It Begins

So, Thursday I bought a copy of ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY for the first time in a long time -- not for any interest in the cover story (about a show I've never watched, and hadn't even known was based on a novel series by a writer now living in my old hometown*), but because I saw a little headline in the upper left corner: "THE HOBBIT: A Sneak Peek from Peter Jackson."

This turns out to herald a four-page piece on the forthcoming film, three and a half pages of which are pictures and the remaining half-page a brief interview with Jackson. And with this, the whole game of lamenting the things Jackson changed can begin.**

Up till now, those of us interested in the film have mainly been wondering how much of the original Jackson was going to include (the consensus: just about everything), which actors & actresses from the LotR film trilogy wd be returning in at least cameo roles (the answer: just about all of them who can plausibly do so), and what bits of off-stage action (like the White Council) or flashbacks (Smaug's original attack on Dale & the Mt, Thrain's doomed expedition) might find its way on-camera (the evidence so far: at least some). But what we cdn't tell was what Jackson might add, and what he might change. Some of the things he added to the original films worked spectacularly well (most memorably the beacon-fires sequence) while others fell spectacularly flat (Frodo repudiating Sam's companionship nr Cirith Ungol). The same was true of the things he changed: some proved to be great ideas (recasting Sam as more a friend than a lackey) and others duds (Denethor as a slavering loon). But there's been no way to guess what Jackson would add or change this time around.

Until now. Two very small examples can be gleaned from this article, brief as it is. The first is mention of the casting of an actress (Evangeline Lilly) to play an elf named Tauriel -- a character nowhere appearing in Tolkien's book. I suspect she wears a red shirt, but more on that another time. So here we have something new added -- we run into quite a lot of wood-elves in the course of the story, only one of whom (Galion) is given a name, so working up one of that faceless lot into a recognizable character makes sense.

The other example is the sort of innocuous change that drove Tolkien into a state when it occurred in the Zimmerman script,** the only film adaptation of one of his books he's known to have examined closely. One of the shots from the film shows Bilbo examining his contract, which is a long, long many-folded ream of paper, quite unlike the simple, terse contract given verbatim in the book (and reproduced in facsimile by Tolkien himself as a single two-sided sheet). Furthermore, the accompanying caption explains that

"Bilbo's actually got to sign a contract the dwarves have written up, and there's nothing like Dwarvish fine print"

Thus, the scene as Tolkien wrote it, with the contract being left on the mantle for Bilbo to find the next day after the dwarves have left, will be changed for a bit of comic business. What's not clear is how the new scene they'll have to write to replace it will play out -- just that the idea that they've offered him their terms rather casually, which he'll accept simply by turning up, seems to gone by the way. All we know is that the scene as filmed will be rather different from what's in the book. How well the new story will work or not we'll just have to wait and see (literally).

At any rate, from here on out we shd be getting a stream of detailed information about the film, although paradoxically I suspect this will give us relatively little insight into what the film itself will be like.

--John R.

current reading: BLOOMSBURY PIE by Regina Marler and PORTRAITS IN MINIATUE by Lytton Strachey.

*TRUE BLOOD and Charlaine Harris, respectively.

**Tolkien objected, strongly, to the scene in the script at the Prancing Pony where the innkeeper assigned Mr. Underhill room number fourteen and had him sign the registry.

A Long Post (con't)

(con't)

(3) So, just how big a deal is this for New Zealand? Well, the first hint I got of it was when I read that when the studio executives flew down to N. Z. , they met with the Prime Minister. That's right: the country's leader made time in his busy schedule for a series of meetings with the film people. In the course of which he brokered a deal which, I learn from skimming the posts on Kristen Thompson's always excellent website, http://www.frodofranchise.com/blog/, immediately led to the New Zealand parliament's fast-tracking legislation to make that deal fully legal. That's right; they didn't just given them big tax breaks (though they did that too): they changed the law so as to keep Peter Jackson happy. There was even some mention elsewhere of the exchange rate for the New Zealand doller fluctuating according to the latest news re. the films and whether they'd be made there. Now that's a big deal.***

