Hobbit story to be padded out into two "war" films, Kill Bill style -- UGH!
Brian
cash-in, at least made sense --
in favor of padding out the story of the Hobbit into two "hard PG-13"
films.
http://www.theonering.net/torwp/2009/04/17/31800-hobbit-movie-formats-confirmed-1-hobbit-2-films/
Jackson even says a cliffhanger ending and "darker" tone than the LOTR
movies will help it fit in with the trilogy.
Totally doesn't understand the Hobbit AT ALL.
A bridge movie would have at least made sense, even if it was largely
made up, it would have preserved the
integrity of the Hobbit as a self-contained, classically plotted hero
journey. This is like splitting up Star Wars
Episode IV into two movies -- in order to make the story "darker" in
keeping with the prequels!
Or, more precisely,
it's like splitting Princess Bride into two "war" films, with one
centered on the invasion of Guilder.
(After all , the two stories are very similar in tone -- and really,
William Goldman should probably be scripting this, or at least leave
it up to Del Toro -- not Jackson, with his expressed disdain for the
"lighthearted" tone of the Hobbit)
The convention-goers over at theonering.net seem to be well pleased as
they usually are with every boneheaded decision surrounding the Hobbit
film, they are arguing that the Hobbit should not be a "childish" film
and that they loved LOTR as PG-13 when they were 6 years old (natch),
and would have loved it less if it had been PG.
A PG Hobbit would be some boring old lighthearted romp like Princess
Bride, I guess -- too old fashioned!
I don't have a problem with a "soft" PG 13 Hobbit as that seems to fit
the material but this latest news confirms my suspicion that Jackson
has really been drifting away from any understanding of the material
he (or more precisely, his wife) may have had, ever since Two
Towers... as evidenced by ROTK being cast as a sepia-toned WWII film
with Gollum as the villain.
~~Apologies for using Google Groups~~
Brian R.
> Del Toro/Jackson drops bridge movie -- an idea which, even if it was a
> cash-in, at least made sense --
>
> in favor of padding out the story of the Hobbit into two "hard PG-13"
> films.
>
> http://www.theonering.net/torwp/2009/04/17/31800-hobbit-movie-formats...
>
> Jackson even says a cliffhanger ending and "darker" tone than the LOTR
> movies will help it fit in with the trilogy.
>
> Totally doesn't understand the Hobbit AT ALL.
To be precise, I AM AWARE that they've been planning two films, but
the idea was that a single Hobbit film would be made and no harm would
be done if the "bridge film" was a flop. this new approach (dividing
up the actual Hobbit story into two films) is just about the most
ignominious end to a movie franchise since Conan the Destroyer.
Perhaps they could have Brett Ratner direct the second half.
Flas...@live.com
Nope. LOTR is really quite amazing at impeccably following through the
books;- divergence, for the most is insignificant if not a considered
right production can claim. Besides, understanding isn't needed in
the LCD of people watching movies to fantasize over a 50-magnum...
Frodo in avant-garde fulfilling a need at least for an "Goblin
stinger" AK-47.
http://www.fatwallet.com/forums/hot-deals/920466?highlight_key=y&keyword1=ak-47
Sean_Q_
> Jackson even says a cliffhanger ending and "darker" tone than the LOTR
> movies will help it fit in with the trilogy.
Don't tell me PJ's going to mangle another great epic. I can picture
Iceland severing diplomatic relations with New Zealand if he ever
tries to film _The Sagas_.
SQ
Sean_Q_
> The convention-goers over at theonering.net seem to be well pleased as
> they usually are with every boneheaded decision surrounding the Hobbit
> film, they are arguing that the Hobbit should not be a "childish" film
Why not? I liked the 1977 animated version with music by Glenn
Yarbrough... more or less... even though it depicts Gollum as
some sort of amphibian.
