{"id":482657,"date":"2026-05-13T13:54:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-13T13:54:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/482657\/"},"modified":"2026-05-13T13:54:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-13T13:54:11","slug":"lord-of-the-rings-hunt-for-gollum-why-andy-serkis-is-directing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/482657\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Lord Of The Rings: Hunt For Gollum’: Why Andy Serkis Is Directing"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\t\u201cI could have directed it, but I thought, I\u2019ve done that,\u201d said Peter Jackson<\/a> today at his Cannes<\/a> Film Festival Rendez-Vous about why he\u2019s sitting out as director on Lord of the Rings: Hunt for Gollum. <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cIt would be more interesting with this particular story \u2013which takes place between Hobbit and Lord of the Rings \u2014 if Andy Serkis<\/a> directed it,\u201d said the 3x Oscar winner who picked up an honorary Palme d\u2019Or last night. <\/p>\n

\n\tThen teasing the new film, Jackson said, \u201cIt\u2019s an internal story about Gollum\u2019s psychology and addiction. It\u2019s a personal story to Gollum. Andy knows this guy better than anybody. I didn\u2019t think about me. The more exiting version of this movie is if Any Serkis made it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI\u2019m leaving it to him. I\u2019m here to help where I can. But I don\u2019t interfere. I\u2019ve given him as much freedom as I can,\u201d said Jackson who is a producer on the new New Line project which hits theaters on Dec. 17, 2027. <\/p>\n

\n\tJackson also said he\u2019s writing a new Tintin. \u201cI\u2019ve been working with Fran on a new Tintin script.\u201d In fact, he was literally working on the script while here at Cannes.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThe deal was Steven (Spielberg) directs one, and I direct another,\u201d said the filmmaker who produced the 2011 movie.<\/p>\n

\n\tJackson also hopes to make a movie about the Dambusters Raid, which was an attack on\u00a0German\u00a0dams by the Royal Air Force carried out on the night of May 16, 1943 by\u00a0617 Squadron\u00a0RAF Bomber Command. Jackson originally was looking to do this movie before he had to commit to The Hobbit after Guillermo del Toro\u2019s departure. <\/p>\n

\n\tThe director explained that del Toro really was supposed to direct The Hobbit films. Del Toro worked for seven months in New Zealand prepping The Hobbit, however Warner Bros hadn\u2019t greenlight the project. The studio was holding it up, asking for further drafts. Per Jackson, del Toro opted to move on and make other movies rather than wait.<\/p>\n

\n\tJackson explained that the whole notion of Serkis playing a motion capture version of Gollum simply evolved during production of Lord of the Rings. Originally, the actor was called to the New Zealand set as his presence with the voice was required to play off Sean Astin and Elijah Wood\u2019s acting as Sam and Frodo Baggins. Originally, the plan was for Gollum to be animated with Serkis providing the voice. Given how Serkis was providing an eye-line for the actors, it was decided to use motion capture technology. <\/p>\n

\n\tAsked by French film journalist Didier Allouch whether the Academy Awards would ever laud a motion-capture performance, Jackson signed, \u201cI don\u2019t think it will happen, not in the current environment.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cEveryone is getting worried about AI. Gollum isn\u2019t AI. He\u2019s a motion-captured performance.\u201d <\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI don\u2019t think any artificial character or generated character has hope of winning awards. It\u2019s a bit unfair. In the Andy Serkis case, it\u2019s not AI generated, it\u2019s a human-generated performance.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cI could have directed it, but I thought, I\u2019ve done that,\u201d said Peter Jackson today at his Cannes…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":292872,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[263],"tags":[7196,10404,190863,210233,18,117,19,17,327,55595,7200],"class_list":{"0":"post-482657","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-movies","8":"tag-andy-serkis","9":"tag-cannes","10":"tag-cannes-2026","11":"tag-cannes-film-fesival","12":"tag-eire","13":"tag-entertainment","14":"tag-ie","15":"tag-ireland","16":"tag-movies","17":"tag-peter-jackson","18":"tag-the-lord-of-the-rings-the-hunt-for-gollum"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482657","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=482657"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/482657\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/292872"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=482657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=482657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=482657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}