There’s a lengthy 10-page interview with Guillermo Del Toro, via Total Film. The filmmaker in charge of the toughest job on the planet, adapting Tolkien’s THE HOBBIT into 2 movies talked about the scripting process, working with producer Peter Jackson, but he also talked about the creatures. Now I have never read any of the Tolkien book so I’m just going to let you read the full interview OVER THERE but I’ve included excerpts after the jump…
“We are respecting the structure established by Professor Tolkien because the order of the adventures in The Hobbit is well known to generations and generations of kids. You don’t want to be moving stuff like that.
But we will be integrating Gandalf’s comings and goings because he does disappear in the book quite often. So, as opposed to the book, we see where he goes and what happens to him.”
“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.”
“I think one of the designs I’m the proudest of is Smaug. Obviously he took the longest.
Early in production I came up with a very strong idea that would separate Smaug from every other dragon ever made. The problem was implementing that idea. But I think we’ve nailed it.”
I cannot tell you what it was because it would be a massive spoiler! But I’m 100 per cent happy with Smaug. If there is such as thing as 110 per cent, then I’m there!
Shelob was quite a promiscuous girl [laughs]. She mated with many partners. And insects and spiders are incredibly adaptable creatures. There will be spiders… [Laughs]
That sounds like a Paul Thomas Anderson sequel: There Will Be Spiders! But they are visually quite striking and in a different way to Shelob.
I wish I could tell you more but I would be spoiling it again. They are very different. They are more creatures of the shadow, more creatures of the deep forest. They are not earth nesting. They are nesting in the canopies so physically they have adapted to that environment.
THE HOBBIT part I opens 2011 and part II opens 2012