Here's some comments about the film that gave me a chuckle, from:
http://dauntlessmedia.net/middle-earth/hobbit/the-hobbit-1977-film-review.html
"The Hobbit (1977) was a made-for-TV animated film that adapted J.R.R.
Tolkien�s literary classic by the same name. The results are mixed...
"(Editor�s note: This review will focus on the craft of the film. For
a discussion of the story of the Hobbit, please visit the BOOK
REVIEW.)
"When the film begins, a number of decisions are immediately
noticeable. For starters, The Hobbit 1977 is, primarily, a children�s
film. This was an explicit decision on the part of Rankin/Bass...
First, and most prominently, is the animation style. The landscapes
of Middle Earth are quite well done. But even thought this is a
cartoon, the characters are not rendered anywhere near anything
approaching realistic. In fact, there is a great deal of hyperbole
with respect to the visuals. Indeed, the animators seem to have some
kind of nose fetish, making everyone�s noses proportionally several
times too large for the characters� faces. They also take the
�roundness� of Bilbo�s body almost too literally, resulting in a doe-
eyed character that puts the Pillsbury Doughboy to shame. [!]
"Other characters are rendered even more implausibly � and oftentimes
contradictory to their descriptions in the book. Gollum is something
like a frog. The goblins have mouths that are as large as their
bodies. The Wood-Elves actually look like orcs. And then there is
Smaug, the great and mighty dragon who is central the quest. His
appearance? Tolkien had described Smaug�s snores sounding a bit like
a giant �tomcat.� And so the animators took that line and made Smaug
� look like a cat � from his feline face to his facial whiskers and
fur on his back.
"I understand that this is a children�s film but instead of evoking a
sense of danger, his design evokes a sense of hilarity � at least
initially. There are indeed a few moments, while he is breathing
fire, in which he looks (almost) impressive. But it only works if you
can stop laughing before you see it. And while we�re on the topic of
animation, the Battle of Five Armies looks like a flea circus on too
much caffeine. It�s really a rather poor display.
"Another consequence of making this adaptation into a children�s film
is the emphasis on songs. On the surface, it seems like an
intriguing, and authentic, decision � especially considering the
prominence of song within The Hobbit. But the film adds in a few
songs of its own and the songs themselves are highly stylized,
reflecting late-70s pop culture. There is the folk-singer approach,
the vaguely country-western approach, and a disco-approach. The
results do not hold up very well over time. Instead they come across
as cheesy and cringeworthy. I�ll say this much, however, the lyrics
to Glenn Yarbrough�s �The Greatest Adventure,� while also cheesy and
cringeworthy, fit the spirit of the film perfectly. Suffice to say,
if you can buy into this approach (a very, very, VERY big *IF*), you
may find yourself pleasantly surprised by the film. Otherwise, you
find yourself shutting it off before you even make it out of Bag-End."
[end of extract] See the site for full text of review.
SQ
Brian R.
> Brianwrote:
Does Google Groups eat your message if you change the followups?
Goddamnit...
Well, if you don't see it, I replied to Sean Q saying that the main
concern I have
with LOTR is in film three, where it devolves into a Wagnerian
morality play that
has more in common with 1930s German Expressionism than with the
nuanced
outcome of the books. It would have been a great movie other than
that.
Noel Q. von Schneiffel
Well, this is entirely the fault of all you moviegoers who made
Jackson's LotR such a financial success. If you had boycotted it and
made them lose money with it, they would never have been able to
finance the Hobbit movie(s). Unfortunately, at the time of the movie
release, reasonable critical voices such as the comments of L. Epstein
(1) were drowned in the cacophony of so-called "fandom". Now live with
your shame.
Noel
(1) I have deep respect and admiration for the great thinker and
philosopher Epstein, even though I sometimes disagree with him in
other, non-LotR-related issues. For example, I think the WTC should
not be rebuilt the way it was, but rather be replaced by a giant
Tolkien statue.
Brian R.
Google Groups ate my reply to Sean Q when i restored the ramc-f
header!
