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Dreamdeer
Valinor
Apr 27 2008, 8:08pm
Post #101 of 128
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I do see the necessity for a young actor to play Bilbo Baggins. But I would love it if Sir Ian Holmes would coach him, the way that the actors coached their body doubles in LotR. Heck, if I was a young actor, I'd sell everything I had to buy lessons from Sir Ian Holmes!
My website http://www.dreamdeer.grailmedia.com offers fanfic, and message-boards regarding intentional community or faerie exploration.
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Lost Hobbit
Rivendell
Apr 27 2008, 8:10pm
Post #102 of 128
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Hey Aragorn, I always thought about it and I just was thinking of it yesterday. It would be nice, but the thing is - how to tell this story? Yes, it will have the form of appendix, but how to do it, if Peters movie already had a different ending. No Scouring of the Shire was used, Saruman already died in Isengard. It would be nice to see what you are interested in but the more the director will use such scenes means his version will be completely different story.
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Dreamdeer
Valinor
Apr 27 2008, 8:14pm
Post #103 of 128
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If Mr. del Toro is looking for the right role for Doug Jones, rather than enmeshing him in animatronics, I think (as I've said elsewhere) that he would make a fabulous King Thranduil! I can see him bringing an eerie, other-than-human sensibility to the role.
My website http://www.dreamdeer.grailmedia.com offers fanfic, and message-boards regarding intentional community or faerie exploration.
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Aragorn
The Shire
Apr 27 2008, 8:33pm
Post #104 of 128
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Yes, I thought about that: there is indeed a scene in the extended edition, about Saruman's death. I believe Legolas shot him in Orthanc. That would be hard to get by. But on the other hand, fans probably won't want to see Saruman taking over the Shire anyway.
I would have gone with you to the end, into the very fires of Mordor.
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Dreamdeer
Valinor
Apr 27 2008, 8:36pm
Post #105 of 128
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To figure out hobbit/human age equivalents, divide a hobbit's age by 3, and then double the result. Thus, at 33, hobbits officially become adults when they reach the physical and mental maturity level of a 22 year old human being. Pippin embarking on his adventure at 27, not quite an adult but close enough, comes out to the hobbit equivalent of a human 18. At the time that Tolkien wrote that, most western countries considered an 18 year old person old enough to serve in the military but not old enough to vote. Bilbo departs on his adventure at a "middle-aged" 50, which is the equivalent of being in his thirties.
Frodo acquired the ring just when he came of age, and stopped aging at that point--so he really was supposed to look too young for his years. In fact, in the books, his unnaturally youthful appearance and behavior generated much comment in the Shire, along with concern that in some way it would have to be "paid for".
My website http://www.dreamdeer.grailmedia.com offers fanfic, and message-boards regarding intentional community or faerie exploration.
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Dreamdeer
Valinor
Apr 27 2008, 8:59pm
Post #106 of 128
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Sir, you brought tears to my eyes...
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...speaking so warmly of dear Fritz Leiber, and his alter-ego, Fafhrd, the scholarly barbarian! I thought that everyone had forgotten about him these days.
Yes, the lessons of possessiveness ring as true as ever in "The Hobbit" (And I hope that Christopher Tolkien catches on about this central theme in his father's intent, so that you really can pull the Quest of Erebor into the mix!) An equally important theme would be the heroism possible in anyone. I don't know how many times I forced myself to do what I feared, thinking that if Bilbo could do it, I could do it. This is why I find "The Hobbit" so important, why I counsel adults to read it before they start "The Lord of the Rings," because you have to see hobbits at their most staid and unexciting to begin with, in order to understand the full scope of Frodo and Sam's eventual achievement. You will have done your job, sir, if anyone walks out of the theater thinking, "I may be stodgy, fat, and so boring that people know what I'm going to say before I say it, but by God I'm going to spend the rest of my life standing up for what I think is right, and taking any risk I must to back it up!"
Thank you so very much for diving into this with so much enthusiasm and insight!
