Help Sir PJ!

[Junai]

Warner Bros.' confidence in NZ as shooting location for the Hobbit is shaken. Whiny aussie unionists.

 

Rally!

[Morgoth]

This is just stupid.

[Junai]

You're right!

 

Production is delayed b/c of stupid people.

The Shire is in New Zealand, nowhere else!..

 

*sigh*.

 

J.

[Oblarg]

They can't change it now, not after how superb the setting was for the first three films. That would be a nightmare.

[Zoraptor]

The whole thing is a fiasco. Australian union screws up NZers (followed by loltastic "relocate to Australia" pitch), NZ union feels it has to support Aussie union despite their spokeswomen looking like a frightened rabbit right from the beginning and the stunned and disbelieving annoyance of other NZ unions, Jackson postures and grandstands and Warners uses it to wring more tax concessions from our government- and I would have sympathy for Warners if they hadn't blatantly and provably lied about receiving assurances that there would not be industrial issues from the people who actually make that decision rather than from some smug Australian who should have been fired back across the Tasman with a RotK surplus trebuchet.

 

Complete, utter, unmitigated garbage from the lot of them.

[Tigranes]

You'd think a project like the Hobbit would be glittering in gold and guaranteed to do good, but I think the unions saw that too and thought, hey, here's the best vehicle/chance we have for pushing our agenda. I'm sure amongst that there are some legitimate grievances - the creative industries are never that good for employees - but it is quite amazing.

 

Jackson would have been the best person to mediate it all but I hear from people in Weta that the relationship between Jackson and some of his NZ partners are becoming quite strained.

[Zoraptor]

I know a lot of people don't like Jackson as he is and has been very outspoken on a bunch of film industry related issues, isn't afraid of tough negotiating and can come across as slightly self important. Though to be fair so far as I am aware he has been so since as far back as Bad Taste (and arguably being self important is a requirement for a good director) and from what I understand the conditions on LOTR were- broadly- the same as they would have been if unionised.

 

Interesting (?) trivia: they filmed parts of The Frighteners on the property next door to ours and had a big half built house covered in tarpaulin like stuff there for a few months.

[Junai]

Warners uses it to wring more tax concessions from our government- and I would have sympathy for Warners if they hadn't blatantly and provably lied about receiving assurances that there would not be industrial issues from the people who actually make that decision rather than from some smug Australian who should have been fired back across the Tasman with a RotK surplus trebuchet.

 

Complete, utter, unmitigated garbage from the lot of them.

 

Quite funny, this column by Paul Holmes in the NZ-Herald;

"And if it all has simply been a brilliant game by Warner Bros to garner greater tax breaks, they have played it brilliantly."

 

I wouldn't be suprised actually, but if this is the case, it proves that they really want to shoot it in NZ. Doesn't it?

I cross my fingers, anyway.

 

I wanna go to NZ and see the Shire..

[Morgoth]

In the end, I don't really care where they shoot the films. NZ has some breathtaking landscapes, but so do other countries.

 

I'm just glad that PJ is sitting in the director's chair again. Tel Doro would have turned the Hobbit into some dark Emo fest or something.

Edited October 24, 2010 by Morgoth

[Monte Carlo]

It will be much better now it is being filmed on This Blessed Plot.

 

After all, Hue in Full Metal Jacket was filmed in East London. The barbarians at the beginning of Gladiator were defeated in Surrey. Harry Potter, most James Bond movies and Band of Brothers were made in Hertfordshire.

 

I'm sure NZ is utterly beautiful, it certainly looks lovely from the LotR movies. But shouty trade unionists can take the shine off of anything.

 

The Shire is, in Tolkein's mind's eye, the English East Midlands of the early 20th Century. It is good that The Hobbit is coming home.

[~Di]

LOL, NZ actors' union shoots itself in the head with a bunch of new demands, and NZ newspapers blame Warner Brothers? That's rich! Rich as in not what the actors in NZ will after Warner moves to the lovely British countryside to film.

 

There must be something in the water down there that creates uncontrollable self-destructive behavior in otherwise sane humans.

Edited October 25, 2010 by ~Di

[Zoraptor]

Actually the NZ union only asked for a meeting to discuss conditions. All the other stuff- boycott talk etc- came from the Australians so your claims that they shot themselves in the head are... incorrect. The sole thing the NZ union did wrong was not distance themselves from the Australians (by no means easy for them to do- if they were willing to try strongarming a large multinational like Warners they wouldn't have any problem blacklisting NZ union members who criticised them- quickly enough.

 

And as I said, Warners has most certainly spun their own amount of bull. They said they'd never received assurances from the NZ union (ie, the union that actually matters) when they'd had them in writing for days and had in fact responded to that assurance asking the union to keep quiet about it.

 

As for filming in the UK? Would not suggest one holds one's breath. If it ain't NZ then location work in Eastern Europe and post processing in NZ is far more likely.

Edited October 25, 2010 by Zoraptor

[Nepenthe]

If it ain't NZ then location work in Eastern Europe and post processing in NZ is far more likely.

Possible studio work in the UK, though...

[~Di]

Actually the NZ union only asked for a meeting to discuss conditions. All the other stuff- boycott talk etc- came from the Australians so your claims that they shot themselves in the head are... incorrect. The sole thing the NZ union did wrong was not distance themselves from the Australians (by no means easy for them to do- if they were willing to try strongarming a large multinational like Warners they wouldn't have any problem blacklisting NZ union members who criticised them- quickly enough.