(4) The end result of which is that things shd start moving quickly now. During the enforced down time, they had time to work on the script, scout locations, create sets and models, perfect any new make-up and special effect techniques, &c. They did lose their director, Del Toro, who made what seemed at the time a reasonable decision to bail on the film after the delays stretched on and on. A bad choice on his part, it turns out, but so it goes. Personally, I've always hoped Jackson wd direct it himself, so it'd be a smoother match for his LotR films. They still need to lock down McKellan, and Serkis, and I suppose Weaving (though I wdn't mind if someone else played that role here). About the only disappointing bit of casting news I heard was that former Dr. Who Sylvester McCoy has been tapped to play Radagast:

http://www.digitalspy.com/movies/news/a284054/sylvester-mccoy-reveals-hobbit-rol

Too bad: his main claim to fame is having been the second-worst Dr. Who ever.**** This casting strikes me as bizarre, given that if you were going to go that route Tom Baker, the greatest of the doctors, is still alive, though getting on a bit (in his mid-seventies now).

On the other hand, there is the cheerful thought that since he's playing someone who doesn't appear in the book, McCoy's scene may not wind up appearing in the movie either (i.e., the theatrical release). But that seems unlikely. We'll just have to suck it up and hope Jackson can cox a career-transcending performance out of unpromising material. He's done it before.

(5) And finally, I learn from the new BEYOND BREE (just arrived) that the studios have finally done the right thing and paid the Tolkien Estate the money they owed them. And again we're talking a lot of money here: "millions of dollars" according to the passage quoted in BEYOND BREE (cf. http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/jacketcopy/2010/10/jrr-tolkeins-the-hobbit-might-finally-be-coming-to-screens.html). There's nothing like needing something out of somebody to make a big business do the right thing. So that's good news at least.

--John R.

***but then given that the first three films made about ten billion dollars all told, there's an awful lot of money potentially to be made from the two-part HOBBIT film.

****beaten out only by his predecessor, Colin Baker as the sixth doctor.

Peter Jackson's HOBBIT

So, thanks to a link provided by a post to the MythSoc group, here's the news that Peter Jackson's taking over to direct THE HOBBIT himself is looking a whole lot more likely all the time. Here's the story:

http://scifiwire.com/2010/06/peter-jackson-will-be-dir.php?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Obviously they haven't worked out an agreement yet, but it looks like they're trying hard to arrive at a way to make this work. Suspect we'll be hearing more soon, one way or the other.

Stay tuned.

--John R.

The Epic of the Decade?

So, Friday I picked up the new issue of TOTAL FILM magazine (not something I usually read), which proclaimed on its cover their selection of Peter Jackson's THE LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy as The Epic of the Decade. This designation turns out to be less distinctive than it might be, since the magazine turns out to have ten nested covers, each inside the other: Best Epic, Best Blockbuster, Best Sci-Fi, and the like. Still, LotR did get priority of place, both as the first cover and first write-up for the lead story (pages 62-65) -- which focuses mostly on Jackson who, seeing the films again for the first time since their release (in order to get his mind working on THE HOBBIT project), muses on ways his films had influenced the way other films had been made, right down to specific shots. Better still, there's a small box about the upcoming HOBBIT movie, which is due out the end of next year: they've now finalized the look of Smaug, the wargs, spiders ("visually striking, in a different way to Shelob; massive but very nimble") &c. Apparently filming starts late this spring -- not so far away at all now, the day before Groundhog's.

Retrospectives are always interesting, and when the tenth anniversary of the first film rolls round I'll be curious to see what the consensus opinion will be about how well they hold up. There may be remakes someday (given the way Hollywood works, or doesn't work), decades down the road, but I suspect these will remain the film adaptations people think of when they hear the phrase "Tolkien movies".

--John R.

current reading: THE RABBI'S CAT by Joann Sfar.