My website http://www.dreamdeer.grailmedia.com offers fanfic, and message-boards regarding intentional community or faerie exploration.
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Dreamdeer
Valinor
Apr 27 2008, 9:07pm
Post #107 of 128
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Get back out of the box, Sunflower!
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Honey, it's not the end of the world that you quoted the wrong person initially. The point that you made was beautiful and important and true. You just keep right on making points like that--I like the way your mind works.
My website http://www.dreamdeer.grailmedia.com offers fanfic, and message-boards regarding intentional community or faerie exploration.
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Sunflower
Valinor
Apr 27 2008, 9:48pm
Post #108 of 128
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What I'd really like to do is get into an intellectual sparring match with him,, on cinema, that is.....but 1) I'm sure he would beat me, and 2)he won't be replying, of course .
Thanks for the comments. Oh, and I don't think I replied to your comment about trees the other day. Would it surprise you to know that on my way home from work yesterday, I spotted a tree that had a hugely bulging spot on it, with some nasty looking pink fungus? (or something pink.)It had SOME sort of disease. I made sure no-one was looking, then put my hands on it and said a prayer for it to be healed. Then kept my hands on it another moment or two. I swear, I felt a slight tingle in the fingers....hope me prayer will be answered.
*Only on TORN would I confess something like this*
Several of your posts reference nature. Do you live in a very rural spot?
(This post was edited by Sunflower on Apr 27 2008, 9:50pm)
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Dreamdeer
Valinor
Apr 28 2008, 2:39am
Post #109 of 128
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Praying for a sick tree seems like a perfectly reasonable thing to me, and a charitable act. I pray for the willows out behind our church all through the winter to help them through (but then desert willows have a special relationship with Yaquis anyway--maybe I'll tell you about it someday.)
Yes, I live four miles outside the Tucson city limits, in an old former dude ranch now divided up into really weird and funky apartments made of raw, unshaped stone, designed when Art Noveau was all the rage, so there's a certain fairytale sensibility about the little clusters of cottages tucked discretely into the wild desert hillsides here and there (some have been called hobbit-holes because they're buried on one side) Mine is a segment of the largest building, which has some hints of castle-like features. But yes,everything is wild out here, no lawns or hedges or anything like that, but rather paloverdes and jojoba and cacti. Javalinas (wild boars, to you European folk) regularly troop up my front walk and over the porch to raid the neighbor's garden. Deer and coyote go up and down the dirt road in front (not usually at the same time) Rabbits and lizards abound. Tarantulas annually wander indoors (there's holes in the old stone walls) on their yearly march in search of females, and have to be gently shown out again. Rattlesnakes "shhhhh!" at you like scolding librarians if you step too close. Butterflies migrate in waves miles wide in early autumn, swooping across the desert. As a matter of fact, a coyote chorus just started up while I'm writing this. We're out far enough to be free of streetlights and traffic noise, and can sleep as deeply as hobbits in holes. I love it out here, even if it is slightly falling apart and rugged (which reminds me, I'd better go put water on to heat for washing dishes--the hot water doesn't quite make it all the way to the kitchen.)
My website http://www.dreamdeer.grailmedia.com offers fanfic, and message-boards regarding intentional community or faerie exploration.
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Sunflower
Valinor
Apr 28 2008, 3:05am
Post #110 of 128
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Lovely spot, Dreamdeer, but I'm a typical cowardly female. I'll skip the tarantulas and rattlers, thank you very much..I'm not sure what the population of the Shire would be if they had snakes! (good question for The Professor methinks?) . Though I am sure that if you are one of the desert tribes there's all sorts of lore and if you are versed in it, then you don't mind them one bit.
