As I suspected on reading this, sadly this rumour is more nonsense rubbish made up by the bloody British tabloid press it seems. Here’s an official word from Jackson’s assistant, from
http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,3661599a1870,00.html
No Dam Busters remake for Jackson
08 May 2006
New Zealand film director Peter Jackson will not be directing any remake of the World War 2 film The Dam Busters, says a spokesman.
Jackson was working on the screenplay of his next movie The Lovely Bones, said Matt Dravitzki.
He rejected any suggestion Jackson would be directing a $NZ293 million re-make of The Dam Busters, as reported by Britain’s The Mail on Sunday newspaper yesterday.
The only other film work Jackson had scheduled was as executive producer of a $100 million movie version of the video game Halo.
Filming of The Lovely Bones, based on the book by Alice Sebold, will start early next year.
The Mail on Sunday said Jackson had already done test shots in New Zealand of a Lancaster bomber, one of only two of the 617 Squadron planes still airborne, and had met RAF veterans in New Zealand to discuss the project.
But Mr Dravitzki said Jackson’s interest in planes from World Wars 1 and 2 was well known, and whenever an aviation movie from those eras came around, journalists assumed it would attract his attention.
AdvertisementAdvertisementIn fact, Jackson was working on replicas for the Aviation Heritage Centre at Omaka, near Blenheim.
Jackson and Weta workshop are undertaking the bulk of some of the exhibits.
Jackson recently cut a special deal with Te Papa to obtain a vintage Sopwith Camel airplane engine for the display at Omaka Aerodrome.
The 1954 Dam Busters film which featured Richard Todd as Wing Commander Guy Gibson and Michael Redgrave as scientist Barnes Wallis told the story of a “bouncing bomb” that skipped across the surface of lakes to destroy two hydro-electric dams.
The movie about the 1943 Operation Chastise, in which 19 Lancasters destroyed the Mohne and Eder dams in Germany’s industrial Ruhr Valley, was based on Paul Brickhill’s 1951 book about the 617 Squadron’s low-level bombing mission.
Its film rights are now owned by former TV entertainer Sir David Frost, and his company, Paradine Productions, said it had not heard of any involvement by Jackson.
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