“The Hobbit” director Peter Jackson said Tuesday that the future of cinema lay in 3D spectaculars on supersize screens, and that he hated the idea of people watching his latest movie on an iPad.
Speaking alongside stars of the epic fantasy including Martin Freeman and Ian McKellen at a press conference in London, Jackson said filmmakers should embrace new technology to draw in “dwindling” cinema audiences.
“I think we should look at the technology that we have available and say, ‘How can we make the experience more immersive, more magical, more spectacular?'” said Jackson, whose new film is a prequel to his “Lord of the Rings” trilogy.
“There is a degree of jeopardy at the moment with the film industry with all the alternative ways that people have to see movies now, right from their home entertainment systems down to an iPhone and an iPad,” he added.
“I really hate the idea that I’m a director making a film for an iPad. That’s kind of depressing. I think I would go and lie on a beach in Fiji and retire if I thought I was really doing that.” Jackson used plenty of technological wizardry to recreate J.R.R. Tolkien’s classic fantasy for the screen, shooting it in 3D and using 48 frames per second — double the normal amount — to produce a less jerky picture.