This reminds me of a story from the Raiders of the Lost Ark filming. Spielberg said that they had a hard time getting the tarantulas on that guy's back in the opening sequence to move )you kmow, when he was getting the Idol) so he asked the "tarantula wrangler" what to do. (Spielberg wanted them to be crawling down his back.) The wrangler told him they were all males, so they had to put a female one on there. So they did, and BOY did they start to move...LOL)
I spent a large part of my childhood at my grandma's house on Keuka Lake, a waterfront property in central NY State, in a country of rolling hills and valleys, where they grow wine grapes. In fact, before Cali, This area was the wine capital of the US...it looks a lot like the San Fernendo Valley. It is a beautful place, though the Finger Lakes area has a reputation for spawning mystics and crazy people. Visionaries, etc. The founder of the Mormons is said to have had his vision here, and the leader of the women's movement, Mrs Stanton, came from here. At night, the mist rolls blue across the Lake; it takes a long time for the mist to clear from the hills. Nowadays, the area is becoming gentrified, with more and more fat cats from NYC and Jersey buying up the homes. (My hope is that the housing market will get so bad that they'll be proced out and have to leave, and property vzalues will go down again.) It is an area of villages and resort homes, but also a lot of Amish live here, up in the hill areas and valleys, where they grow wheat and corn. Organically. You can stop at a farm road in summer and buy the biggest strawberries, the best fruit you ever will get.
Keuka Lake is tempermental. In Seneca it means "crooked lake" (as Adirondack means "bark eater", and Lake George's origional name was Lake Atiaronocte.) I love Native American lore. (I began my love of trees after finishing Black Elk Speaks, and a novel called " Hanta Yo" by Ruth Beebe Ellis.)
....If a storm blows up on the Lake, watch out....the lake is shaped like a Y,--it is 17 miles long, and the fork of the Y is in the dead middle--and in the middle, during a storm, it forms a whirlpool. The seven Finger Lakes are said to be connected by an underground cavern. It is said that a town 30 miles south of Keuka Lake, called Horseheads, got its name in the 1820's when a farmer driving his wagon team next to the Lake got sucked out in a storm and a few weeks later the skeletons of the horses, still in harness, were found washed up on the river bed.
(This post was edited by Sunflower on Apr 28 2008, 3:09am)
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Eowyn of Penns Woods
Valinor
Apr 28 2008, 4:16am
Post #111 of 128
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'If you don't, if you even breathe a word of what you've heard here, then I hope Gandalf will turn you into a spotted toad and fill the garden full of grass-snakes.'
They don't sound so bad, though.
I can deal with snakes, but big spiders gotta go!
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Peredhil lover
Valinor
Apr 28 2008, 4:54am
Post #112 of 128
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...speaking so warmly of dear Fritz Leiber, and his alter-ego, Fafhrd, the scholarly barbarian! I thought that everyone had forgotten about him these days. In Germany, these books only recently have been published in a new edition. Not everyone has forgotten about Leiber!
I do not suffer from LotR obsession - I enjoy every minute of it.
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hanshotfirst1138
The Shire
Apr 28 2008, 1:41pm
Post #113 of 128
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Are you a fan of H.P. Lovecraft Mr. del Toro? Because I seem to detect and influence of his on your work. You're so amazingly well-read, just had to say.
Do not meddle in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and good with ketchup.
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Guillermo
Rivendell
Apr 29 2008, 1:30am
Post #114 of 128
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I am a huge Lovecraft fan- I've been struggling for years to have a studio finance an adaptation of AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS (his superb response to Poe's Grodon Pym) and I am a disciple of Ashton Smith, WH Hodgson, Algernon Blackwood, Machen and others loosely associated with his "circle" of interests. Including, of course, Lord Dunsany...
I co-wrote teh script (has been reviewed online several times) co-created a series of 16 inch maquettes and about 30-40 drawings of Soggoth overtakings and transmutations to illustrate the ways in which the film VFX could be achieved, but to no avail... I still await for it to happen.
Just to hear your lists in return- allow me to name some of my very favorites ever: Dickens, Wilde, Capote, Borges, Schwobe, Dinesen, Rulfo, Gombrowicz, McCullers, Henry James (no- not limited to his ghost stories), Tolstoi and Chejov. Always curious - anxious, actually - to read yours.
