Jackson: No Movement, No Green Light

Despite recent reports that MGM may be closer to sorting out its financial difficulties that may pave the way for The Hobbit films, Sir Peter Jackson says that the film status has not really changed in any meaningful way. Jackson spoke with Empire Online about the true status of the film.

“We are nowhere different to any other reports or conversations,” Jackson told us last night. “We haven’t got a greenlight yet. We’re still waiting. Things still seem to be inching closer to some sort of happy place. I keep hearing that so many times now I’ve stopped tuning into it.”

“We’ve seen these reports before, reports saying there was going to be a greenlight in a couple of days — well, a week’s gone by and there isn’t one," adds Jackson. "You can’t believe everything you read. There is only one thing you want to believe and that’s when the studio announces a greenlight. As far as I’m aware that’s not going to be today. I keep hearing positive things. Everyone’s working very hard. There’s a lot of people at Warner Bros. who are working around the clock trying to manoeuvre through the MGM complexities. MGM is a company that is about to go bankrupt and in a way they are about to take The Hobbit into bankruptcy hell with them when they go down. Warners are trying to extract The Hobbit out of the bankruptcy hell before it happens. It is just so complicated I can’t even put my head into it. It’s all to do with American copyright laws, bankruptcy laws. A lot of Warner Bros. lawyers are working round the clock at the moment trying to make it happen so let’s see."

The goal seemed to be to control expectations and prevent fans from getting too excited or impatient. Realistically, until MGM sorts out its problems, the Hobbit will not move forward. As Jackson suggested WB could buy out MGM's 50% ownership but MGM's future plans seem to rely heavily on The Hobbit films and they will not give up that stake easily. Basically to sum it up, no MGM as a functioning studio = no Hobbit films.