The copyright of "The Hobbit" is extremely complicated, the distribution rights are MGM, and the production rights are owned by Warner Bros. New Line, which means that the film will be made possible by the cooperation of the two companies.

The Lord of the Rings trilogy, directed by Peter Jackson, has taken the world by storm with a total box office of nearly $3 billion, and in 2003, the series' finale, The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King, won 11 Oscars, including Best Director and Best Picture.

In August 2005, Peter Jackson, who held a box office dividend contract, sued New Line, arguing that the other party had unclear accounts and was suspected of concealing the box office, and demanded an in-depth audit. Jackson said: "I've never been in a lawsuit when I'm this big, and I'm not going to work with New Line until everything is clear." In January 2007, Bob Shea revealed in an interview that the new line later paid Jackson $250 million, and he vowed never to have anything to do with Jackson again in his life.

But only a few months after Bob Saya's gamble was made, the new line began to lower its profile. In December 2007, due to the box office fiasco of the large-budget film "The Golden Compass", the new line released the news, saying that it had invited Peter Jackson, who had a relationship with "breaking the ice", and gold medal partners Fran Wales and Philippa Bojans to serve as executive producers and screenwriters of the two "The Hobbit".

The problem now is that the new line has always wanted to exclude the Jacksons from Middle-earth, offending the great director, and another reason is that the great director's asking price is not low, at least 20% of the profits, so the two sides have not been able to negotiate.

The contradictions between MGM and New Line on investment, production, distribution, and sharing are constant, which makes this project put on the agenda again and again, and is shelved again and again due to various problems.

"We've been told over and over again by the company that the problem might be solved next month," Peter Jackson said. But wait until next month, still say so. Everyone was frustrated. ”

Eventually, MGM and Guillermo del Toro, director provisionally approved by the new line, announced their retirement from the crew. Gilmour can't afford to wait indefinitely, after all, the original start date of filming has been delayed by six months.

And screenwriter Philippa Bojans said that Del Toro was a very straightforward person, and he did not shy away from saying that Jackson and his team should take over the film. In the wake of the withdrawal, some industry insiders close to Del Toro have questioned whether the inside story could be more complicated.

Maybe Peter Jackson didn't want to take over "The Hobbit" entirely, but more or less, he would go beyond the scope of his role as a screenwriter and put his beak on the director's job. From a creative point of view, Gilmour certainly wanted to shoot entirely from his own point of view, but Peter's intervention must have made him wonder: is this film still his work, and will it take years of hard work to make a wedding dress for someone else?

Now, at last, there is a major turnaround, with Mark's family fund controlling a 10% stake in Time Warner, and he will be the bridge between the two groups.

Wellington, a picturesque harbour city in the southwestern North Island of New Zealand, is Peter Jackson's hometown and home to his special effects kingdom, Weta Studios. The studio's business scope is mainly films, video game props and special effects. Weta has worked on the Avatar and Narnia film franchises, and the studio's portfolio includes some of the world's top shooting and post-production equipment that makes tech-savvy filmmakers thrill.

Although Jackson's work is enough to make him one of the most influential A-list directors, he prefers to hide in a small town on the other side of the world to avoid the difficult studio executives. The only people he deals with on a daily basis are a group of long-time collaborators, screenwriter and wife Fran Wales, screenwriter and producer Philippa Bojans, and Weta employees.

This small circle is somewhat xenophobic, but the internal relationship is very simple. An executive producer at a studio who has worked with the Jackson Group said, "They don't touch the dirty stuff, they don't even talk about it. They love movies very much, and they always work day and night without slacking off. ”

One of the world's two major special effects companies, one of the pride of New Zealanders, today a rare gathering of all employees on the lawn at the entrance of the company, as if waiting for a big man, led by Mr. and Mrs. Jackson, Weta Digital's senior management is all dispatched, the last time all the staff were dispatched, it was the Prime Minister of New Zealand who visited.

There are also a large number of journalists waiting here.

Today's visit is a world-class tycoon and director Mark who arrived at Wellington International Airport on his private jet and arrived at Weta Digital's headquarters under the escort of a police car.

