Ian McKellen defends 'The Hobbit' trilogy decision
Actor says fans will want to watch movies 1,000 times
Sir Ian McKellen has defended filmmaker Peter Jackson's decision to turn J.R.R. Tolkien's novel "The Hobbit" into a movie trilogy, insisting fans will be delighted to see three installments. The director originally intended to make a two-part prequel to his "The Lord of the Rings" series, and came under fire after announcing he would release three epics instead. Critics accused him of trying to make more money by stretching out the classic book, but McKellen, who plays Gandalf the wizard, refutes the suggestion.
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He tells The Hollywood Reporter, "Anyone who thinks Peter Jackson would fall for market forces around him rather than artistic integrity doesn't know the guy or the body of his work. If we just made one movie, 'The Hobbit,' the fact is that all the fans, the eight, nine and 10-year-old boys, they would watch it 1,000 times. Now, they've got three films they can watch 1,000 times."
Jackson explains he was able to expand the narrative by drawing from appendices Tolkien included with "The Return of the King," his third and final volume of "The Lord of the Rings."
Jackson tells The Hollywood Reporter, "'The (Hobbit)' is written in a very brisk pace, so pretty major events in the story are covered in only two or three pages... (We) wanted to do a little bit more character development, plus... we could also adapt the appendices of 'Return of the King,' which is 100-odd pages of material that sort of takes place around the time of The Hobbit, so we wanted to expand the story of "The Hobbit "a little bit more, as did Tolkien himself. So all those factors combined gave us the material to do it."
Ian McKellen is right about the "fans want more" of the Jackson-directed "The Hobbit" . He is being much to specific when he describes the fanbase though..."8, 9, and 10 year-olds" are just a fraction of the fans that will be viewing "The Hobbit" more times than would seem sane. I am 45 years-old and will be giving the "8, 9, and 10 year-olds" a run for their money in the "repeat viewing of The Hobbit" arena........
The only real shame in all of this is the fact that Jackson and the producers could have had no idea that the LOTR-Trilogy would be received as well as it has been or they would likely have done the same with the first three films and STRETTTCHHHEEDDD them out into a minimum of six films.Thanks to the HUGE success of the LOTR Trilogy Jackson has the "juice" with the "money boyz" to get the OKAY to make "The Hobbit" into a trilogy and give us MORE of the wonderful world that was Middle Earth.......
THE FANS gave Jackson the leverage he needed to get this thing done and our reward will be coming to us over the next 3 years.....WHOOOOPPPPPPPPEEEEEE.......can't wait.......
Elijah Wood didn't know why so many people that were not young boys would like LOTR. I did, and I'm a 53-year-old woman. Tolkien was a genious. Jackson is a genious. And they were both fortunate to get backing to publish on a world scale. The book is my favorite of all the books I've ever read, and I'ver read a great deal, certainly all of the classics. Yes, far better than The Ovid. Better than Anna Karenina. Better than The Great Gadsby. I don't care for his poetry, but his prose makes up for it gangbusters.
I'm pleased Peter can do this. I can't think any producer or director that could do justice. Thank you Peter.
Even stretching The Hobbit out to the max, it is at best, ONE longish movie... possible TWO if you want to get greedy. THREE movies to cover this book is just obscenely blatant greed. I've read the book several times, thereby playing the movie in my head. I guess this is called riding the Hollywood gravy train. Thank you, but I won't be watching or buying this bloated movie.
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