We'll keep talking- now I post at 2 am London time as I have a bad case of the flu...
Until then-
Yr Obt Svt
GDT
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mwirkk
Rohan
Apr 29 2008, 2:06am
Post #115 of 128
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If you weren't already a great director...
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...I suspect you could have made an excellent academic and/or author yourself.
I will indeed take up your invitation to join your site. Gracias!
-mwirkk :)
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mwirkk
Rohan
Apr 29 2008, 2:50am
Post #116 of 128
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Okay, please, no hate mail -- I'm just joking! :)
But I, too, was displeased with the Wargs in tTT; a bit better in RotK, but only slightly.
So, on the DVD the WETA folks who designed them said they just didn't want to give us (boring?) giant wolves. But, how did Tolkien describe wargs in The Hobbit? Very much like giant wolves! Okay, not exactly like, but very much like. The same, only different. More menacing. Like a turtleneck shirt compared to a button-down. ;P So, what did we get? Hyenas. Yuk!! Well, I guess that's a good match for an smelly Orc. I was wondering what a wolfling would be doing associating with goblins, anywayz. ...the wolf is obviously much smarter. ;)
-mwirkk :)
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mwirkk
Rohan
Apr 29 2008, 6:02am
Post #117 of 128
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I'm not so sure animatronics is the right way to go for The Hobbit.
[mwirkk] I can't fault you for your trepedation. But what about Jabba the Hutt? That's the best two-tonne talking slug *I've* ever seen on screen. ;P
I haven't seen Pan's Labyrinth
[mwirkk] You must! Get the deluxe edition so you can see Guillermo's interviews. What I really liked about PL was it's a fairie story, but it is not a Disney-fied version of one -- all the old-time brutality is there.
...somehow, my brain picks out patterns of movements from animatronics and puppets, even when well done, and totally removes me from the film.
[mwirkk] That is sooooo true! Other things can take away the Suspension of Disbelief, though, with eqaully jolting effect, such as fat, fuzzy, little, blue space-elephants playing keyboards in the bar/cantina/lounge/whatever... Oh, wait a minute, that was an animatronic too. :)
Yoda in Ep.I for instance, is much more distracting to me than CGI Yoda in Ep. II and III.
[mwirkk] I liked Yoda in Ep.V. He was a cute little guy, getting into stuff, whacking miscreants with his little cane, using the Force to cheat at games of Pinochle...
Didn't they use both animatronics and CGI for Treebeard? ... A few shots of Treebeard just looked way too mechanical.
[mwirkk] I think that it was the right choice for the closeups with Treebeard's facial details. He had to have a mechanical, crackly, frictiony kind of texture and movement. His skin is made of bark, poor guy. Maybe the EntMaidens (whom are lost) have better complexions -- more like aspen, birch or alder. :)
Compare him with the Balrog and Oliphaunts.
[mwirkk] Now those would have been some big-4$%#&! animatronics! Pretty dangerous too, I'll bet. Especially when they light the Balrog on fire.
Whatever they used for the Balrog, Oliphaunts, etc. is what should be used in The Hobbit, in my opinion.
[mwirkk] Ya, what he said! (whatever=cgi) Don't think it's up to us, though. But I'm not worried, they'll make good decisions. :)
Just think how those techniques have improved in the more than ten years that will have passed between these productions.
