Tag: The Hobbit

Far Over the Misty Mountains Cold.


“Far over the Misty Mountains cold, to dungeons deep and caverns old…” Also materializing online, as of last night, is the first trailer for Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. Looks great, although I’m a little wary of the Twilight-style division of the book (presumably, Smaug is in the second film), as well as the “original trilogy” tone — The Hobbit is more whimsical; it shouldn’t just be a prequel to the Lord of the Rings. (Also, “prequel to the original trilogy” is a phrase that deservedly spawns doubt in the hearts of many in the world of men this age.) But, all in all, this looks splendid. One year to go!

King Under the Mountain.


Far over the misty mountains cold, to dungeons deep and caverns old, we must away ere break of day to seek the pale enchanted gold. After revealing the rest of the dwarven company, Peter Jackson & co release a pic of Richard Armitage as Thorin Oakenshield. Looks younger than I’ve imagined, but it’s hard to disentangle my vision of Thorin from the Rankin/Bass cartoon at this late date.

Update: If you have a hankering to see these dwarves in action, PJ has released another fun production video, below.

The Grey Company.


While summer swelters stateside, Peter Jackson and co. are thankfully hard at work on The Hobbit. Here’s the second production diary (and the first, if you missed it.) And some production stills: Above we have Nori (Jed Brophy), Ori (Adam Brown), and Dori (Mark Hadlow), and below we have Oin (John Callen) and Gloin (Peter Hamilton) next to Fili (Dean O’Gorman) and Kili (Aidan Turner). That’s seven dwarves accounted for — six more presumably to follow in short order.


Update: Three more dwarves — or maybe three and a half, depending on how you count Bombur – materialize: Bombur (Stephen Hunter), Bofur (James Nesbitt), and Bifur (William Kircher). Note what appears to be a large chunk of metal embedded in the latter’s forehead.


Update 2: Almost there…Here’s Balin (Ken Stott) and Dwalin (Graham McTavish).


Update 3: And Thorin Oakenshield is here.

The Master of Bag End.


“‘There’s no way you can pace yourself for shoots like these,’ Jackson says. ‘When we were going through the schedule for The Hobbit, I felt a terrible drop in my stomach when I saw that we’d be shooting for 254 days. We’re only 12 days short of The Lord of the Rings even though we’re only doing two movies.‘

More big news from Middle-Earth: EW gets the first official pic of Martin Freeman as Bilbo Baggins. “‘He fits the ears, and he’s got some very nice feet,’ Jackson says of his Bilbo. ‘I think he’s got the biggest hobbit feet we’ve had so far. They’re a little bit hard to walk in, but he’s managed to figure out the perfect hobbit gait.’”

Dragon of the Baskervilles.


Some recent news on the Hobbiton front: Peter Jackson has rounded out the casting of An Unexpected Journey and There and Back Again (some solid titlage there, by the way) with Evangeline Lilly as an elf named Tauriel, Barry “Dame Edna” Humphries as the Goblin King, Luke Evans as Bard the Bowman, and Bilbo’s investigatory companion, Sherlock‘s Benedict Cumberbatch, as the voice of Smaug. “As well as playing Smaug, Cumberbatch is voicing the Necromancer, the evil Mirkwood sorcerer who is revealed in the Lord of the Rings to be the evil spirit Sauron.” (Smaug pic via here.)

Back Down in the Hole.


“Warner Bros. has officially announced the beginning of production on The Hobbit, Peter Jackson’s two film epic adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s timeless classic. The Hobbit is set in Middle-earth 60 years before Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings, which Jackson and his filmmaking team brought to the big screen in the blockbuster trilogy that culminated with the Oscar-winning The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King.“

Oh, wait, it’s a prequel?!? Never mind, then. (I kid, I kid.) In any case, many years and pounds later, PJ’s The Hobbit finally begins its Greatest Adventure. And the best news yet? The Return of the Figwit! Bret, you’ve got it going on…

Banes of Smaug, Allies of Sauron.


“Mr. Freeman at least lived up to Mr. Jackson’s billing, offering a comic denial that the ‘Hobbit’ project was cursed. Despite the many setbacks the films had faced, Mr. Freeman told Agence France-Presse, “we’re ready to go – just as soon as 2015 comes around.” While PJ recovers from recent surgery, the cast of The Hobbit get ready to embark on a grand adventure. Cue the Glenn Yarborough…

In related news: In Soviet Russia, the Ring carries you…Salon‘s Laura Miller takes a gander at Yisroel Markov’s The Last Ringbearer, a Russian fan-fictiony novel purporting to tell the War of the Ring from Sauron’s side. “In Yeskov’s retelling, the wizard Gandalf is a war-monger intent on crushing the scientific and technological initiative of Mordor and its southern allies because science ‘destroys the harmony of the world and dries up the souls of men!’ He’s in cahoots with the elves, who aim to become ‘masters of the world,’ and turn Middle-earth into a ‘bad copy’ of their magical homeland across the sea.”

Saoirse to the Shire.

“[W]orking with Peter Jackson is like working with a family. So they’ll have a great time. Saoirse’s family will go too, everyone is very close and very loving on those sorts of jobs.” Saoirse Ronan, late of Adaptation and The Lovely Bones and soon of Hanna, is apparently heading to Middle Earth as part of Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit. (Get well soon, PJ.) Hmm…an elf, perhaps? She has the look.

Radagast the Seventh.

Five armies, seventh Doctor? The cast for Peter Jackson’s The Hobbit fills out further with Sylvester McCoy (Radagast the Brown), Ken Stott (Balin), Mikael Persbrandt (Beorn), Ryan Gage (Drogo Baggins), Jed Brophy (Nori), William Kircher (Bifur), and, back for more, Cate Blanchett as Galadriel. [Earlier casting here.] Very glad to see this moving along.