Del Toro confirmed to direct The Hobbit

Finally, after months of speculation and weeks of inching closer to an announcement, Guillermo del Toro has been confirmed as the director for New Line and MGM’s adaptation of JR Tolkien’s The Hobbit. Executive producers for the project Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh, along with New Line president Toby Emmerich and chief of MGM’s Worldwide Motion Picture group Mary Parent made the announcement on 24 April, putting an end to the rumours which have teased us fans for too long now.

The Hobbit, which will take the form of two movies to be shot back to back, will see Del Toro move to New Zealand and the Pan’s Labyrinth director has cleared a four-year stretch in his diary to work on the project. Shooting is expected to begin next year with the studios aiming for a release in 2011 for the first part and 2012 for the second.