Peter Jackson Hints At The Hobbit 721
Hellboy0101 writes "News.com.au is reporting that New Line Cinema is currently in talks to purchase the rights to the film adaptation of The Hobbit. There are apparently some difficulties with getting the go ahead from Tolkien's son Christopher, who is executor of the estate. When asked if New Line has approached him about the project, Jackson said he has not ruled it out, but not until after King Kong is done. 'New Line, which spent $US300million ($415 million) making the films, is already planning to continue its Rings success with an adaptation of Tolkien's novel The Hobbit.
More difficulties with the Tolkien estate were looming, said Jackson, who added that he would be keen to get involved after he finishes remaking King Kong in 2006. "New Line haven't actually talked to me about The Hobbit. I know there's difficulty about the rights, certainly if they want to talk to me about it I'd be keen," he said.'"
ATTN: PETER JACKSON (Score:5, Funny)
(Although if you must... you have my sword)
Re:ATTN: PETER JACKSON (Score:5, Funny)
Re:ATTN: PETER JACKSON (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:ATTN: PETER JACKSON (Score:5, Informative)
Re:ATTN: PETER JACKSON (Score:5, Informative)
Re:ATTN: PETER JACKSON (Score:3, Funny)
I am the Axe (Score:5, Funny)
Re:ATTN: PETER JACKSON (Score:5, Informative)
Have you ever seen the damned thing? I have to admit I think it got the mood right, but man, those misshapen heads- and they really screwed up the elves! They were like little gremlins! The cartoon creators were obviously thinking of the elves that live up at the North Pole making presents for Santa. That's the wrong kind of elf. Although they did refrain from skateboarding down stairs while shooting arrows. That's one thing they did get right.
Hate to differ on taste... (Score:4, Insightful)
The Rings animated adaptation was doomed partly by the scope of the books, but your reaction's just colored by your having seen the live action first. My kids chose it to rent out last year too, and it had some things going for it, it genuinely did. I'd take the animated version of the hobbits' meeting with Strider over Peter Jackson's; it did a much better job of allowing him to be enigmatic, whereas the recent Fellowship telegraphed that scene badly. (I'm not so into Vigo in the role, he's way self-conscious.) In general the animated version has a lot less time for orcs screaming their lungs out to shell shock the audience, too, which ain't so bad to do without.
Not that they're perfect, but this isn't nearly as much of a train wreck as Attack of the Clones, or not in my book. The adapters did "get" the original stories, they understood the lines of each scene. If the Rings cartoon breaks down, it's mostly because of scope and their production values. And no, they didn't let the dwarves become a running short joke, either, or Legolas a rad surfer dude.
King Kong Bomb (Score:4, Insightful)
The remake is being done on the strength of Mr. Jackson's 'Lord of the Rings' trilogy, which has sold (or will have sold in a few months time) over a billion dollars US in box office tickets after costing roughly $200 million to make and promote worldwide. Impressive, yes.
The Lord of the Rings is a dense multi-volume fully realized fantasy that has offered a rich complex story and hundreds of opportunities for using state-of-the-art computer-generated imagery to complement the plot into a strong, enveloping film fantasy.
But $400 million for King Kong?!? This is a flimsy plot about a giant ape who develops an obsession about a tiny blonde human woman pet. (Hollywood metaphor anyone?). Big monkey lives on a distant island; whites come; they capture him (somehow); they take him to New York, he flips out, smashes up some shti, climbs a building, and gets shot down. Duh, end of story.
How is this worth making into a $400 million movie? Or, rather, how is $400 million going to make a better movie than the original or the 1978 Jessica Lange remake? More computer graphic imagery? Of what? A big monkey smashing things in NYC? Didn't we see all that already in the remake of Godzilla? You remember that... The remake of Godzilla that cost $80 million and lost most of it because it was stupid and a completely unnecessary film? How are you going to cover a $400 million investment on a big monkey film?
