bands of roving brigands, so they’re basically isolated and have to work out the situation themselves. Or they could attempt to cut cross-country to Bree in an attempt to get word to the King, and this is where the Bombadil/barrow-wight material could be worked in.
The most likely probability, of course, is that the other movie will reveal the epic story of Radagast! Master of shapes and changes of hue! Friend of Eagles! Secret architect of Sauron’s downfall! Radagast! Who came to earth with powers and abilities far beyond those of Mortal Men! Radagast! Who can change the hue of mighty rivers! Bend shapes in his bare hands! And who, disguised as a mild-mannered country wizard, fights a never-ending battle for Truth, Justice, and the Valinorian Way!
Aragorn could make a cameo as a 10-year-old. Perhaps a case of mistaken identity happens, and the Hobbits thinks he’s a non-hairy-footed cousin. Big laffs ensue!
Seriously, maybe there’d be a chance to lay out at least a little more background about Dwarves. The struggles in the (movie) Lord of the Rings mostly centered around populations of Men, with the other races as supporting crew, or less in the case of Dwarves. Otherwise we’d not know who to cheer for at the Battle of Five Armies. (Go wargs!)
Oh, yeah: great post, Terrifel