Never saying never might be the smart play for Guillermo Del Toro, who once went off so memorably on the Lord of the Rings franchise ("I was never into heroic fantasy. At all. I don't like little guys and dragons, hairy feet, hobbits — I've never been into that at all. I don't like sword and sorcery, I hate all that…
· Leave it to the unlikely arena of a TRL interview with Jason Lewis for a probing analysis of the lopsided gender-divide among SATC fans. (To Lewis's credit, he never once utters the phrase, "Cause they're, like, old and not hot.") [MTV]
· It's the Burn After Reading red band trailer! We think we just witnessed the…
In a blog post last month, before The Hobbit officially landed a director, Lord of the Rings veteran Sir Ian McKellen was more certain he would reprise his role as Gandalf than he was of his former castmates' sexualities. He was even surer in a recent interview with Empire magazine, in which the 68-year-old…
Our dissatisfaction at Friday's news that Guillermo del Toro would inherit the Hobbit reins from Peter Jackson met with a mix of scorn and curiosity over the weekend. "Pony up an alternative, Cochise," wrote a commenter. "Destroy those two GENIUSES and all we will be left with is Lucas and Spielberg. And that is not…
There's been much to-do over the last day about Peter Jackson's hiring of Guillermo del Toro to direct the two-part Lord of the Rings prequel The Hobbit. Among our favorite dissenting opinions belongs to Salon critic Andrew O'Hehir, who pulls out his Cannes '06 interview notebook to look up del Toro's sentiment at…
Lord of the Rings grandmaster Peter Jackson and New Line announced yesterday that Hellboy and Pan's Labyrinth director Guillermo Del Toro will take on a two-film adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit in New Zealand under Jackson's supervision. If this sounds like positive news for those who have been waiting for…
· By the WIND, people. Get your minds out of the gutter! Bonus besteverness? Directed by David Fincher. [Creativity Magazine]
· Nerds rejoice! Guillermo del Toro has finally signed on to direct the long gestating LOTR prequel, The Hobbit. He will be spending the next four years (!!!) in New Zealand alternately…
Even though the Warner Bros. ax has yet to fall around New Line headquarters and the Tolkien family still wants its cash for The Lord of the Rings saga, Sir Ian McKellen took to his blog (We know! We're as stunned as you are) Wednesday to confirm he's "keeping [his] diary open for 2009" to reprise his role as…
Everybody's Suing Everybody Day continues! Accusing New Line of employing the kind of "Hollywood accounting" practices that could secret billions of dollars of Lord of the Rings revenues in suspicious budget lines like "Hair/Make-up Hobbitscaping Services," "Elijah Wood Eye-Desparkling Effects," and "Hide all…
Having recently buried the $40 million hatchet with Peter Jackson to bring to an end that ugly feud over Lord of the Rings profits, New Line (and partner MGM) can now turn its attention to the crucial matter of finding a suitable director (Jackson, as you surely remember, is executive producing) for its two planned …
Yesterday, there was much rejoicing in Fanboy Middle Earth following the announcement that director Peter Jackson would return to produce two The Hobbit movies for New Line after settling his dispute over the Lord of the Rings profits the filmmaker said the studio owed him. But how much money did it take for Jackson…
In a Christmas miracle sure to have Lord of the Rings fans putting on their official Bilbo Baggins Furry Feet™ and dancing in unselfconscious joy around the replica Shires they've lovingly constructed in their basements, the once-feuding Peter Jackson and New Line have announced they've buried the hatchet (read: a…
· Want more Gail Berman stories? Of course you do. [Variety, THR]
· Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson politely responds to New Line co-chairman Bob Shaye's comments to Sci Fi Wire that Jackson (who is suing NL over LOTR money he says he says he's owed) will make The Hobbit or any other movie with his studio…