I haven't seen the new Peter Jackson 'King Kong'. Hell, it hasn't even been made. In fact, the producers are wracking their pointed little heads trying to think of some new angle that will get 45 million people to pay $10 each just to cover the pre-production cost ($400 million film and $50 million in publicity).
But I just know it's a bomb. It's the 'Gigli' of Summer 2006. And it's going to take a studio or two down with it.
This isn't a troll, it's a tragedy...
Thank you kindly,
Re:King Kong Bomb (Score:5, Funny)
Re:King Kong Bomb (Score:5, Funny)
You'll probably experience about the same experience into the 7th or 8th hour of LOTR marathons....
Re:King Kong Bomb (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:King Kong Bomb (Score:3, Funny)
And if I download a ripped copy of that movie from Kazaa, even if I own the DVD, that money won't go to buy a gaffer's glasses.
Re:King Kong Bomb (Score:4, Funny)
Yeah man, that's soooo King Kong.
Errr wait...
Re:King Kong Bomb (Score:4, Funny)
Re:King Kong Bomb (Score:4, Funny)
Ade_
/
Yes, it's travesty called "not reading the post" (Score:5, Informative)
Scroll to the top and reread the story.
Wait, don't both here it is:
"New Line, which spent $US300million ($415 million) making the films, is already planning to continue its Rings success with an adaptation of Tolkien's novel The Hobbit. "
That plainly says they spent the money on the LoTR series, not on the King Kong Remake. Further hints include the little know fact that "films" is plural, whereas "the King Kong remake" is singular.
Oh, and not to pick any nits or anything, but Universal is the one paying Jackson to do the remake of King Kong, and has budgeted 100 million to the project.
The only "insight" is that Simonetta didn't seem to read the original post. The tragedy is that s/he went off on poor defenseless strawman, and got a +5 insightful.
Just goes to show that put enough monkeys at a keyboard and let them bang away, eventually they'll mod anything and everything up to +5 insightful.
Re:King Kong Bomb (Score:4, Funny)
It very likely could have been Variety magazine within the past two months.
Of course, if this film actually does get made, the production may be reduced to realistic levels that can generate a profit. But in the present Hollywood climate, it doesn't seem likely.
I had dismissed the King Kong remake rumor as Hollywood vaporware until I saw the reference to it in the article that generated this Slashdot topic. Now it seems quite possibly true.
If so then I think that Hollywood in 2003 is in the same position that the Dot-Com industry was in 1998. Obsessed with bigger and bigger projects that in the light of day stand no real chance of ever being profitable. And having each success encourage a wilder grander more expensive project.
Sort of like a gambler doubling his bet on each successful roll of the dice.
Re:King Kong Bomb (Score:5, Informative)
Re:King Kong Bomb (Score:4, Interesting)
BTW, I am absoluetly amazed at the amazing film capabilities in New Zealand. It shows you why Lucas stays AWAY from hollywood (his stages are in London). There is too much trash and hangers on in Hollywood.
The massive stuff that Weta Digital has done will make them a rival to Industrial Lights and Magic. I could see them licensing out that stuff and making a fair amount of money from the other special effects houses.
Hinting at the Hobbit? (Score:5, Funny)
Like beating the Bishop?
Re:Hinting at the Hobbit? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Hinting at the Hobbit? (Score:5, Funny)
My personal opinion (Score:4, Interesting)
I've read everything Tolkien many times over. While I didn't feel the Jackson movies were completely honest to the books, I can understand his explanation regarding pacing and whatnot as it applies to the visual medium.
I really enjoyed the first two of the Trilogy, and am very much looking forward to the third.
If Jackson wants to take on The Hobbit, I'd be very interested in seeing the resulting work.
Re:My personal opinion (Score:5, Funny)
Tolkien's rewrite of the bible, spoken in elvish. Mel Gibson is slated for involvement, I hear.
