Peter Jackson to Split ‘The Hobbit’ Into a Trilogy: Brilliant or a Blatant Sellout?
SodaHead Film
2012/08/06 03:01:41
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Last week, director Peter Jackson announced that the forthcoming prequel to his massively successful Lord of the Rings series would be split into three films instead of the planned two. The first movie, The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, will hit theaters on December 14, 2012. The second film, There and Back Again, will be released in December 2013. The third and final installment will come in summer 2014.
Jackson wrote on his Facebook page, “It is only at the end of a shoot that you finally get the chance to sit down and have a look at the film you have made. Recently Fran, Phil and I did just this when we watched for the first time an early cut of the first movie - and a large chunk of the second. We were really pleased with the way the story was coming together, in particular, the strength of the characters and the cast who have brought them to life. All of which gave rise to a simple question: do we take this chance to tell more of the tale? And the answer from our perspective as the filmmakers, and as fans, was an unreserved ‘yes.'“
But does The Hobbit really warrant three full-length movies? Or is this just another Hollywood attempt to squeeze as much money as possible out of a franchise? We believe it’s the latter.
To begin with, J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit is only 304 pages. In comparison, each of the three Lord of the Rings books was longer (together they totaled 1,241 pages) and none of them received the multiple film treatment. Jackson argues that he’ll also be drawing from related materials that appeared in the appendices of LOTR, but we’re still skeptical.
What do you think SodaHeads? Is Peter Jackson’s decision to split The Hobbit into three parts brilliant or a blatant sellout?
Jackson wrote on his Facebook page, “It is only at the end of a shoot that you finally get the chance to sit down and have a look at the film you have made. Recently Fran, Phil and I did just this when we watched for the first time an early cut of the first movie - and a large chunk of the second. We were really pleased with the way the story was coming together, in particular, the strength of the characters and the cast who have brought them to life. All of which gave rise to a simple question: do we take this chance to tell more of the tale? And the answer from our perspective as the filmmakers, and as fans, was an unreserved ‘yes.'“
But does The Hobbit really warrant three full-length movies? Or is this just another Hollywood attempt to squeeze as much money as possible out of a franchise? We believe it’s the latter.
To begin with, J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit is only 304 pages. In comparison, each of the three Lord of the Rings books was longer (together they totaled 1,241 pages) and none of them received the multiple film treatment. Jackson argues that he’ll also be drawing from related materials that appeared in the appendices of LOTR, but we’re still skeptical.
What do you think SodaHeads? Is Peter Jackson’s decision to split The Hobbit into three parts brilliant or a blatant sellout?
Read More: http://theweek.com/article/index/231307/the-hobbit...
Top Opinion
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cddjmikey 2012/08/06 03:06:10Blatant sellout
+13Stretching it into two movies I could handle because they would be able to cover more of the story. Stretching it even further to THREE movies is just being greedy !! All I can say is since they ARE doing this then they better not leave out a SINGLE sentence from the book !!
It will be brilliant if they really cover a lot of the backstory, and at (probably) over 8 hours in total better be pretty faithful to the book... i think each of the LOTR films was around 3.5 hours on the extended versions so will be fascanating to see how they can get more than 8 hours out of this...
Not brilliant is having to wait for 2 1/2 years till ive seen them all
To me, the more of the story Peter Jackson tells, the better. The Lord of the Rings trilogy is my favorite trilogy ever.
By this Math we should have 9 LOTR movies. And ya know, i bet people would be ever pleased with that, but to make Hobbit into 3 movies, WTF!!!!
First time i read the LOTR i went half way forgot who was who started again with a pad to keep notes on who was who.
Did not do that with the Hobbit, will all the books be trilogy's,just think a bit of a overkill to make it into a trilogy.
What are they going to do to stretch it out that much, include long silent moments and lots and lots and LOTS of walking to epic music???
I cant see how they will make it riveting over 3 films if they just stick to the Hobbit, unless they involve the other parts of the books by Tolkien into the Hobbit.
But also, Jackson tends to shoot a LOT of content. Anyone who's seen the true extended version of LOTR on DVD saw over 2 hours of added footage that was cut from the theatre release. It was a completely different trilogy after seeing all of those edited scenes back in. And I'm hoping Jackson & others on this film project realize how much better the first series was with the extended scenes left in, and are deciding to just make 3 movies out of it instead of 2.
The second part is Bilbo, proving his worth to the dwarfs and almost being eaten. meeting Smeagal, & rescueing the dwarfs from King Thranduil. (I think)
The third part (without giving away the ending) is getting back to Hobbit town.
Thanks for explaining.
It could be hard to stretch out from meeting to start of journey into one film.. that would really be dragging it out... surely till end of the goblins would make a more logical point. then second could end with them arriving at the dragons lair.
The three books of the trilogy were actually two books each..
it would have made more sense to have made the trilogy into more movies.
Jacksons Trilogy left out so much of the First anf last books , he turned the hobbits into minor characters.
These movies better be some of the best I've ever seen.