'T4' and 'Hobbit' News Out of MGM

Also talks of 'Crown' and 'Scoundrels'

By: Brad Brevet
Published: Wednesday, October 25th 2006 at 11:15 AM

MGM COO Rick Sands has continued his talk of a Terminator 4, The Hobbit being made in two parts, a Thomas Crown Affair sequel and now a remake of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. Last night at ShowEast Sands was quoted by The Hollywood Reporter with the following news:

He's packaging the fourth "Terminator" film — it will be titled "Terminator blah blah, not Four," Sands joked — with a new star likely to fill the Arnold Schwarzenegger role. "It's like the 'Batman' or 'Superman' franchise in that it lends itself to having different actors in the roles," he said.

Sands is in discussions with New Line Cinema to get the rights to produce two prequel films to "The Lord of the Rings" series, based on J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Hobbit," he said. Other projects he mentioned include a sequel to "The Thomas Crown Affair," set to star Pierce Brosnan, and a remake of "Dirty Rotten Scoundrels."

All of this makes sense except for The Hobbit in two parts and a remake of Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. Okay, so maybe only 50% of it makes sense, but when it comes to Hollywood I guess that is pretty good. Do we really need a Scoundrels remake and why does The Hobbit need to be made into two parts, and for that matter does it even need to be made? I am not saying a Hobbit movie wouldn't be cool, my primary beef is that if it was going to be made it should have been made before the Lord of the Rings films. Prequels have seemed to suck and while Peter Jackson's involvement in an adaptation of "The Hobbit" will pretty much guarantee it will be done correctly I just am not that interested at this time to see it.