God, this service sucks.
On Apr 28, 10:33 pm, "Brian R." <w...@erols.com> wrote:
> On Apr 28, 6:56 am, China Blue Syndrome <chine.b...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> > Brian<w...@erols.com> wrote:
> > > Del Toro/Jackson drops bridge movie -- an idea which,
> > > even if it was a cash-in, at least made sense --
>
> > > in favor of padding out thestoryof theHobbitinto two "hard PG-13" films.
>
> > This is HÖBBÏT TÄP!
>
> > Follow the misadventures of Höbbït Täp on their ill fated Rhovanion Tour.
>
> > To promote their Smell the Mithril album Höbbït Täp goes on a concert tour
> > across the Edge of Where the Wild Things Are with Bilbo Baggins on rhythm guitar
> > (looking surprisingly like a dimunitive Hellboy), Thorin Oakenshield on bass
> > harp (looking like a Liz Sherman with a beard), Gandalf the Webbed on lead
> > guitar, Thomas Bombadil on keyboards, and a succession of twelve height
> > challenged persons on drums. The tour starts well with kick off party in
> > Rivendell.
>
> > After a mercy killing of the party servers,
Our Dragons Are Different.
How, O Smaug the Magnificent?
See My Claws? Most Dragons have 10 claws. These dragon claws GO TO 11!
See my scales? They also Go to 11!
And my breath? It goes to 11!
With the help of traditional puppeteering and physical effects, the
butterflies and spiders also go to 11 in a dark and introspective
sequence.
We want to transcend the limitations of traditional CGI here.
Oh, and Sean Q, I like the R/B Gollum. He looks more like something
Guillermo Del Toro (or childrens book illustrator Trina Schart Hyman)
would come up with, which I like. Plus, he's actually creepier than
Andy Serkis.
rick++
I believe they have just begun filming these -
together.
Brian R.
He's done a good job on FOTR and TTT, but as I've argued in aft-rabt
before, his misunderstanding of the outcome of the story manifests
itself in ROTK, which would be a great film if the tone of the piece
wasn't so badly mangled and turned into some kind of Wagnerian German
Expressionist movie.
because he never understood the outocme of the central subplot (he
repeatedly said LOTR was about "the Greatest Generation" returning
from war or some such BS, like the similarly melodramatic Saving
Private Ryan with its childish moral lessons, when in fact it's an
introspective moral drama, quote the opposite sort of film. The only
"war films" the original story is similar to are Thin Red Line, or a
movie about SURVIVING holocaust and war).
What's worse is that some fans who dislike the superficial changes in
ROTK don't actually have a problem with the lack of moral depth in
ROTK. A lot of them think the characters in the book were supposed to
be archetypes of pure good and were watered down for the flicks. This
is the opposite of my complaint about ROTK.
But regarless of how well he did LOTR, I've said from the beginning
that Jackson does not "GET" Hobbit and doesn't understand that it's
supposed to be a different sort of story from Lord of the Rings.
Regardless of how well a job he did on Rings, Hobbit is a different
sort of story and he's trying to take a story that's more like
Princess Bride or A New Hope and make it more like 300.
Derek Broughton
> Unfortunately, at the time of the movie
> release, reasonable critical voices such as the comments of L. Epstein
<snort />
It's far too early in the day for such feeble attempts at humour.
David Trimboli
> But regarless of how well he did LOTR, I've said from the beginning
> that Jackson does not "GET" Hobbit and doesn't understand that it's
> supposed to be a different sort of story from Lord of the Rings.
> Regardless of how well a job he did on Rings, Hobbit is a different
> sort of story and he's trying to take a story that's more like
> Princess Bride or A New Hope and make it more like 300.
I think he gets it. He just doesn't care. He wants more money and
adulation, and more LR is the way to get it. THE HOBBIT isn't LR? Just a
pesky detail, quickly swept under the rug.
--
David Trimboli
http://www.trimboli.name/