He might not be directing the Hobbit, after all, but Guillermo del Toro’s time working with Peter Jackson seems like it shaped him a little. For one, he’s reportedly lost 40 lbs (which will surely make for a Biggest Loser reveal as dramatic as PJ’s LOTR-to- King- Kong transformation.) More to business, he’s just christened a huge studio, Mirada, with “a champagne bottle and some blood” and it sounds like it’s hewn from the same granite of thinking that Jackson’s Weta Workshop was built.
The 25,000 square facility in Marina del Rey will house every aspect of today’s “transmedia.” Listing the kind of departments and output they’ll have would seem excessive compared to just saying, succinctly, that they’ll have everything and they'll make everything. Honestly, it’s probably more fruitful to check out their site and search for what they aren’t doing (and maybe even submit a resume if you're a budding effects artist.)
Considering that Deadline’s saying At the Mountains of Madness (that seemingly sure-fire 3D project the bull man’s directing and James Cameron’s producing) is still waiting for a “Go!” call before the end of the year, I figure part of the impetus for this might be to set up an infrastructure for del Toro to give some of his 57 (or so) in-development projects a better shot as getting made. Viva Mirada!
Being more like Jackson is a good thing. I feel they're both kind of contemporaries of the same types of films and they both are extremely involved in their work. In fact... they're almost sounding like the same person...
My feelings exactly!