Interesting Jackson News

[Mister Underhill]

Originally Posted by IMDB

Spielberg, Jackson Can't Get Budget OK For Tintin

With studios finding it especially difficult during the current financial storm to find funding for their pictures, Universal Pictures has rejected a film submitted to it by Steven Spielberg and Peter Jackson, the Los Angeles Times reported today (Friday). The final budget for their 3-D animated Tintin had come in at $130 million. In reporting the studio's decision, the Times commented, "Universal's refusal to finance Tintin underscores how in today's tough economic climate, bottom-line concerns trump once-inviolable relationships between studios and talent. Until now, however, filmmakers of Spielberg's and Jackson's stature were thought to be immune to the brass-knuckles tactics of the studios. Squeezed by a business trapped between rising costs and leveling revenues, the two filmmakers are Hollywood's latest -- and most prominent -- victims of cost containment."

Very interesting. I wonder what, if anything, this might mean for The Hobbit, which I would imagine will budget out somewhere in the neighborhood of $200 to $300M for two films.