Once Peter Jackson announced to the world that he would be writing and producing an adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit and that it would be two movies, there has been speculation as to just how the book will be split. Will it be cut in two and be a two-part adaptation like others are doing for the last Harry Potter and Twilight films or will the first movie be based on the book and the second serve as a bridge to Jackson’s Lord of the Rings?
Well, wonder no more because Jackson himself has cleared up the mystery, according to an interview he gave recently. The two movies will be based completely on the book.
“The second Hobbit script is still based on the Hobbit novel,” Jackson said in a group interview after a press conference for The Lovely Bones. “The Hobbit novel is in two parts.” Well, that sounds pretty definitive, doesn’t it?
In case you’re not familiar, The Hobbit tells the story of young Bilbo Baggins’ quest for a treasure guarded by the dragon Smaug. Written prior to The Lord of the Rings, it establishes some of the characters for that trilogy, including the wizard Gandalf and the evil Gollum, and the world of Middle Earth in which they live.
The first Hobbit movie is due in theaters in 2011, with part two following in 2012.
