Guillermo Del Toro Comes Out of The Hobbit Closet - Film School Rejects

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 probably not hit theaters until 2010.

I had the great privilege of attending the Hellboy 2 panel at New York Comic Con and Del Toro was being pretty coy about whether or not he would be directing The Hobbit or not. Apparently there was still some legal issues being worked through but he said we would know in the next 5 days. Looks like he's a man of his word. I've been a huge Del Toro fan since Gringo and I went to see The Devil's Backbone at the Ragtag. I'm an even bigger fan after seeing him in person. He reminds me a lot of Kevin Smith in the way he interacts with the fans. He's definitely one of us and he has a huge passion for movies. He's also really freaking funny. If there's ever a dream team to collaborate on something like The Hobbit, it's Del Toro and Jackson.

So now that the gears appear to be moving on the project, let the casting rumors begin! Ian McKellan has said he wants to return and I'm sure Andy Serkis will be there too. The big question is who will play Bilbo. If they can somehow make Ian Holm look younger, I think that would be cool. Hopefully they'll also be able to get Hugo Weaving to return as well. As far as new characters go, if Del Toro is on board how about Ron Perlman for Beorn? Then you have all the dwarves. I don't really know who would fit well in those roles. Feel free to comment with your ideas.

UPDATE: Check out this interview with Del Toro from TheOneRing.net. Lots of good stuff there. Sounds like McKellan and Serkis are all but confirmed.