"The Hunt for Gollum"

So, for the past three days I've been listening to talk radio when in the car. For the most part the results have been appalling, but interesting. However, today I just missed a segment on NPR about a new fan-made Tolkien movie that was about to debut on-line this weekend. While I only heard the last thirty seconds or so of the radio story, tonight when I got home I followed up on the link they gave, and it proves to be a plug for "The Hunt for Gollum". I'd first heard about this a few months back, then as time passed with no more word I assumed it'd fallen by the wayside, as so many other ambitious fan projects do.

In the words of one Tolkien scholar at the '83 Marquette Conference, "Wrong, wrong, wrong!"

Here's the link to the NPR [National Public Radio] story, with the embedded links to both the original radio audio track of which I'd heard only the end and also a video trailer for the movie.


http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=103673352

Once the 40-minute film itself is released, I'd advise anyone interested in watching it to do so sooner rather than later, since I can't imagine it'll go without legal challenge (think what Disney's response would be if someone made and posted a forty-minute Micky Mouse film, or Geo. Lucas's reaction if someone wrote, filmed, and released their own STAR WARS movie without bothering to get legal permission).

In any case, we'll soon have a case in point to see whether I was right in my comments a few days ago about the difficulty of writing a new story out of Tolkienian materials. I suspect this film will be to Peter Jackson as Terry Brooks and Dennis McKiernan are to JRRT. We'll soon see.

--JDR

The HOBBIT Movie

So, it's been a while since there was much news on THE HOBBIT movie. Kristin Thompson's website continues to have updates from time to time, but these have mostly been "where-are-they-now" snippets about current projects for alumna of the Peter Jackson LotR films and the occasional report on the ongoing lawsuits.

Then, starting about a month or so ago, new news has been beginning to show up. It seems that the studios are going ahead with the assumption that the Tolkien Estate's lawsuit (insisting they be paid their share for the last films before the next are made) will be resolved.

Earlier this year, reports about the two films would have it that the first would focus on THE HOBBIT and the second on filling the gap between Bilbo's return from his journey and Gandalf's arrival for Bilbo's Long-Expected Party many years later. The obvious problem with this plan is that while we know a good deal about what happens during that gap, from flashbacks in LotR and the invaluable Appendices, Tolkien never wrote the story of that period. Which means that the scriptwriters would have to forge a narrative out of the bits and pieces available -- "The Deeds of Young Aragorn", as it were. Such a film would no doubt focus on bringing in as many characters as possible from the LotR films, so they could draw back audiences and capitalize on the star power of those actors & actresses. But the prospect of scriptwriters creating a story on par with THE HOBBIT or THE LORD OF THE RINGS to stand between them is a dubious one.

That's why the recent news posted on Kristin's site (http://www.kristinthompson.net/blog/?p=637) is particularly welcome. According to a recent Peter Jackson/Guillermo del Toro interview (http://www.empireonline.com/news/story.asp?NID=24610), the plan is now to do a two-part HOBBIT movie, rather than THE HOBBIT plus a filler film.

Horray!

This is especially good news because it means THE HOBBIT won't get cut up to fit into a single three-hour time slot -- folks dazzled by the richness of THE LORD OF THE RINGS often forget just how full of adventures Bilbo's journey is, and almost all his encounters on the way out feed into the grand climax of the Battle of Five Armies.


What will the Jackson/del Toro HOBBIT look like?

Well, we know what a Peter Jackson Tolkien movie looks like.

We know what a del Toro fantasy movie looks like (cf. HELLBOY II: THE GOLDEN ARMY).

Therefore, we have a pretty good idea of what THE HOBBIT movie shd be like.

We know that Ian McKellan has agreed to return to play Gandalf, and the Andy Serkis has agreed to play Gollum. We know that Weta Workshop will once again be supplying the special effects. We know that Jackson, Walsh, and Boyens will again be doing the script(s) -- apparently with del Toro also contributing (that's a LOT of scriptwriters). We know that Alan Lee and John Howe will once again be doing concept art. We know that Howard Shore will NOT be returning, since working with Jackson on four straight films was apparently for him like Tenniel's working with Lewis Carroll on the ALICE books, despite the admirable results of those collaborations in both cases.

