No Peter Jackson?
So this might be good then
Ian McKellen keen to reprise Gandalf
Sexagenarian Brit thespo Sir Ian McKellen has expressed hopes that he will reprise his role of Gandalf in Lord of the Rings prequel The Hobbit, saying he'd be "very pleased" to get the hat and beard out of mothballs. McKellen, 68, told Reuters: "If I am still functioning and working well, it is very likely I would be asked to …
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Frogspawn
Is there anything to prevent him from being Gandalf in his own time? Does he sometimes don the costume when he goes out to the shops, or if he feels the need to perform acts of goodness? We should be told.
I'm going to have a little picture of Mark Mothersbaugh from Devo. There should be a dedicated Devo icon, with the funny hats they word; the energy accumulators.
RE: No Peter Jackson
Don't you mean "So maybe if they say they'll stick to the book, they'll stick to the book then?".....
Never mind Paris Hilton...
... where's the "Arwen in panties" angle?
The IT angle is obvious: only geeks, nerds and sysadmins can bear to read or watch Tolkien's risible faux-saga.
Any literate adult should regard LOTR - book and film both - as ludicrous, overblown and boring (even though many of us have sat through it for our kids' entertainment).
Who gives a flying fuck whether it's McKellen or Roy 'Chubby' Brown playing Gandalf? The news that we are to be fed yet more of this interminable meretricious tosh on celluloid should fill every right-thinking person with despair.
Tolkien should've stuck to what he was being paid for instead of wasting Oxford university's money scribbling puerile drivel about furry-footed ingenues and eldritch villains. (And bloody CS Lewis was little better IMO.)
Bah! Humbug!
@sceptical bastard
>Roy 'Chubby' Brown playing Gandalf?
now thats a film i'd go and see :)
Roy Chubby Brown as Gandalf the White [Supremacist]
"I am now Gandalf the White. Not brown, or black, or yellow, or any other colour. Pure white, that's me. I am as old as the world is wide... what's that? Sorry, that should have been 'as wide as the world is old'... "
@Sceptical Bastard
Aside from boringness (which is a matter of taste in any genre) your main objection to the Rings books/movies seems to be... that they're fantasy. Overblown? Of course! Ridiculous? Well, yeah... there's dragons and orcs and stuff.
Yes. It's fan-ta-sy. If you think it's boring, fine, but... ah, whatever. Just go back to watching some 'independent' movie about a drug dealer who accidentally rapes his daughter, tries to kill himself in despair, misses and shoots his boss in the stomach as he walks in, and then fails systematically to prevent the extermination of his family by the outraged kingpin.
That's much more realistic and oh-so-edgy in its legitimacy for people who've never suffered and think themselves enlightened for understanding how bad it must be.
It's a different book.
It wouldn't necessarily ruin the film if Sir Ian wasn't cast as Gandalf, whatever the reason, What;s important is that he set a high standard, and Peter Jackson, while his film is flawed, also set a high standard for the quality of the design.
In some ways, >i?Fellowship of the Ring</i> is both the best-adapted part of the book, and the closest to <i>The Hobbit</i>. Match that, and IO think we'll be alright.
Another great tek story by the register
Keep it up guys! I look forward to the Star Wars, Star Trek updates, because lets face it... as nerds that's all we're interested in... :)
Director
Get Jon Woo or James Cameron to direct it ..
Perhaps even Michael WInner could be tempted away from his insurance ad gig to bring The Hobbit to life...?
Driving Instructor
Just had a thought that Gandalf would make a brilliant driving instuctor for neds/chavs
"YOU SHALL NOT PASSSS!!!!"
The Book of the Film
My chum Esquire has opined that the film version of LOTR would have been a lot better had the book never been written.
I loved it, because I am irredeemably shallow and believe that "Die Hard" should have won seven Oscars.
Bilbo 4TW
I read the book of the movie last year, and it wasn't a bad adaptation. Quite a lot of words, and there was a hell of a lot of extra stuff that the writer made up that wasn't even in the movie, but not a bad effort. I notice that they've released the book of the prequel (The Hobbit Movie or something) before the film's even been released! I'm almost tempted to read it, but I wouldn't want to spoil the ending of the movie when it comes out.
Seriously, though... More important that whether Ian McKellen plays Gandalf: Who'se going to be the young Bilbo Baggins? Several people are almost certain to be vaguely interested...
Sexagenarian?
Excuse me. Would you write tresagenarian, or quatrogenarian? OK, to be a nonogenarian is a feat, and some octogenarians merit praise for doing something that normally only younger men do, but to draw attention to a 60+ actor playing a character from the First Age (i.e. at least 3000 years old) seems bizarre
Diet of Worms
I enjoyed LoTR, both books and films, but The Hobbit is a much lesser work. They're going to have to deviate quite a lot from the book to make a decent film out of it. And if anyone suggests filming The Silmarillion, they really do need to be stopped.
The young Bilbo
Erm, it's me. I'm going to put my knees in my shoes and my feet up my arse and waddle around a bit. "Coo! What's that? Could it be a ring? Oh - so it is! Well fancy that!", and so forth.
Musically Delicious
It's got to be a Musical. Thats what Bilbo Baggans Hates!
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