Re:My personal opinion (Score:4, Interesting)
the Silmarillion
Wow.. You could do a trilogy just on that amount of material alone. Of course, by then I expect it all would have been thoroughly "Lucas-ized" and the Tolkien Estate's worst fears would be realized.
Could you imagine a 3-hour film with vignettes comprised of various parts of "Unfinished Tales"? That'd be like a Tolkien "Creepshow" (which was based on short stories by Stephen King).
Re:My personal opinion (Score:4, Insightful)
Moreover, the simple structure of his myths contain, if anything, a parallel to the Gnostic pseudo-christian myths of the 15th century with a creator-god with no direct intervention in the world, not to mention the lack of any Christ-figure, is quite contrary to normal Christian mythos.
Re:'nother angle... (Score:4, Funny)
As long as you shrieked in Quenya, you have nothing to be ashamed of.
Re:Christ's Lineage passage (Score:4, Interesting)
It is still important to Christians today to have a record of the fact that Christ was descended from David, since that was prophesied and we take those prophecies as proof of His deity.
When I was a boy my parents told me to skip all those genealogical passages. As a teenager, however, I decided that if they were in there they must be important, so I adopted a policy of making myself read them each time I come to those points in the Bible in my regular reading. (I don't go seek them out if I'm just thinking I feel like reading some of the Bible, but I don't skip them in my regular scheduled reading as I go through the Bible each year or so.)
What I found is that while for years it was almost impossible to even pay attention to them, gradually as I became more and more familiar with the rest of the Bible the genealogies took on meaning as a sort of review of what I've read. When I read through the genealogy of Christ, I have a capsule review of David, all the kings of Judah that came after him, the exile of Israel, the restoration under Zerubbabel, and other important events of the Old Testament. Now, I can see how if these events are unimportant to you then the genealogies would continue to be unimportant. :) But for those who like me believe the events in the Bible are God's way of teaching us how to live, those capsule reviews have begun to help me.
A few years back we had a special event at church where we were taught a series of hand-motion mnemonics to remember most of the events in the Old Testament. (Apparently there's a comparable set of mnemonics for the New Testament, but we haven't had the program for that.) At that point I had only recently started to notice that the genealogies were starting to have meaning to me, and I remember having the sudden epiphany: "Hey! The genealogies are God's mnemonics!"
For the record, there are tons of genealogies in the Bible, often quite repetitive. (That's a lot of review.) The book of Genesis contains quite a few as it relates the earliest ancestors of the human race and the Israelite people (those are the ones my parents originally told me to skip). The line of King David is narrated in great detail, there are many records of the major families of Israel, and the book of Chronicles (the last book in the Hebrew order of the Old Testament) begins with a gigantic genealogical summary from the first man, Adam, all the way down to the author's day. Then, of course, the New Testament contains two genealogies of Christ; one through Joseph, and one through Mary.
I hope people find this post interesting, even if they don't agree with my religion.
Re:My personal opinion (Score:3, Interesting)
The problem is that there are some excellent dramatic stories in the Silmarillion:
- Feanor and the revolt of the Elves, from about his birth to the time the elves establish themselves in Beleriand. It's got grreat pacing, mostly follows one character's development and history, and then after his death there's some resolution with his sons.
- Beren and Luthien. It's got romance, adventure, action, a few daring
Re:My personal opinion (Score:3, Interesting)
One of the issues that Jackson could probably address that would help the situation would be to actually pay a decent royalty for the rights to the Tol
Seems odd (Score:5, Funny)
I Guess size doesnt matter.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Haven't you heard?.. (Score:3, Funny)
I personally blame the Japanese
Keen? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Keen? (Score:5, Funny)
(Apostrophes, you recall, are for OWNERSHIP.)
Re:Keen? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Keen? (Score:5, Funny)
The 30's 60's 70's and 80's called (Score:5, Funny)
They saw what happened to Godzilla.
