It looks like MGM are in for a long wait if it wants Peter Jackson to direct that Hobbit film – Peter Jackson has just clapped his eyes on another lot of fluff about dragons and whatnot that he wants to direct first.
Peter Jackson has decided that he wants to direct Temeraire, a movie based on a series of books by Naomi Novik that supposes the Napoleonic war was fought with squadrons of dragons instead of boats, or something like that at least. Peter Jackson is thought to be excited by the notion of bringing Temeraire to the big screen, and his ideas include swapping the Napoleonic war for a load of different places in New Zealand, swapping the dragons for a giant monkey and making the whole thing go on for so long that the audience's legs will shrivel up and fall off before the third act.
Despite the pounding that King Kong took at the box office, Peter Jackson has rarely been in higher demand. People are quite literally queuing up outside Peter Jackson's door asking him to sprinkle the trademark Peter Jackson magic over their movies, even though the trademark Peter Jackson magic seems to mainly involve removing every last trace of humour from the film, carting everyone off to New Zealand to make it and then ending up with a film that's 17 and a half hours long complete with the sort of soundtrack that rubbish Irish pubs play during the daytime.
In recent weeks, Peter Jackson has been busy executive producing the Halo movie and getting it ready for the man with the dancing car to direct, plus he's going to produce a remake of Dam Busters complete with more official secrets and less animals named after racial slurs. And on top of that, MGM bigwig Harry Sloane has publicly called for Peter Jackson to direct his new Hobbit movie. But, hey, screw The Hobbit – Peter Jackson wants to direct a film about a man blowing up ships with a dragon instead. IGN reports:
Oscar winner Peter Jackson is lining up his post-King Kong directing projects, with a big-screen version of author Naomi Novik's historical fantasy series Temeraire being one of his potential upcoming projects. The filmmaker reportedly wants to also develop the series for interactive entertainment.
Chances are – like us – you haven't ever heard of Temeraire, so here's what we know; Temeraire follows British naval captain Will Laurence, who finds a dragon's egg from the King of China meant for Napoleon. The egg hatches, and Laurence flies about on the back of it blowing lots of shit up. For four hours, probably. The Temeraire author Naomi Novik is now working on book four, so Peter Jackson might even get to make another of his fancy Lord Of The Rings-style film series. He certainly seems excited about Temeraire:
"'Temeraire' is a terrific meld of two genres that I particularly love – fantasy and historical epic. I can't wait to see Napoleonic battles fought with a squadron of dragons. That's what I go to the movies for… As I was reading these books, I could see them coming to life in my mind's eye. These are beautifully written novels, not only fresh, original and fast-paced, but full of wonderful characters with real heart."
All this seems a lot of work for Peter Jackson – Temeraire and Halo and Dam Busters and The Hobbit – so we've decided to compile them all into one handy movie for Peter Jackson to film, free of charge. In this new movie, Master Chief finds a dragon egg, hatches it, names it Nigger and then one of Bilbo Baggins' mates kills it with a bow and arrow. We realise that's quite a short film, so Peter Jackson can feel free to pad it out with three hours of an old man trudging across a mountain, like he does in all of his other films.
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[story by Stuart Heritage]