Chatty del Toro Talks “Hobbit” Movies

Peter Jackson and Guillermo del Toro: Getting in the Hobbit. Ha ha. 

The always shy and retiring Guillermo del Toro talked to TotalFilm about his plans for “The Hobbit” movies. It’s a pretty long interview, and while it’s frustrating that he constantly has to back off specifics as they would be “spoilers,” it still is a must-read for anyone who’s following the progress of the films. Some of the most interesting parts is where del Toro talks about how he is trying to put his own stamp on the creatures that populate the film, but also make sure that they relate to the aesthetic we saw in Peter Jackson’s own “Lord of the Rings” films. Here’s a quote:

The way I phrased it to Weta, I said we would keep the DNA in the same gene pool as the Rings trilogy, but that we would generate a different type of character. For example, in the trilogy most of the creatures are brutish or inarticulate.

In The Hobbit, the creatures speak: Smaug has beautiful lines of dialogue; the Great Goblin has beautiful lines of dialogue; many creatures do. So we had to design them with a different approach because you are not just designing things that are scary.

I also wanted some of the monsters in The Hobbit to be majestic.

I wanted the Wargs to have a certain beauty so that you don’t have a massively clear definition: what is beautiful is good and what is ugly is not. Some of the monsters are absolutely gorgeous.

Well, we love gorgeous monsters! Make sure you go to TotalFilm to read the whole interview.