You are right, Grondy. The first movie might leave off almost anywhere deemed midplot to a story which has more in it than the main plotline of The Hobbit.

For myself, I think a good place to stop would be "Barrels Out of Bond," that is, if this is even included. After all, the longest chapter in the book is "Flies and Spiders." But most of the action in that chapter is in the last part when Bilbo and the dwarves battle the spiders and afterward discover Thorin missing. I rather think that hopefully we shall see the inside of the Elvenking's caves. Maybe we will even see Legolas--looking (how shall we say?) younger, if that's possible for an elf. So if the story goes that far, I think a good point to stop would be when Bilbo finds the means of escape, the dwarves are packed in barrels, and they are all flung into the Forest River. We might even follow them out (during end-credits) to where they are lashed together, and maybe even to the bay of Laketown.

In other words, the first movie would be concerned with getting from Hobbiton to within hailing distance of the Mountain. The second movie would be concerned with immediate preparations to arrive at the Mountain, what happened there, and what happened as a result. The climax, as in the book, would be the Battle of the Five Armies. But of course, even if this sounds logical to others here, it will not necessarily be the "logic" chosen by the movies' producers and directors. Still, with the penchant movie-makers have for depicting war and the more gruesome side of Tolkien's subcreation, I suspect this division might offer some possibilities.

Gandalf

Heres a few tidbits about the movie straight from the horses mouth as it were.

Concerning any delays...

Well, it's not really been delayed, because we've never announced the date. I mean it's sort of interesting because the studio [MGM] has never greenlit The Hobbit, so therefore The Hobbit has never been officially announced as a 'go' project, nor have we ever announced a date. But there's so much interest that people — newspapers and magazines, of their own account, say, ah, it's likely to film in May, it's likely to film in June, it's likely to film in September. People make this stuff up. And then if it's not filming in June, you get a story saying, "The Hobbit's been delayed." But it's never actually been announced.

Concerning returning actors....

We haven't signed any actors up yet, because we couldn't do that until they greenlight the movie. But I would imagine that if we get a green light within the next month or two, we would be hopefully making some casting announcements by, I guess, the middle of the year. We've done a little bit of auditioning, but we haven't really done any meetings with actors or anything yet. We've just been totally committed to the scripts. Everything's a little bit later than what people assume it is. I think people think we've been sort of doing secret casting
I mean, any character that's returning from The Lord of the Rings, we obviously would love the same actors to play. But even those actors haven't been approached yet, or there [haven't] been any deals done. And the studio wouldn't organically do any of that until they've greenlit the film.

And finally, concerning shooting........

We've just delivered the script. Literally last week, we delivered the second of the two screenplays—the first draft. So the studio's got both scripts now, which is a milestone; and if anything was holding it up, it was us doing the screenplays, because we'd just been writing as fast as we can, but it took us this long to get them finished. So we take whatever responsibility there is for the speed. And we're now in the process of budgeting the films, and then hopefully we'll get to a budget the studio [people] are happy with, and they'll greenlight the movies and we'll announce the shooting dates. I'd be pretty optimistic that we'll be shooting before the end of the year. I would imagine October, November, we'd be shooting by. I'm not announcing it, though.

So we're a while off yet but overall good news...it still all happening.

Well, it is not the place here, but just to make a starter: I think Avatar was not bad, but really they've spent fife times more money on commercial than on the movie and it was a waste...

If the Hobit is meant to be done the "Avatar-way" I will still watch it more times than I did Avatar (which was twice, because I did it once with my friends and once with my wife). Anyway, the LoTR style will be more appreciated where I am standing. Animation should support the real shots, not substitute.

I am proposing and "angry mob" movement of Tolkien fans against making the Hobbit look like a Futuristic Sci-Fi.

I was first quite shocked by this news, as I had grown used to the idea, and had been content with it since del Toro is a Tolkien fan himself.
All I can hope now is that the vacant position is filled by someone with real talent and a passion for Tolkien (though of course, the ultimate dream would be seeing PJ steering this ship again).
Any thoughts?

I hope everyone who reads our Frontpage News item to which the above link points read all the way through, especially the last line.

I was taking it seriously until the Smaug bit You had me goin' Grondy!

Two pieces of good news:

1. The genius who composed, orchestrated and conducted the soundtrack for the LotR films, Howard Shore, is going to do it again for the Hobbit.

And (even better, in my opinion):

2. Peter Jackson is now in talks to direct the Hobbit after del Toro's departure.

Well, that news from Arwen-Undomiel might be old - PJ was not going to direct the Hobbit, until del Toro left - and right now, accroding to various sources including theOneRing.net, Jackson is having talks with the producers and studio over whether he should step in or not.

You have a point yes but of i found PJs LotR much closer to the book than any of the Harry Potter movies.cinematically presenting i guess you need to make certain changes but distortion of facts is not right.i just hope whoever makes Hobbit does not chop out important stuff.

Movies are just about making as much money as possible nowadays. Imho, the only possible way to try to stick as close to the source material as possible, is a mini-series. There is an upcoming one about Game of Thrones, for instance.

Many scenes of PJ's movies were close to the books in anything but tone and spirit. The only thing in the movies that felt really Tolkien were the beginning scenes in the Shire until the Long Expected Party, and the ending. Everything in between was highly erratic, to say the least.