Casting for The Hobbit begins this week, and Peter Jackson has told MTV that there are two 'Lord of the Rings' stars who will likely be returning to the franchise, in addition to the previously-announced Ian McKellen.

"Gandalf, being a 2,000-year-old wizard, is still around and plays a major role in 'The Hobbit,' and we're having Ian McKellen reprise," explained the filmmaker, who is executive-producing the flick and writing the screenplay. "There's a couple of other characters: Elrond, who was played by Hugo Weaving [in the original films], and there's a possibility of Galadriel, who was played by Cate Blanchett."

The plot thickens. The presence of Weaving and Blanchett would definitely add a nice sense of continuity to the new films, to say nothing of the additional thespian gravitas they'd bring to The Hobbit.

Lensing of the two movies is slated to begin in the spring, with Guillermo del Toro at the helm. The first film is looking towards a December 2011 release, with the second intended for release a year later in December 2012.

Del Toro drops out of "The Hobbitt"
 

Now maybe he'll have time for "Hellboy 3"

http://www.comingsoon.net/news/movienews.php?id=66547

Not sure what I think about this yet.

One one hand, it's great that he'll have time for other projects - hopefully he can finally get At the Mountains of Madness off the ground - but on the other hand, I pretty much just lost all interest in The Hobbit. Del Toro was the perfect man for that project, and even with him still co-writing the script I can't imagine it turning out nearly as well as if he was still behind the camera.

I've got to agree with Return. This is terrible news. del Toro was the perfect director for this project. I can't imagine anyone else bringing the sense of magic to life like he could.

We should all write a collaborated letter and send it to him. Demanding he direct the movie because it would basically be his life's accomplishment and he kinda has to do it. =/

There's been a lot of talk surrounding The Hobbit recently, most of it simply rumors and speculation, but today it seems we have some official information as Deadline reports Peter Jackson will be directing both the first installment of The Hobbit as well as the subsequent untitled sequel.

Jackson was first rumored to be in talks to direct the two films back in June following Guillermo del Toro's departure from the director's chair the month prior.

Deadline's Mike Fleming adds that Warner Bros and MGM have set a December 2012 and December 2013 release pattern for the two films, replicating the release pattern of the original Lord of the Rings features with production expected to begin in January 2011. Even more importantly, all the rumblings concerning the two Hobbit films being shot in 3D were recently confirmed by the New York Times.

The two-picture shoot is expected to cost around $500 million.

As far as casting goes, Ian McKellen is expected to return as Gandalf and Martin Freeman has been rumored in the past as the first choice to play Bilbo Baggins. The film is based on J. R. R. Tolkien's novel "The Hobbit; or There and Back Again" and will tell the story of tiny, furry-footed Bilbo and his adventures in Middle-earth, which ultimately served as the prelude to Tolkien's epic "The Lord of the Rings", which was published in three volumes during the 1950s.

I have just heard about this movie. I think after reading your info about this movie, I have to watch it once so that I can also come to know about the director's efforts in the movie..:):)

Awesome. I didn't think this was going to happen.

Director Peter Jackson announced two new additions to the cast of The Hobbit.

Lee Pace (Pushing Daises) is set to star as the Elven King Thranduil. In The Lord of the Rings mythology, Thrandull is the father of Legolas and plays a supporting role in The Hobbit. Additionally, Kiwi actor Dean O’Gorman will be playing Fili, a dwarf and one of the twelve companions of Bilbo.

Posting the news on his Facebook page, here’s what Jackson had to say about the casting of Pace:

While we are not familiar with O’Gorman, the addition of Pace to the cast is great news. He turned in some fantastic work in Bryan Fuller’s criminally underrated TV series Pushing Daisies, and his involvement is certainly exciting.

The Hobbit will be broken into two parts. Part 1 is set for December 2012 and Part 2 will come out in December 2013.