 

And as I said, Warners has most certainly spun their own amount of bull. They said they'd never received assurances from the NZ union (ie, the union that actually matters) when they'd had them in writing for days and had in fact responded to that assurance asking the union to keep quiet about it.

 

As for filming in the UK? Would not suggest one holds one's breath. If it ain't NZ then location work in Eastern Europe and post processing in NZ is far more likely.

 

 

That's hardly the whole story, but bottom line, it was the union affiliated with NZ actors that called for an international boycott. If the Aussies had their hands up NZ's rear using them as puppets, it's because the NZ actors gave informed consent. Annnnd it's gonna cost them.

 

A less biased and more complete overview of the mess can be found here... http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/26/business....html?src=busln

 

... or just about anywhere on the web that doesn't originate in either the NZ or Australian press. Me, I don't care where they shoot the flicks. I do know that if I wanted to be in the film, I wouldn't be flinging my "weight" around talking about international boycotts. Now that the feces has hit the windmill, both unions are suddenly willing to revoke the boycotts and are begging Warner executives to talk to them. Ahem. Methinks the damage has been done, and Warners is scouting greener and more film-friendly pastures as we speak. Warners has made several good faith gestures over the months waiting for the Aussies and NZ actors to come to terms with New Zealand law, which does not allow collective bargaining.

 

There's no shortage of stupidity to be found here, more than enough to spread around to all the players in this international extortion attempt. Don't think other big studios around the globe have not noticed this ridiculous situation. I'm thinking that it'll be dry pickings for NZ and Aussie actors outside of their own backyards for a long time to come.

Edited October 26, 2010 by ~Di

[Zoraptor]

.. with New Zealand law, which does not allow collective bargaining.

New Zealand law allows collective bargaining. Reference (please note: .govt.nz in URL)

 

Unions have a right to represent their members in relation to any matter involving the members' collective employment interests. Unions also have the right to negotiate collective agreements.

[Tigranes]

NZ teachers union is bargaining for collective agreements as well, at the moment.

[Zoraptor]

Yeah, it's the sort of thing anyone who lives here instantly knows is wrong.

 

To be fair though, if you don't live here you'd have no reason not to take what the NYT said at face value.

[Thorton_AP]

But it was the unbiased (and therefore more accurate???) source!!

[~Di]

.. with New Zealand law, which does not allow collective bargaining.

New Zealand law allows collective bargaining. Reference (please note: .govt.nz in URL)

 

Unions have a right to represent their members in relation to any matter involving the members' collective employment interests. Unions also have the right to negotiate collective agreements.

 

Well, a New Zealander contributed to the NYT article, but if he was wrong in reporting that "The producers and some New Zealand officials said such bargaining would violate the country

[Hiro Protagonist]

Well, a New Zealander contributed to the NYT article, but if he was wrong in reporting that "The producers and some New Zealand officials said such bargaining would violate the country

Edited October 27, 2010 by Hiro Protagonist

[Junai]

PM steps up, $34 mill. taxbreak - and the Hobbit is safe in NZ.

 

Warner sure knows how to use unionists to their advantage.. lol

 

 

Grats NZ.

[~Di]

I frankly don't understand why NZ has the expectation that they have some kind of entitlement to the location and/or actors of NZ simply because the original LOTR trilogy was filmed there. Warner has no requirement to film the prequel there, especially when they are facing boycotts and costly delays by union interference. It seems a bit of the-USA-company-sucks whining to me, actually.

[Nepenthe]

I frankly don't understand why NZ has the expectation that they have some kind of entitlement to the location and/or actors of NZ simply because the original LOTR trilogy was filmed there. Warner has no requirement to film the prequel there, especially when they are facing boycotts and costly delays by union interference. It seems a bit of the-USA-company-sucks whining to me, actually.

 

You know what, I understand both sides of the deal here. The LOTR stuff is VERY important to the NZ's branding (which we've discussed in this forum before), while WB wants to make the movie for as little as possible (not that it won't make billions, again, anyway, but still!).

 

The sense of entitlement (which I'm not seeing as anything more than an argument to get the masses moving, people in general having a colossal sense of entitlement as spending any amount of time in a video game forum will show to you) is mostly born out of the fact that they've made LOTR such an important thing for themselves, they literally can't imagine Hobbit being shot anywhere else. Even though it could probably be done with a minimum amount of hassle and nobody would be able to tell the difference...

[Zoraptor]

Ye Gads Di, not everything is an Evil Plot to defame the US. If anything, as the debunking of that NYT article shows, the misrepresentation has been against NZ.

 

There was never any serious chance of the production going elsewhere. They'd already spent $100 million on it which would almost all have had to be written off, pretty much all of the people Jackson has ever used on the technical and production side are NZers and changing places would delay the project by anything up to a year.

 

There isn't so much a sense of entitlement as a feeling that the whole thing is a fiasco which could and should have been sorted out amicably six months ago over a beer and fish and chips if there had been a modicum of goodwill shown rather than an immediate leap to see who had the bigger Cheney followed by a series of typical vested interest pile ons.

[Monte Carlo]

I suppose I'll never go to New Zealand, mainly because I can never imagine myself spending that much time on an aircraft. But the tourism ads for the place there show here always strike me that they're a bit bloody pleased with themselves.

 

The Hobbit is actually a British book. It's quite nice that NZ have taken Tolkein to their hearts but, when all's said and done, The Hobbit and LotR has nothing whatsoever to do with the place.