Ben
Please, no hobbit! (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Please, no hobbit! (Score:5, Insightful)
So? That's generally the situation with any movie adapted from a book. Movies written from pre-existing works are based on another's perception of that work, never a direct expression of the work itself (unless, I suppose, the author of that work participates in the film-making. In which case the movie will still by slightly influenced by the director's interpretation). Besides, I wouldn't necessarily rule out the possibility that the same children you think are reading The Hobbit are also reading the LOTR books. In any case, they'll still get the full value of the books if they are read, and still much of the story if they just watch the movies instead without ever reading them. Either way the story is told, which is the important thing.
It's like that version of Romeo and Juliet we all had to watch in middle school. It was a pretty loose interpretation of Shakespeare, but for those that would have never read it on their own, it atleast instilled a good sense of the work.
Re:Please, no hobbit! (Score:5, Insightful)
On the contrary said the author, my book still exists in its original form. Nothing has changed except that a new movie was made.
Some things are hard to unlearn (Score:3, Insightful)
Not all experience, or learning, is positive, and some things can't be unlearned.
"Polanyi admits that focusing on particulars may improve our capacity to attend to the overall meaning. For instance, when we analyze poetry we might temporarily destroy our appreciation of it but it also makes for a much richer understanding once our attention is returned to the whole. It can be expected that one's understanding will be different from one's original understandi
Re:Please, no hobbit! (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Please, no hobbit! (Score:5, Insightful)
It would, quite frankly, rock.
Re:Please, no hobbit! (Score:3, Insightful)
It is Tolkien's character who are out of cardboard. That's the nature of a myth. There is nothing wrng with it. Go and read it again.
I love LOTR, and the vision that Jackson brought to screen is an excelent job. Get over it it is not the book - it is a movie. Pretty darn good movie. Nobody took the book from you - it is still on your shelf. Or, is it?
Re:Please, no hobbit! (Score:3, Interesting)
During the story they would flash back to Merry and Pippin squabbling about the details. In some cases they would show Merry's version and Pippin's version. Sometime more childlike sometimes more gruesome.
What would be 100% essential is to show how Bilbo initially hid the nature of the
Re:Please, no hobbit! (Score:5, Insightful)
actually, if the movie is tailored for a wide audience (PG-13) then most kids will get a chance to read the book before they're old enough to see the movie.
When I was seeing the "The Two Towers", before the movie started, my wife and I started talking to this young girl (must have been under 8) who was there with her mother. She was seated in front of us and doing the usual young child sit-backward-in-the-seat-and-gape-at-strangers trick. We asked her if she'd seen the first movie; she said yes. We asked her if she liked it; she said yes. I asked her if she liked reading the books (hell, I first read them when I was about her age) and she replied, "Oh no, I don't have to read the books - my mom is buying the DVD!".
I didn't know who to slap - the little girl or her mother.
Re:Please, no hobbit! (Score:5, Insightful)
Because they are. Movies are limited to only 2 of he five senses. They're also limiited to the time people are willing to sit in a theater, the amount of money in the budget, the technical capabilites at the time of production, the abilities of the cast and crew, the interpretation of the dirctor, etc.
Books have no such limitation. The only limitations are the imagination of the reader and the ability of the author. They have far more room to grow and explore than movies do. Concepts that would utterly fail in a cramped media like film can work when powered by your imagination. And unlike movies, who's effects get dated, the power of the written word never fades.
You may find a few so-so books turned into decent movies. And you may find an adaptation that makes you look at something differently. But you will never find a good or great book that is surpassed by a movie version.
Re:Please, no hobbit! (Score:3, Insightful)
Shawshank Redemption. From the short story "Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption" by Stephen King. A very good story, but surpassed by the movie. The movie added richness that imagination could not, as most of us can't imagine the inside of a prison.
Re:Please, no hobbit! (Score:3, Insightful)
The point, of course, is that film and literature are distinct arts, even when they avail themselves of each other.
