Peter JacksonThe plan was to be impartial and emotionless in the printed word and provide interested parties (hopefully you dear reader) all the facts and information from Peter Jackson’s un-press conference in San Diego as possible.

After all, he had 40 or so of us delighted to be trapped in a room with him in a small but luxurious hotel a few hundred meters from the convention center where the world’s biggest celebration of popular culture was taking place. It was the end of the first day of the four-day event and Jackson had swooped into town, showed off his first ever public screening of “District 9,” and then convened Geek Court. Continue reading “Peter Jackson speaks”

How do Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson, the two titans of pop culture, collaborate on the new 3-D motion-capture version of Tintin? With lots of high-tech wizardry. Spielberg, who’s directing the first instalment, The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn, recently wrapped 32 days of performance-capture shooting in Los Angeles. Producer Jackson travelled from his New Zealand home base to Los Angeles for rehearsals and the first week of shooting, and then appeared via an elaborate video-conferencing set-up for the rest of the shoot, using a specially designed iChat-type system in which the Kiwi filmmaker can see everything on the set in real time and simultaneously talk with Spielberg. The film is scheduled to hit theatres in 2011. More lines to learn

How do Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson, the two titans of pop culture, collaborate on the new 3-D motion-capture version of “Tintin”? With lots of high-tech wizardry.

Spielberg, who’s directing the first installment, “The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn,” recently wrapped 32 days of performance-capture shooting in Los Angeles. Producer Jackson traveled from his New Zealand home base to L.A. for rehearsals and the first week of shooting, and then appeared via an elaborate video-conferencing setup for the rest of the shoot, using a specially designed iChat-type system in which the Kiwi filmmaker can see everything on the set in real time and simultaneously talk with Spielberg. The film is scheduled to hit theaters in 2011. ‘Tintin’ project brings moguls together

Everyone knows Hollywood giants Peter Jackson and Steven Spielberg are collaborating on three Tintin movies, but rarely has the public seen the two top film-makers in the same place. A new online video shows them not only together, but with the potential to be a snappy comic duo. The official website for Tintin unveiled this week a two-minute video recording of Jackson and Spielberg made for the the Angouleme International Comics Festival in France. In the video Jackson and Spielberg wear bowler hats and carry umbrellas as a homage to two of the Tintin series’ most popular characters, the bungling detectives Thomson and Thompson. They are seated between a cardboard cutout of Tintin, the plucky Belgian detective. “We’re here to celebrate Tintin’s 80th year in existence,” said Spielberg, who is directing the first Tintin film Secret of the Unicorn. Tintin video unveiled Video

By Garth Franklin at DarkHorizons (via Variety): While fans who are aware of “Tintin” have been enthusiastic about the project, the single most common complaint from fanboys unfamiliar with Herge’s brilliant stories of the roving reporter has been that their ‘god’ Steven Spielberg shouldn’t be wasting his time with such nonsense.

This is despite the fact almost all of them are completely unfamiliar with the material, even though the twenty-four graphic novels have been in publication for over eight decades. Decades before the likes of “Watchmen” hit the shelves it was weaving stories of Middle Eastern tension, South American and Eastern European coup d’etats, opium smuggling, human trafficking, arms dealing and espionage. More…

As secret agent James Bond, British actor Daniel Craig is used to exotic locations but this year he may find himself in Wellington. Craig has been cast as the evil pirate Red Rackham in the first Tintin movie from Peter Jackson and Steven Spielberg. Variety magazine reported that The Adventures of Tintin: Secret of the Unicorn has begun shooting in Los Angeles. Spielberg is directing the first movie, and Jackson, who is also producing, will direct the second of three. Shooting for the first film will take place in Wellington later this year, which means that Craig, seen recently in the Bond adventure Quantum of Solace, may be in the capital, along with other cast members and Spielberg. James Bond star cast in Tintin movie