[mwirkk] That's going to be one of the most anticipated aspects, me thinks. By us gearheads, anywayz. We'll be sitting there, just staring, and drooling... drooling... droo(oh! Er, sorry!) ... thinking about all the possibilities... things that they could go back and touch-up/fix from the first trilogy. Of course, if the wargs are the same as before, it's probably an all-hope-lost scenario for that ever happening. {Just kidding. A'little. I guess.} It should certainly be much much easier for them to do Gollum this time around. Not only have they done it before, but, as you say, the technology will be so much more advanced. However, if they decide to do a bunch of CGI characters in a long series of scenes (say, for example, most of the dwarves), I hope they think real hard about all options, because I was thoroughly unimpressed with the quality of the character animations in last years Beowulf, with Gerard Butler. ...except for Angelina Jolie, of course. ;) {Sorry, Imma oinker! ;P}
-mwirkk :)
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mwirkk
Rohan
Apr 29 2008, 6:27am
Post #118 of 128
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Ya, Sunflower! What Dreamdeer said...
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...You can't go anywhere. You were the first person to answer me on TORn boards, once I finally got off the couch and joined. :)
So don't you hide, or I'll be sad. :(
-mwirkk :)
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mwirkk
Rohan
Apr 29 2008, 7:35am
Post #119 of 128
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ˇHola Sr. Del Toro!
I loved El Laberinto del Fauno (like anybody else whom had chance it to espy), it pulled me in immediately. It was a wonderful blend of the real world and the fringes of Faerie. And it shocked me in a couple of places, which I really enjoyed. That reminded me of reading of reading familiar Fairy tales in their oldest folk forms. :) Prior to PL I was aware of you from Hellboy and Blade II. But it was PL that really made me sit up and take notice! And it also got me looking back at what else you've done, like Cronos and Devil's Backbone. I'm really glad for that. (Funny how a door is closed, until some event comes along, makes you take notice, and then you open it...!?!) Anyway, back to Faerie...
I was wondering if you've read much, or any, of George McDonald, and what you might have thought of it? Lilith is my favourite of his. (My friend Joel from CO was good enough to lend me his copy.) I thought that might have been one you would have liked as well. Or maybe not; but it seems to me it would have fit your descriptions of what you like and don't. William Morris is another Edwardian era fantasy author I like. Also, have you read the recent author Susanna Clarke? She wrote: Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, a bit over the top in a couple of places, but quite unlike anything anyone else has done in a long while; and, The Ladies of Grace Adieu, a collection of short stories. I like what she says in explaining the difference between Faerie and our world (as it exists in her stories), she says... Men and fairies have much in common, the primary difference being: Men have a great talent for logic and reason, but a small talent for magic; Fairies have a natural talent for enchantment and magic, but a small talent for logic and reason. That, it seems to me, is elegant, simple, and yet powerful. It explains very much, while saying very little. I don't know if that has been said before by someone else somewhere else, or whether she coined that definition herself.
ˇAdiós amigo! Pax! Kiitos!!
-mwirkk :)
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marlonbrando76
The Shire
Apr 30 2008, 10:05am
Post #120 of 128
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have a good journey in Middle Heart!
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Dear Mr Del Toro, i'm Huge Lovecraft fan too! and i really hope after The Hobbit Movies, you will be able to direct AT THE MOUNTAINS OF MADNESS!
i just want to tell you one thing, when all the troubles about Hobbit production came out, and the presence of Peter Jackson was in discussion, i have really thinked about a possible substitute, and it was just one name, Guillermo del Toro!
Why? cause i'm a huge fan of your work, i have discovered your work very soon, years ago like for Peter Jackson with Bad taste, i'm an italian actor and i eat movies since i was 3 years, i love your style and visions, i really love Pan's Labirinth, where the real world with his wars is much more scary and without a logical sense, then the fantasy world with his demons but where there are rules.
i feel all your astonish potential like an artist still must be seen and The Hobbit Movies probably will be the right place, the right time, and the right journey, to express all your great talent! you have all my esteem, i trust in you and if you and Mr Jackson have you wanted work together, i can just feel good emotions about it.
have a good journey in Middle Heart!
for this movies you and Mr Jackson, will be like Dante And Virglio.
thanks a lot, for your passion and visions.
p.s.
just one thing, if Mr Lee is too old to leave for New Zeland, i hope you will be able to shot his scenes in London, Mr lee is a MUST.
