Guillermo Del Toro Comes Out of The Hobbit Closet

Posted by Neil Miller (neil@filmschoolrejects.com) on April 24, 2008

Guillermo Del Toro to direct The Hobbit

Oh yes, ’tis true my friends — Guillermo Del Toro, the master director who has previously blown our collective mind with the awesome badassery of Hellboy and the euphoric grit and beauty of Pan’s Labyrinth has finally made it official. He will be directing The Hobbit.

Variety is reporting the announcement from Executive Producers Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh, New Line president Toby Emmerich and MGM chief Mary Parent that Del Toro will helm not one, but two Hobbit films. The sequel, as the report states, will deal with the 60-year period between “The Hobbit” and “The Fellowship of the Ring”, which as you will remember was the first in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Del Toro will move out to New Zealand for the next four years to work with Peter Jackson and his Wingnut and WETA production teams on the two flicks, the first of which will both probably not hit theaters until 2010.

As you well know, Del Toro has been in The Hobbit closet for quite a while. Back in August of last year it appeared that it was a three man race for the job between Del Toro, Spider-Man director Sam Raimi and Peter Jackson himself. After Jackson announced his decision to produce only, it was clear that Del Toro was the frontrunner. In fact, since late last year the speculation has turned into a situation of general awareness, whereas we all pretty much knew that Del Toro was the man, he just wouldn’t say for sure. Well now it is true, mainly because Variety says its true.

Let the casting rumor mongering begin. Let’s get it started — we’ve heard that Samuel L. Jackson is in the running for the voice of Smaug the dragon. As well, we would like to begin lobbying for Peter Dinklage to have a part in the film somewhere. We don’t really care who he plays, he just needs to be there.

Sound Off: Are you surprised that Guillermo Del Toro is directing The Hobbit? (Note: Unlike most of our other “Sound Off” questions, this one is rhetorical.)


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  • the 60-year period between “The Hobbit” and “The Fellowship of the Ring”

    Who the, what the--?! So they are going to make up a story or are they taking something from Tolkein's writings? That has money-grabbing, mythology-wrecking clusterf#&k written all over it. Is Lucas somehow involved?
  • Bilbo
    It is being taken from one of tolkein's writings the book called The Hobbit. and is this going to be a cartoon? cause that would be dumb.
  • tha plow
    no man. the hobbit was written by tolkien before he started lotr. the main characters are bilbo (frodo's uncle) and gandalf. it is much less dark than lotr, but plenty of action. it was a single book, but it sounds like they are making it into two movies. i don't think that money is a driving force here. just a chance to finish up an epic story on the screen. now if they considered doing the silim...whatchacallit, then that would probably be milking it.
  • TP, I understand what The Hobbit it is. However, the article says the sequel takes place between Hobbit and FOTR, so it's not two movies to make The Hobbit as originally mentioned.
  • I think "sequel" means the second of the new movies. The first is "The Hobbit". The second will be from a different source.
  • Tokien's nut juicery
    The stuff between the hobbit and the fellowship of the ring is based off of notes that Tolkien left behind. That's what I've heard.
  • Little Neddy
    Film one is The Hobbit. The second film should be based on what Gandalf was off doing during the story of The Hobbit when he isn't with Bilbo and crew. There is some lit written on The Necromancer of the South (in Southern Mirkwood). Gandalf and the other five wizards drive the "necromancer" out of southern Mirkwood. He goes on to reside in Mordor. Although the much of this isn't fully written out, it is talked about in several areas. When PJ was still working on LOTR he said this is what he wanted the the second Hobbit movie to be.
  • stwobie
    Hmmm, could be interesting. Showing some of the background to the Middle earth.
    Aragorns hiding/growing up in Rivendell. Gandalfs struggle with the rising power of Sauron
    in Mirkwood, the story of how Frodo came to live with Bilbo. Not too mention Balin's
    exploits into Moria.
    Tolkien gave us some general information of the overall timeline in the appendices, so it
    wouldn't be impossible to create a script from it for the 2nd film. In fact, I would love to see
    many of those scenes played out on screen.
    Cheers to them for undertaking this endeavor, I think it will be fun.
  • I for one can't wait to see the trolls try to eat Bilbo.
  • flein
    "euphoric grit and beauty"!? Pan's Labyrinth was profoundly tragic and depressing, at least to this moviegoer. I didn't get anywhere near euphoric for some time after I saw that mind-f*&k of a movie.

    Anyway, perhaps Mr. Toro can steer away from his obsession with graphic depictions of emotional and physical abuse, and give us something more, shall we say, "euphoric". At least epic would do for starts. With Peter Jackson as commander, that is at least a possibility.
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