Peter Jackson talks Hobbit filming and Lord of the Rings on Blu-ray

Last week Peter Jackson was asked about the status of The Hobbit and he said that filming would now take place is the summer, which is a few months after the original March shooting date. This prompted questions as to whether the films would be pushed back a year to 2012, however Jackson cleared things up when speaking to Collider recently:

Nothing has changed as far as I am concerned. Somebody wrote something on the internet and a lot of nonsense happened. You don’t want to believe everything you read on the internet. We were due to deliver the scripts and be shooting sometime around April and now I think I said in an interview we were shooting in June. And somehow people are now saying the film is delayed. As far as I am aware, they are not delayed at all. I am not even sure when we are going to start shooting…we are delivering the scripts just after Christmas they’ll be finished and we’ll be shooting as soon as we possibly can. But you need a certain amount of time to finish the pre-production.

He also commented on the Lord of the Rings Blu-ray release which was originally set for this month:

Well, it keeps changing. I am not the best person to ask about that believe it or not as I am not in charge of the Blu-ray, Warner Home Video is. I believe it is scheduled for sometime next year. They keep changing the date…I don’t know why. I’ve seen the Blu-ray as they sent it to me to approve and I looked at the film and it looks fantastic on Blu-ray but I don’t know the date.

He also says that it will most likely only be the theatrical versions released on Blu-ray first, and one can assume the extended editions will be released around the time The Hobbit is released. Typical studio tactics to make us buy the films on Blu-ray twice!