It is quite possible that the LOTR films be "better" than the books. The books are wonderful, but they have flaws. There is some truly unnecessary material, from a narrative perspective, in the books. In Jackson's view, the Scouring of the Shire is one of those flaws. The Godfather films outshone the novels they were base
Re:Please, no hobbit! (Score:4, Informative)
If you consider a book to be a straight narrative from plot point to plot point then you're frankly missing the point. The Scouring of the Shire is my own very-favorite part of the series, because the fate of the world does NOT hinge upon it. These days I tend to look carefully at any work that has as its aim the Saving of the World. When looking at what I can take away from a story, the belief that the act of saving the world is harder than figuring out truthfully what must be done for it to be saved is looking progressively more stupid as I age. I don't blame Jackson for excising it (*something* had to go, I suppose), but it is not an extraneous portion of the story.
Looking at the larger picture, what bothers me isn't that *some* movies are better than the books upon which they were based. If you want a prime example look at The Wizard of Oz, the originals weren't bad but the movie is great. However, the longer the book has been around, the less likely that a movie version, if it happens, will be better, because the older a book is, the better it has to be for studio execs to scent gold it. Also, the older and more beloved the work, the greater a wall of public regard that must be torn down in order to work their grimy magic upon it.
But to step back a bit, what bothers me is the general public perception that the movie is *automatically* better than the book, because it's a *movie*, which is not even true half the time. Yet, Harry Freaking Potter excepted, everyone watches the movie, and far fewer read the book. Film and literature may be different arts, and they mey exchange letters and invite each other over for tea every Tuesday, but the neigoborhood still gossips about them. And the fact is, people always compare them to each other. The fact that movies are extremely huge money these days while most authors work second or even third jobs contributes to this effect.
What got me all hot under the collar in this department was seeing countless works of literature sold with their covers matching the movie adaptation, looking exactly as if they were mere novelizations, copies of truer celluoid. Now it's happening to Lord of the Rings -- just a couple of days ago I saw at the bookstore a compilation of the three novels in the trilogy, with a movie still cover and with movie Gandalf and movie Frodo collectable bookends in a big movie-themed cardboard box. What I hate is the sense that the movie appearances of these characters will become the "official" versions in the minds of everyone who isn't at least an undergrad (which is to say, most people). You may not believe this, but the picture on my own mind of what a Balrog looked like was a hell of a lot nastier than that CGI version, and my own image of hobbits did not take into account the Elijah Wood factor.
Hurting my own argument: What about the Ralph Bakshi versions? No one complained about them?
Ah, but they didn't have hundreds of millions of dollars pushing them into the public consciousness, did they?
Re:Please, no hobbit! (Score:5, Interesting)
But speaking from personal experience, if I ever had a mental image of the Kwisatz Haderach, it's long since morphed into Kyle MacLachlan. And I must have read LOTR... (lets not exaggerate here...) say 20 times. I'm positive I had a mental image of Frodo. What was it? I have no idea.
Is it really all that earth-shattering to admit that movies tend to burn an image into one's mind in a way that overpowers the changeable visions of the imagination? (that being said, I don't know how many times -- always a surprise -- in the past month I've thought I saw something on tv or in a movie and realized that I read it and the mental image is so strong I could swear I saw it somewhere till I remembered the source. That, however, does not diminish the argument that an external visual representation of the same thing couldn't extinguish that mental image)
Personally, I'd like to see P.Jackson's version for the sake of consistency of vision, not because I'm mentally lazy (though I am most assuredly that, paraphrased the man, er, Dude). That and to prevent Bakshi from wreaking more ruin.
Re:Please, no hobbit! (Score:3, Interesting)
Gandalf aging backwards? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Gandalf aging backwards? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Gandalf aging backwards? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Gandalf aging backwards? (Score:3, Informative)
Transcript snippet from FOTR Script [seatofkings.net] at www.seatofkings.net.