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Mirabella_Bunce
Rivendell
Apr 30 2008, 4:23pm
Post #121 of 128
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I must say the whole concept of this "sequel" movie worries me sick. It strikes me too much as FanFic, even if it is being created by the two or three human beings on Earth most qualified to do it.
I try to console myself by saying that well, yes, Tolkien did write and allude to many goings-on that may well go into a "sequel." At least: together with The Hobbit, there is enough for at least Two Movies. I just can't convince myself these events should actually BE a "sequel" per se (as in: taking place only after Bilbo's return to Bag End and before his subsequent departure at age eleventy one.) Because many of the important events that link the Hobbit to LOTR occurred during, and in some cases even before, Bilbo and the Dwarves' journey and "the incident with the dragon."
Beloved characters such as Gandalf, Galadriel, Aragorn, etc. (as well as the not-so-beloved Gollum and Saruman) were all very active before, during, and after The Hobbit. And knowing what they were doing off the Hobbit radar is tremendously helpful in understanding how the Hobbit is indeed very much connected to LOTR. It's just the chronological sequence that has me worried.
In order to make "a sequel" in the strictest sense of the word, we would have to leave many important events out, namely ones that happened before April 25 2941 (For instance: Gandalf's finding Thorin's father in the dungeons of the Necromancer, and his talking with the Dwarves about how all-out war on Smaug would be a very bad idea and how he had thought of a better strategy involving a certain hobbit he knew of!) What happens between 2942 and 3001 might - with some padding (probably long, tedious battle scenes, ugh!) be enough to fill out an epic movie. But without making up totally new (i.e. not written or even alluded to by Tolkien) events out of whole cloth, it would still lack certain elements that are essential to a good Story, namely: a Beginning, a Middle, and an End.
One thing I can say is that I do feel fairly confident that if Philippa Boyens is involved in writing the screenplay, whether it be "The Hobbit plus A Sequel" or actually incorporating enough backstory and afterstory to make the whole Hobbit venture into two movies, it will for the most part be really good stuff.
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Rabittooth
Bree
Apr 30 2008, 7:02pm
Post #122 of 128
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...One thing I can say is that I do feel fairly confident that if Philippa Boyens is involved in writing the screenplay, whether it be "The Hobbit plus A Sequel" or actually incorporating enough backstory and afterstory to make the whole Hobbit venture into two movies, it will for the most part be really good stuff.
Yeah...I'd like to know that both Fran and Philippa are going to be closely involved in script writing and development. Anybody know what's going on in that area?
-Rabittooth
www.rabittooth.com
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Keebler the Elf
Rivendell
Apr 30 2008, 8:02pm
Post #123 of 128
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Follow the storyline, GDT, and you've got me on your bandwagon....
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I'm sure you'll do a great job, Guillermo!!!!!!
Mmmmmm....somethin' smells good!!!!! Could it be cookies baked in a tree?
Keebler's Website
Those were good cookies.....TIME TO HUNT SOME ORC!!!!!!!!!
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MadMatt
Registered User
Apr 30 2008, 11:20pm
Post #124 of 128
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Quick question, which may be of no interest to anyone except me, or might have been discussed before (which, if that's the case, I apologise - I'm new here!). What aspect ratio will Guillermo shoot the movie in? He's said he wants to stay as true to the LOTR trilogy as possible, but to the best of my knowledge he only ever shoots in 1.85:1... and I believe Peter Jackson's marvellous films all use the wider, grander 2.35:1 ratio. I hope he can be convinced to do likewise!
Apart from that small worry, I'm very excited about the new movies!
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crolodot
Registered User
May 2 2008, 8:56pm
Post #125 of 128
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Mr. del Toro,
Ask and ye shall receive: you have my trust! Having seen several of your films (my favorite being Pan's Labyrinth), I am impressed to say the least. You seem well placed to interpret Tolkien & Jackson's material with your own creative vision. I can only say the fruits of your labor cannot come soon enough. I can't wait!
- Christian
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