LOL: 'Hobbit' Director Peter Jackson Claims To Hate Big Hollywood Franchises

When's the last time you rolled your eyes and scoffed "oh, that's rich"? Has it been a while? Would you like to do it now? Because if so, we have the perfect occasion for you.

Peter Jackson, director of three Lord of the Rings movies and three Hobbit movies, has gone on the record criticizing Hollywood for being too "franchise driven." He also thinks the advent of technology has helped the industry lose its way. Say it with me now: "Oh, that's rich." See, wasn't that satisfying? Read the Peter Jackson franchise comments after the jump. 

Jackson shared his thoughts on the current state of the industry with Moviefone:

I don't really like the Hollywood blockbuster bandwagon that exists right now. The industry and the advent of all the technology, has kind of lost its way. It's become very franchise driven and superhero driven.

Yes, this is coming from the guy who turned a 320-page children's book into a three-film, 474-minute franchise. Also the guy who tried to make 48 FPS a thing, and who used so much greenscreen he made Ian McKellen cry. This is the guy complaining that "the advent of all the technology" and the "franchise driven" model has ruined movies.

Honestly, Jackson and Warner Bros.' decision to stretch The Hobbit into three pictures might not have been so obnoxious if he had added enough substance to justify the ridiculous running time. However, all Jackson really did was make everything that happens take a really, really long time. Which is a criticism he's heard before. The director offered a defense:

It's a weird thing, even when you look at the reviews for this movie, people are still bitter about the breakfast scene from the first movie. They say, "It took so long." Fair enough. But I always thought of these movies as a 7 hour film. So you look at it as, "Why are we spending the first quarter of this movie at a dinner scene?" Where I'm thinking that it's not the first quarter it's actually 1/16th of a thing. We shoot them at the same time and obviously I can't think of them as a single film, but I have to keep that structure in mind. That's not really excuse for a long dinner scene, but still.

No, it really isn't an excuse. It doesn't matter whether Jackson considers the dinner scene 1/4 of a three-hour movie or 1/16th of a seven-hour movie or 1/90th of a 500-hour movie, because the proportions weren't really the problem. It was the fact that the dinner scene was tedious and repetitive and added little of value. In other words, that it was too damn long.

Anyway, Jackson's so tired of "franchise driven" Hollywood that he's planning to go back to smaller films like the ones that started his career. He explained:

I'm absolutely happy to make smaller films. It's what I want to do. Fran and I, and obviously with Philippa, we made "Heavenly Creatures" as a chronicle of New Zealand. We're New Zealanders. "Heavenly Creatures" was the last time we made a movie about our own culture. So we want to go back and make some New Zealand stories.

Which, great. If they're good, maybe they'll get Jackson back on track again. If they're bad, at least they'll keep him from trying to make more Tolkien movies.