Re:Gandalf aging backwards? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Gandalf aging backwards? (Score:5, Insightful)
Gandalf is not a man -- he is istari, an immortal Maya (sort of a "lesser god"). He came to Middle Earth a few thousand years before the action of LOTR takes place and he was already old back then, considering he's been around in one shape or the other since the creation of Arda. :)
See more here: Encyclopedia of Arda [glyphweb.com]
Damn... Did I just fail the geek outing test?
i Arriba ! (Score:5, Funny)
I didn't realize that wizards were from Mexico.
(...It's Maia.)
LOTR actors (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:LOTR actors (Score:4, Interesting)
Andy Serkis, on the other hand... I can't imagine anyone else playing Gollum now. And just think of it, a crowded theater sometime in the winter of 2009, Bilbo in a cave, then a familiar CGI face and the first whisper of "Precious"... think of the beginning of the opening crawl for Episode 1 (when we didn't know how badly it would suck) and multiply it by 10 and that's what you'll get.
And of course we have to have Ian McKellen playing Gandalf too, simply because he loves doing it and there's no one better out there for the role.
Re:LOTR actors (Score:3, Informative)
He doesn't particularly mind doing Gandalf, but I wouldn't say it's his favorite, by a long shot. Read the White Book [mckellen.com] entry from three weeks ago, especially the part about signing autographs. For more of his take on LOTR, read his journals [mckellen.com]. I'd reproduce the relevant paragraphs here, but the site doesn't allow it.
Re:LOTR actors (Score:3, Funny)
Shome thingsh in here don't react well to arrowsh!
Ent draught - shaken, not stirred.
And I can just picture gandalf with a dragon-hilted katana...
Re:LOTR actors (Score:5, Funny)
if?
i think he's already waiting in the studio carpark.
prof.
Re:LOTR actors (Score:3, Funny)
Like the keymaker...
Please, oh please... (Score:5, Funny)
hmmm (Score:5, Funny)
It'd suck. Guaranteed. (Score:4, Interesting)
The only way it would work would be if it was deliberately filmed and marketed as a movie for young children.
Re:It'd suck. Guaranteed. (Score:4, Insightful)
I wouldn't put down The Hobbit like that. Even though the details are simplified, it doesn't mean they aren't there. I read The Hobbit, and then LOTR, the Silmarillion, then going back to reread The Hobbit I found that it's remarkably consistant with the materials from the other books (granted, Tolkien did a bit of revisionist history with "The Hobbit", but I digress).
The Hobbit also introduces us to the hardy race of halflings which at first seem unlikely that little Bilbo could even survive the dangerous journey with the dwarves, but later he turns into the most resourceful and most heroic character in the book (very convincingly too).
The only way it would work would be if it was deliberately filmed and marketed as a movie for young children.
I'm not sure it'll be terribly suitable for young children. It's going to have giant spiders biting the protagonists, and the battle of five armies is rather bloody indeed.
Re: It'd suck. Guaranteed. (Score:3, Interesting)
> Ask anyone who ever read the Lord of the Rings as a kid and then went and read the Hobbit afterwards. Although it's a delightful children's novel, the Hobbit is inevitably a terrible disappointment after the scope and depth of the LOTR.
Not me. I read LoTR, then after many years re-read it and then read The Hobbit for the first time. And frankly, I think The Hobbit is a better story.
LoTR scores high on conception, but has its problems. IMO the author is too heavy handed, recycles too many of his own
Re:It'd suck. Guaranteed. (Score:3, Interesting)
Agree partly. I couldn't read the Hobbit at all after I read LotR. But I started reading The Hobbit to my kids to get them into it, and I discovered that the book is meant to be read aloud ... there seems to be a lot of poetry in the book when it is spoken that you miss if you just read it by yourself.
Maybe as a movie some of that effect would come out.
