Reassuring the fans

Academy Award-winning director Peter Jackson is optimistic The Hobbit will still go ahead “sometime soon” and that Warners was “making progress untangling the MGM situation”. In an interview with the Dominion Post, Jackson also said there should soon be certainty about whether he would direct The Hobbit movie, which would allow him to map out a five-year plan for projects “that will keep many people very busy”. But that’s not all he’s planning: it sounds like his long hinted-at ANZAC project may be the next project on his plate. A huge fan of Gallipoli, Peter Weir’s 198s take on the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps who fought in the Mediterranean in WW1, Jackson hopes to get his own take on the story of the disastrous Dardenelles campaign off the ground. Jackson’s other commitments include directing the second Tintin film — the first, directed by Steven Spielberg, is to be released next year.