Money changes everything

I admit it — I’m tickled to hear that Peter Jackson and New Line Cinema have decided to bury the hatchet and make another truckload of money with a film version of The Hobbit, to be released in two parts. Christmas is coming and that means I’ll be settling down with Dances With Mermaids at some point for our usual marathon viewing of the three Lord of the Rings movies. It will be fun to know there’s another trip to Middle-earth in the offing.

I guess we can chalk this decision up to the lackluster box office reponse to The Golden Compass, which New Line had positioned as the next Lord of the Rings. Stuck without a franchise and mired with a lawsuit filed by the director of its most successful release — all of a sudden, an out-of-court settlement starts to make loads of sense.