For the Community (Score:5, Insightful)
Someone should tell Jackson that there's a whole lot you can do for a community besides put up a museum or a monument to what you did with their tax break, and it need not even be an eyesore like that statue he wants. How about building parks and playgrounds? Contributing to local health programs? Financial aid for economically depressed areas? Charities? Libraries? Help for schools?
These and a whole lot of others are ways to give back to the community in ways that really help. And they don't require the permission of the Tolkien estate either.
Re:For the Community (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:For the Community (Score:5, Interesting)
I would be forced to agree with you with nearly any movie (or series of movies) such as The Matrix, Star Wars, Titanic, and what not... but not The Lord of the Rings.
If you happened to catch the extra features on the Extended Edition of The Fellowship of the Ring (and to a lesser extent The Two Towers), you'd see that they made literally tens of thousands of swords, pieces of armor, costumes, helmets, everything. Heck, every dang mug from the Prancing Pony was custom made.
And then there are the Uber Cool 'Bigatures', like the two towers, the Black Gate, and others, not to mention the various sculptures of Gollum and Treebeard.
Weta Workshop's work is utterly amazing, and if I had any reason to go near New Zealand or Australia, I'd definately stop at that museum.
the Hobbit will be better than LOTR (Score:5, Insightful)
Remember the animated version? It was really goood! I'd imagine that a live action version, using WETA's technology, could potentially be even better.
A good launching for Jar-Jaromir (Score:4, Funny)
Leonard Nimoy to write songs for the movie? (Score:3, Funny)
He could use this as his resume for the job:
http://homepage.mac.com/evanbaumgardner/iMovieThe
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
At least they won't have to rebuild sets (Score:4, Informative)
I think he cracked a joke about building it somewhere and living in it, but hey, this way they can just break it out of storage and rebuild it and it will be the same set from Fellowship... instant continuity.
The problem with long copyrights (Score:5, Insightful)
Oops, he's been dead for thirty years. Probably isn't going to be writing another book set in Middle Earth I guess.
The Hobbit was published in 1937. I think 66 years is plenty of time to recoop the his effort. I appreciate the intent of allowing copyright to pass on to one's heirs, but it's been 30 years since Tolkien died. Can't Christopher Tolkien create something of value himself to provide for himself? Heck, he's got to be doing well, and at 77 maybe it's time to retire and let the rest of the world enjoy a work you didn't actually create!
The Founder's Copyright [creativecommons.org] still covers 99% of the potential value of copyrighted works and manages to do it without putting culture under chains.
Re:The problem with long copyrights (Score:5, Insightful)
Try reading the Silmarillion or the Unfinished Tales. Why, take a look at the Books of Lost Tales as well.
It is quite possible that those beautiful, indeed, essential volumes in the tale of the Middle-Earth would not exist without Christopher, or at least wouldn't, in all probability, fit in so well with the original published works of JRRT. Christopher is, quite understandably so, the best Tolkien scholar par none.
It's actually interesting how real life mirrors the fantasy. What Christopher's been doing with his father's writings is very much the same thing that Frodo and Sam did for Bilbo's Red Book.
I for my part am forever grateful for Christopher for publishing any- and everything his father left behind. And I understand his grudge with the franchising of Middle-Earth, even as I love the movies on their own accord.
Are they selling McLembas already?
just saw Return of the King (Score:4, Interesting)
No spoilers:
- Well another great chapter awaits!
- The battle scenes are stupendous, quite exhausting
- It is *long* (we didn't get an intermission)
- There are a couple of Monty Python-like lines which although not intentional drew some laughs
- The end is kind of soppy (well what did you expect)
- Towards the end it felt like Spielburg was on the job, squeezing out every last ounce of emotion
- Gandalf for president!
Re:just saw Return of the King (Score:5, Informative)
Indeed! I didn't actually notice this until I read your post and checked at IMDb.
FOTR: 178 min (208 min)
TTT: 179 min (222 min)
ROTK: 210 min
Are Peter Jackson actually going to make an Extended Edition of ROTK? I assumed so before, but seeing the non-EE version is about as long...??
