Cost of making 'Hobbit' movies up to $745 million

I loved Peter Jackson for the Lord of the Rings. I am not going to say they were perfect, but I think they were about as close to my high expectations as possible.

However, what Jackson did to the Hobbit is absolutely unforgivable. He seems to have gotten quite full of himself over LTOR and sadly, there are also people who got the idea that he can do no wrong despite the mangling of that fine book. I would rather watch the 70s cartoon version of the Hobbit. No kidding.

I only enjoy TLOTR extended versions. And the extended versions are the only ones I buy as The Hobbit series starts to finish up. I think the budget costs are running up way too high, but we can believe that it will still be a hit because of its origin and fan base.

I'm guessing if we all go to see this at the theater the ticket prices will be much higher than expected too.

Japangal,

Personally, I found the books trite, boring and very difficult to get through after many tries.

Considering you misuse the word "trite" to describe a work that for all intents and purposes created the genre of the modern fantasy novel, perhaps the problem doesn't lay with the books so much as the reader. Just sayin'.... :-)

MarkGOct. 27, 2014 - 09:57AM JST Way too much money for this. Much better spent preserving the environment as they all preach.

Money well spent, two of the movies have already made 2 billion dollars and the 3rd will make another billion dollars. Overall money well spent.

If hugging a tree could make folks billions of dollars more people would be hugging trees. Money talks......

Jackson hewed fairly close to the story of the LOTR, which certainly deserved a movie for each book, though he screwed up the ending by not including "The Cleansing of the Shire" chapter. But he's taken far too much license with "The Hobbit." If he didn't think the story carried itself, then he should have passed on making the movie. All the narrative changes and the invention of elf characters to sort of tart up the story is unforgivable.

Terrible films. Talk about dropping the ball; the LotR trilogy was fantastic. But as long as people will pay to see them...

I read somewhere that movie productions also pad their bottom line, so that the actual costs are not as high as it seems. One of the reasons they do this is because the often offer people a cut of the "profits" and even when a movie does really well, it doesn't on paper because of the production costs. That way, they don't need to give the people a cut of the profits. A lot of the costs are actually paid to subsidiaries which are in turn owned by the same studios.

Wonder if they will make movies from the Silmarillion including Akallabêth.

Personally, I found the books trite, boring and very difficult to get through after many tries.

I guess my mind works in more creative and fulfilling ways.

It's nice that Jackson is bringing so much money into N.Zeid. However, the true retelling of The Hobbit is in the hands of a future movie...just one movie telling the original story.

New Zealand appreciates all that money moving in their economy.

I don't mind the added back-story to tie it into the Rings trilogy, but the addition of the Azog villain ruins it a bit.

That's an expensive snoozer.

Way too much money for this. Much better spent preserving the environment as they all preach.

The money spent on filming doesn't just magically vanish into the pockets of “what a waste" faeries. It goes back into the local economy and into the pockets of real people with real families. Your environmental soapbox is poorly positioned here.

With that, I agree with some posters here that what Jackson has done with The Hobbit amounts to little more than mental masturbation just because he can. I'm sorry to say I fell asleep halfway through the first film -- and I'm an avid fan of the books, as well as the LotR films. The second film wasn't as boring and tedious, but not by much.

The problem is that Jackson is trying way too hard to take source material that is essentially a bedtime story, and recast it as a top-heavy, steroid-pumped Epic of Gilgamesh for 17-year-olds teen boys. It's none of those things.

Chris Tolkien is has probably locked himself off in a secluded tower of his mansion in France just to avoid devolving into a paroxysm of rage at what Jackson's done to his childhood memories, not that I can feel too much sympathy considering the first Hobbit movie alone garnered some US$6 billion alone in payouts directly to the Tolkien estate. It also doesn't help that Chris T. is more than a bit of a pretentious prat.

That still doesn't excuse Jackson for diluting the inherent quality of The Hobbit as it was originally written.

In any event, the films have gotten an entirely new generation of people to read the original books. That's always a good thing, IMO.

It took shrewd guidance by NZ's best government in a generation to bring this huge money-maker to NZ. Amazing that the partisan and naïve in godzone argued against having the movies made here...

Hollywood greed stretching a single, not very thick novel into $745 million dollars of 3 films. What indulgence. What a cynical cash grab.

I enjoyed the LotR movies but I am not going to watch these.

What would a side-by-side comparison of production costs and revenues for the Lord of the Rings trilogy look like next to that of The Hobbit? Inflation being what it is, I'm sure it would be a moot point of no real worth.

Still, knowing the latter was based on one book whereas the Trilogy really was three tomes - each measurably larger than the original Hobbit ever was then having subsequently bought all of them; viewing each over and over again; the shift from faithful cinematographic interpretation to simple commercial "noise" is annoyingly distracting.

I hate to say it but it's like watching Jackson "sell out" to the Lords of Avarice, like watching Saruman becoming corrupt under the guiles of Sauron.

And they will make back every penny and a lot more. mazing that Jackson'r first movie (Bad Taste - made in New Zealand too) cost a few hundred dollars to make with him and some mates acting. The boy done good. Still think the LoTR movies better than these two Hobbit ones.

To punish them for turning the pleasant, thin novel The Hobbit into a trilogy, adding lots of crap that no one needs, I have made the decision to never buy the movies in any form. I will watch them, just never own them in Blu-ray.

Tolkien would be proud..... with the size of the books in question, Jackson has done a remarkable job of getting their essence to the screen. I wait with anticipation for each new installment, beats the hell out of some of the other Hollywood drivel.

That is a lot of money. can't all be on digital effects and the like. Sets? Are the cast being well paid? Ideally they would want a cur of the gross, no? Extras? do orcs get more than minimum wage?

Hobbit 1 might not have been that good but they came back full force in hobbit 2. I cant wait to see the last part I think its going to be one hell of a rollercoaster ride.

Way too much money for this. Much better spent preserving the environment as they all preach.

Wait until you see the price tag for the Silmarillion....

I have to disagree. I loved the Lord of the Rings films, but have not been impressed at all with the Hobbit. The narrative isn`t anywhere near as coherent as it was in the Lord of the Rings and it feels like about half the stuff is just filler. I watched the first Hobbit with eager anticipation at the theatre the week it was released. The second one I watched on an airplane and found myself falling asleep midway through. I might not even bother with the third one.

Money well spent. Tolkien would be proud. One of the greatest cinematic achievements in the history of art.