I suspect a major goal will be to look as much like FR/TT/RK as possible -- from the studio's point of view, why mess with success? In my heart of hearts, I find it hard to believe that Jackson will maintain his hands-off approach, but we'll see.


In any case, at this stage I'm curious about what we might call The Known Unknowns and the Unknown Unknowns. We know, given our experience with the LORD OF THE RINGS films, that Jackson et al. will feel no compunction about cutting scenes or changing characters if they think it will make a better movie. Balanced against that is the lesson learned from the earlier films that the closer they stay to Tolkien's text, the more the fans like it.

The part that's hard to remember is that it's not so much a matter of trying to guess which scenes will stay in* as in not being able to anticipate what they'll add. Given Jackson's track record, there will almost certainly be a number of new scenes added, or changed beyond recognition, to create 'cliffhanger moments' or achieve some cinematic effect.

One guess: I think the film will open with Smaug's attack on Dale & The Kingdom Under the Mountain.

Two details we do know: they'll bring some off-screen moments into the main story, including Gandalf's exploration of Dol Guldur and the meeting(s) of the White Council (which in turn will provide a good excuse to bring in Galadriel and Christopher Lee's Saruman).

Three big questions to which we don't, at this point, have even the glimmer of an answer:

#1: Who will they cast as Bilbo? Ian Holm would be ideal, but at his age he might not be up the rigours Mr. Jackson likes to put his cast through. If I had my choice, I'd tap Hugh Laurie, who's not only the right age to play Bilbo (fifty-ish) but has shown he can both play silly Bertie Wooster and smart, efficient Doctor House. I suspect, however, that they'll go for someone with tween appeal -- another Elijah Wood, so to speak.


#2: Will they include all thirteen dwarves? I'm sure the temptation will be there to trim Thorin & Company a bit, leaving out characters who have few if any memorable moments (e.g. Nori, Ori, Oin, Bifur, Bofur, perhaps Dwalin). I suspect in the end they'll include them all, but making them all distinct and memorable will be quite a challenge, especially under all that make-up.

#3: THE HOBBIT has not a single speaking part for a female character. Will they feel this is a shortcoming they have to fix? Enhancing Arwen's role in LotR is one thing -- Tolkien himself might well have done so had he created the character earlier than he did in the drafting (though not along the lines they did!) -- but converting male characters to female or inserting new female characters into the film(s) both seem like bad options. I suspect they may play around with options a bit but in the end just tell the story more-or-less as they find it.

Finally, where will they split the story between the First and Second films? Kristin suggests the break will come just at the point where they're preparing to enter Mirkwood. My own choice would be just before their arrival at Lake-Town: I think the line "The Lonely Mountain! Bilbo had come far and through many adventures to see it, and now he did not like the look of it in the least" makes for a beautifully ominous parting note.

We'll see.

--JDR


..............
*though I'm as prone to temptation on that point as anyone, and plan to make a future post giving my guesses.

A Wicked Thought

So, while we were walking home tonight my wife had what she herself called a wicked thought. Given that there are some people so vehemently opposed to the Peter Jackson movies that they boycott not just the films but the work of anyone involved with them, what do they do when faced with a new Tolkien book illustrated by one of the films' art directors -- i.e., Alan Lee's illustrated edition of THE CHILDREN OF HURIN?

Do they wait a year hoping for a paperback edition without the illos?

Do they buy a copy and tear the pictures out, discarding the dust jacket?

Do they simply avert their eyes from the artwork as they read through?

Have to admit I have no idea. Given that they can't get the Tolkien book without the Lee artwork (and very nice it is, too, I might add) I suspect they quietly put their principles aside when the alternative is going without a new Tolkien, but the thought does highlight the problems behind 'Secondary Separation'.

--JDR