Fact check -- STOP blaming the Tolkien Estate! (Score:5, Insightful)
In 1976, the Saul Zaentz Co., doing business as Tolkien Enterprises [tolkien-ent.com], acquired rights to both The Hobbit and LotR. This agreement included the film rights. Tolkien Enterprises entered into an agreement with WB so that they could film the Rankin & Bass animated version of The Hobbit. Now comes the fun part: WB still has those rights, and they're sitting on them like a broody hen with only one egg.
New Line can't greenlight Peter -- they don't have the rights, and aren't likely to get them in the near future. Rumor has it that a few of the key brass over at the Frog Studio are a little cheesed off about the fact that a bunch of Hobbits, Elves, Dwarves, and other assorted mangy fairy-tale creatures have been collectively kicking the backside of a certain boy wizard at the box office for the past two Christmases running. Heh.
Now OTOH, the Tolkien Estate is being a pain in the butt about the idea of a movie museum in Wellington. And for that, Christopher Tolkien can rightly be accused of behaving like the dog in the manger.
Re:Fact check -- STOP blaming the Tolkien Estate! (Score:4, Informative)
Isn't NewLine part of AOL^H^H^H Time Warner?
According to This [timewarner.com], they are.
And Warner Pictures is too?
Considering there were a number of reports that TW's profits for the last few years was largely influenced by LOTR:FOTR & TTT - it shouldn't take much for NewLine to receive the rights....
Should it?
Re:Details, please? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Details, please? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Details, please? (Score:4, Informative)
Iron Crown had a bit to do with it as well. I've talked with some of their authors, and to a one, they all blame ICE. The causes are numerous. Not focusing on new customers, issuing more regional background material than they did adventures, chasing the CCG fad while letting the RPG base deteriorate, etc. Tolkien Enterprises merely sunk an already sinking ship.
Re:Details, please? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Details, please? (Score:4, Insightful)
Nothing is being "destroyed" here with Peter Jackson and WETA at the helm.
Re:Details, please? (Score:3, Interesting)
According to one Tolkien writer (forget who), Christopher made his fortune off of "his daddy's wastepaper basket scrapings." I thank him for getting the Silmarillion out, but most everything afterwards was pretty pointless. He should have donated all the wastepaper basket scrapings to a library, instead of trying to edit them into commercial books.
His problem is that he's still leeching off of dear old dead dad.
Oh, please (Score:3, Interesting)
Guess who sold the movie rights to his works specifically for the purpose of more money? Guess who even offered suggestions for editing out parts of the story for movie adaptations, such as cutting out the "unecessary" Helm's Deep?
People like to attribute all this stubbornness to J.R.R Tolkien, but he was as much aware of the difficulties in adaptation as anyone. He was changing his core mythology all the way until the en
Re:I haven't read the book (Score:4, Insightful)
But if you don't like it, no big deal.
Re:I read that, and al I could think is (Score:4, Informative)
Hitler's favorite movie was Metropolis.
Re:Estate needs to pull its head from it's ass (Score:4, Interesting)
My point being - not made very well I suppose - that in order to preserve the Tolkien legacy, things like films, museums and statues are a pretty good way.
I suppose you could argue that the profits from the movie, rather than spent on a museum should instead be spent on an endowment fund to benefit budding writers, or something.
The way I see it, Peter Jackson wants to preserve the effort put into the movie, thank New Zealand and promote Tolkiens' work.
AFAIC, standing in the way of his proposals is just plain silly.
But, if someone can point out the flaw(s) in my comment(s), I'd be happy to listen.
Re:Ridiculous corporate welfare! (Score:3, Insightful)
There is a growing trend to exempt corporations from all taxes, either directly or indirectly. (Enron, as a famous example, had a net government income from all its tax schemes
Corporations ha
no he can't - already being done by Shrek director (Score:4, Interesting)