61 replies to this topic

[Valahiru]

I have heard that Peter Jackson bought the rights for making a new version of The Hobbit, and also might have bought the rights for making a movie of teh Silmarilion. Does anyone know if vthe claims are well founded?

[Yiuel]

If he ever bought the rights for Quenta Silmarillion, I wonder how many movies will he need to produce!

[Enarwaen]

AFAIK the rights to the Silmarillion and any other work are NOT for sale. Tolkien only sold the rights to LotR and the Hobbit (current copyright holder is Tolkien Enterprises -> Saul Zaentz). I doubt there will be a move to sell off the Silmarillion rights in the near future.

[av_nefardec]

These claims are unfounded, as long as the estate holds the rights to the Silmarillion.

Also, since the Silmarillion spans a few thousand years and LotR spans only one year, I doubt that hollywood would even try.

[Enarwaen]

@adam - yep, i agree. but you don't know what the greedy execs will come up with AFTER putting the Hobbit on celluloid.

regarding 'The Hobbit' - New Line Cinema (who financed the LotR trilogy) has the necessary rights to film 'The Hobbit' - but MGM owns the distribution rights - and since Time Warner (mother company of New Line) failed to acquire MGM when it was for sale a few months back (Sony bought it) it seems currently unlikely that 'The Hobbit' will enter production. Also PJ is currently filming 'King Kong' and he hasn't decided whether to return to Middle-earth or not.

[Dnas]

The Silmarillion doesn't really work well as a movie does it? It's more of a history book/book of stories thing other than one big story. It's got the story of the silmarils, but... you know what I mean.

Also, a movie will probably anger purists even more.

[Enarwaen]

@Dnas

very true - you could only pick the one or other interconnected story and try to film it - but the whole thing in one package would be impossible IMO.
on the other hand - if someone made a series out of it? ... nah - nevermind ... good thing those rights aren't available ...

[CorrTerek]

As far as the hobbit goes, I saw on theonering.net that the actors have already stated they'd come back for the filming if Peter Jackson wanted to film it, and that the hobbit stars are actually pushing him to go for it. Don't know how reliable that is, but it's what I've heard.

[Enarwaen]

yep - i've heard/read that aswell. but as long as the legal situation between New Line / Time Warner and MGM / Sony isn't resolved any kind of project is stuck in limbo.

[Curufinwe]

(

At least, if ever they need an actor for Feanor, I will suggest myself ...

[Aztec_Brave]

LOL, but we all know that if The Silmariliion comes out then Feanor will be played by either Will Smith or Jim Carey.

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As far as the hobbit goes, I saw on theonering.net that the actors have already stated they'd come back for the filming if Peter Jackson wanted to film it,

That's not much use seeing as they only have a couple of characters in common: Bilbo, Ganalf, Elrond. They could possibly get Legolas in too, but that about exhausts the list.

[Yiuel]

What a pain, if it was to be one of those who play Feanor! And who would play Manwe? As far as I know, there's a part in Aman as well. That will be a hard part... And who would be Melcor, and his servant Sauron! The Silmarillion cannot be filmed quite easily. Some stories though Hollywood could easily film. I once thought about Lay of Leithan which would be an easy one.

[Stevethegreat]

Although Silmarillion is one book for itself , in fact it is a loooot bigger than LotR. So if LotR was 3 movies, Silmarillion must be around fifteen and then again it would be incomplete. Only separate stories of Silmarillion can stand like movies. However an act like this would certainly spoil the world of Tolkien.

Although I am completely opposite of transferring every succesfull book of Tolkien into movie, I would like to see this transfer being made in one single story: "Narn i Hîn Húrin". In my opinion it is the most "movish" story of Tolkien as it narrates one man's whole life: Turin Turambar. But then again only if they animate really good the feeling this story gives to you.

[Yiuel]

It may be me, but I wasn't really moved by that story (Kill me if you want, I'll still have that opinion)

[Aztec_Brave]

Yeah, but it's one of the only stories long and complete enough to be turned into a film. It would still be pretty hard though.

[av_nefardec]

hehe if it wasn't 5:43 AM and I wasn't so tired, I'd open up a "dream cast" for a Silmarillion movie thread.

*wink* *wink*

[Valahiru]

True. . .a silmarillion movie would proly not go over to well with many purists. . . .thed have to make it into MANY movies -.-

[Aztec_Brave]

Hey, I know I'm a bit off-topic here, but:

Why the hell is the Silmarilion considered so purist?!?!?!

The book itself is not even pure Tolkien, there was considerable editing work done by Christopher Tolkien and we have no idea how compliant it was with what Tolkien would have wanted. The death of Thingol for example is entirely the work of Christopher Tolkien!

[Sukkit]

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Why the hell is the Silmarilion considered so purist?!?!?!

I wouldn't say it's considered purist, but rather that few people know it and appreciate it, compared to the hordes of readers LotR has always enjoyed

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The book itself is not even pure Tolkien, there was considerable editing work done by Christopher Tolkien and we have no idea how compliant it was with what Tolkien would have wanted

Thanks to the HoME series, that's not entirely true. Actually I think the way Christopher Tolkien presented the Quenta Silmarillion was the best option at the time, and especially considering the HoME series came in later to fill in the gaps.

I think that in some ways it's great that, in the end, Tolkien's legends became sort of real mythology because he never finished them, and as a result we have several versions of any story and we cannot really know which one is "real".

[Dnas]

Yeah, would be nice if Tolkien was still alive.

It really would be interesting to see what he would think of the movies.

Did he ever live to see Bakshi's (not so great) versions? I don't know when they were made.