The Hobbit to start filming in 2010

[Josh]

Originally Posted by Depp

Too much confusion, little clarity.

I thought The Hobbit was based off the book, and would be a movie on it's own. Now I'm hearing about a second movie, whats that about?

When does the parts between End of The Hobbit and Beginning of LOTR take place?

Peter Jackson invisioned that The Hobbit would be two movies filmed at once. (much the same way LOTR was all filmed at once). The first film would be based off the book The Hobbit, while the second film would bridge the time between Bilbo returning to Hobbiton with the ring and Frodo leaving with it.

These events are documented - at least in title - in Appendix B or The Lord of the Rings. If you own a complete copy of the book, its in there. More detail to some of these stories can be found in other Tolkien books, none of them which are complete (I don't believe the Similarion applies here, correct me if I'm wrong), and are more notes of events than anything else.

The trick will be picking which events (the first meeting between Gandalf and Aragorn is probably a must have, as well as the battles which happened during this time) will be included in the script, and if those events can be referenced without having rights to all the literature. The lawyers are going to have a field day with this one.

It may just come down to the title and main focus of the film. I mean, LOTR had some elements not found in the book, but in other writings. Yet, they didn't have rights to those notes. Could be very interesting, especially since Christopher Tolkien isn't exactly thrilled about the entire process.