After careful grooming, Mark looks cold and majestic, without a little decadence on today's show, he walks in a tiger, he is full of energy, showing the demeanor of a world-class tycoon, Warner Bros. President Kevin, MGM Macacso follows around, Mark shook hands with Jackson, walked into the inside of Weta Digital together, and did not pay attention to the reporters who were taking pictures frantically.

They visited Weta Digital's various equipment and a large production center, which was not really anything to show off, as Mark owned ILM, the world's largest and best production company.

Mark bluntly put forward the purpose of this trip: "I have settled all the differences between MGM and Warner, and the "Hobbit" project has been officially established, but the project has made some changes, from the original two parts to a trilogy, and the average investment will exceed 250 million for a single film, I hope you will be the producer and director." ”

Although Jackson was still haunted by the lawsuit many years ago, after all, this project was created by him and he had been devoted to it for a long time, so he didn't mind so much if he could recover it. "I always felt a sense of responsibility for Middle-earth, and if I did, I would regret it years later. "That's also the reason why the new line has been using this to restrain him, hoping that he can give in.

Jackson said, "That's good news! Let's talk about the specifics." ”

This is good news for Jackson, "The Lord of the Rings" made him Weta Digital, directing "The Hobbit" became his heart's wish, but after falling out with the new line, the new line has always turned him away, Weta Digital has developed well in recent years, and also won the great director James Cameron's masterpiece "Avatar", but his personal directing career has not improved, the big production "King Kong" profit does not meet expectations, during which he just produced a popular "Lovely Bones".

It would have been a huge shame for him if The Hobbit had been taken over by someone else, but Mark showed up and restarted the project.

Mark is the most discerning and bold filmmaker Jackson has ever seen, and he is amazed by the spirit of the 750 million reboot of Middle-earth, as he talks about how to turn a two-part into a trilogy.

Even Warner Bros. President Kevin is full of admiration when he talks about his boss: no matter how complex the clues, Mark seems to be able to integrate them in his brain and straighten them into scripts, and his brain can automatically generate all the elements, whether they are visible on the monitor or need to be synthesized by the computer in the later stage. He was born to make films, and Mark's talent is to locate invisible characters in imaginary three-dimensional space, setting how much area they will occupy, how to move the camera, and how to integrate with the environment in the front and back scenes. Whether it's the flying battle scenes in "Iron Man" or the virtual battles in "Time to War", these post-synthetic images have been repeatedly retraced in Jackson's mind countless times. ”

Jackson happily accepted Mark's invitation, but on one small condition, he wanted "The Hobbit" to be shot at 48 fps, he said: "The advantage of shooting at 48 fps is that it looks like the speed on the screen is still normal, but the smoothness and clarity of the motion are greatly enhanced." You might think it's okay to watch a 24FPS movie, but in a movie like this, every frame is blurry, especially in fast-moving shots. If the camera pans quickly, the image will shake, stutter, or flicker, and shooting and showing the film at 48 frames per second can be very helpful in getting rid of these problems. It will make the movie look more realistic and easier to watch, especially when it comes to 3D movies. ”

To convince Mark, they showed a clip of Avatar shot at 48 frames, which is breathtakingly detailed in high definition.

However, Mark didn't buy it, saying: "We all know that movies are 24-frame art, and the inner part of the movie is more feelings, and the audience's viewing mood depends more on feelings.

However, Jackson did not give up, saying: "For more than 90 years, we have been using 24FPS to shoot and show movies, not because it is the best, but because it is the cheapest, no one will stop moving forward, and technology will continue to undergo changes, this 48FPS technology will be the trend of future development, Cameron considered "Avatar 2" to shoot with this technology." ”

"In this film, for example, it's so uncinematic, because another important factor in making moving images look real is motion blur," Mark said. In the real world, when people are looking at a fast-moving thing or their eyes are moving quickly, what we see is blurry, and as you just said, 24FPS shooting and projection movies will have blurring, shaking, stuttering and stroboscopic problems, so it looks closer to reality, while the 48-frame version of "Avatar" has a smoother picture and moving objects are clearer, and maybe even a little too clear! Audiences have been watching movies at 24FPS for so many years, and they have become accustomed to the so-called "cinematic sense" of blurring, jitter, frustration and flickering, and suddenly switching to a picture with greatly enhanced smoothness and movement clarity, which is naturally difficult to adapt, and I call this no cinematic sense. ”