Director Case Study: Peter Jackson

Early Life

Peter Jackson is a New Zealand director who is most famous for directing the revolutionary Lord of the Rings saga in 2001. He has won many awards for his work such as 3 Academy Awards for best director, best picture and best-adapted screenplay. Jackson was born on 31 October 1961 in Wellington and was raised at the nearby coastal town of Pukerua Bay. His parents - Joan, a factory worker and housewife, and William Jackson, a wages clerk - were both immigrants from England. He is married to screenwriter and composer Fran Walsh and has 2 children.

Early Work

Jackson started his directing career by shooting Black Comedy films throughout the 80s such as Bad Taste and Meet the Feebles which were more cult films operating on low budgets (With Bad Taste having a budget of $26,000), they were filmed in many locations around New Zealand and received funding from Japanese and European investors. In 1992 Jackson released Braindead which is seen as a landmark in splatter movies, due to its unconventional nature of keeping zombies in, instead of out.

Increasing popularity

Jackson broke through onto the Hollywood scene in 1994 with his original screenplay Heavenly Creatures which was based on a real life murder case in Christchurch in 1950. The film was well reviewed due to how well it handled the delicate subject matter, it was nominated at the Academy Awards for Best Original Screenplay and Jackson had established himself as a big budget director. He then signed a contract with the American distributer Mirimax. This allowed him to Direct his first big budget film in 1996, The Frighteners. This growth in popularity allowed Jackson to improve his special effects and props department WETA to expand and gain new uses such as WETA Digital. The Frighteners however was considered a commercial failure and this along with a fall out with the New Zealand Film Commission caused a rough patch in Jacksons career.

   

The Lord of the Rings

Jackson then went on to make the best films the world has ever seen, the masterpiece that is The Lord of the Rings Saga. Production started in 1999 and the films were released in 2001, 2002 and 2003 winning 11 Oscars and grossing nearly $3 Billion. Jackson was praised for his loyalty to the books, brilliant imagery creating Middle Earth, brilliant music by Howard Shore and fantastic acting from the cast. Lord of the Rings is now seen as a landmark in movie making and revolutionized cinema going for the future, a stroke of true genius.

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Inter years between Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit

Universal Studios signed Peter Jackson for a second time to remake the 1933 classic King Kong—the film that inspired him to become a film director as a child. It was another cinema hit and grossed $550 million worldwide. Jackson completed an adaptation of Alice Sebold's bestseller, The Lovely Bones we he said was a nice relief from his usual grand epics, the film did well worldwide and Stanely Tucci's performance in it was nominated for an Academy Award.

Current Projects

In December 2011 Peter Jackson collaborated with directors Stephen Spielberg and Edgar Wright to create The Adventures of Tintin which is now turning into a major franchise and a sequel is set to come out in the next few years. The first film was a major success and made of $250 Million profit. He is also working on The Hobbit which is a trilogy epic returning to Middle Earth once again. The first two films have already made approximately $2 Billion and the finale is released in December 2014.

Style and Methods

Jackson is known to be an obsessive perfectionist when shooting his movies, sometimes spending whole days to shoot a single conversation. He does many different takes from a massive variety of angles to get the best options when editing. He also insists on filming most of his movies in his native New Zealand. One of his most common visual trademarks is shooting close-ups of actors with wide-angle lenses. Jackson also cameo's in nearly all his films and has even made cameos in other films such as Hot Fuzz.

Why does Peter Jackson Inspire Me?

Jackson inspires me because of his perfectionist attitude and makes sure that every aspect of his scenes are correct to the most minute detail, this can be seen in The Lord of the Rings where tiny details which he concentrated on made it such a massive success. He doesn't lack ambition and puts his heart into his work instead of being a Hollywood sell out who's only interested in making money.