In addition to that, Susan Sarandon was recently interviewed about The Lovely Bones at the premiere of her latest movie Speed Racer and had concerns about how she was directed, stating “I'm really curious to see what it's like because [Peter] kept pushing me to be more and more extreme and sometimes that's when you make your big mistakes so I'm not sure how it will come off — it will be interesting to see it from the point of view of the audience.” All of these factors seem to suggest that Peter Jackson might have developed a huge ego as a result of his recent success and may no longer be the giving collaborator that he once was. If this is true, the news would be quite unfortunate given the fact that Jackson once seemed like one of the few genuine and kind people working in Hollywood.

At this point, viewing the production contentious and disastrous is merely speculation. Film is an art form that requires so many collaborators and involves so many egos that there are inevitably personality conflicts and clashes. While The Lovely Bones production does seem troubled, there is absolutely no guarantee that the final film will be a disappointment. Apocalypse Now had arguably the most difficult production in the history of Hollywood, but the resulting film was a masterpiece. Even if Peter Jackson has become difficult to work with, he still has a track record of uniformly strong work that most filmmakers would kill for. The project probably won’t meet its rumored March 13, 2009 release date, but that doesn’t mean that it will be a disaster whenever it is finally screened. This news is just worrying because it seems as though one of the nicest people in Hollywood may no longer be worthy of the title. But I still don’t buy it…yet.–PB, News Extensions