Excitement builds for The Hobbit premiere

At the time of writing, tomorrow evening's 21:15 screening of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - the first in a new prequel trilogy set in the same word as The Lord of the Rings - at Eden Cinemas has nearly filled up.

Clearly, Malta is far from exempt from the excitement surrounding Kiwi director Peter Jackson's return to Oxford-linguist-turned-novelist JRR Tolkien's perennial fantasy land (Middle Earth), as fans across the world eagerly await the global premiere of this 'prequel' to the Oscar-winning, million-dollar raking The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

The film, which tells the back story to the 'Rings saga, will feature returning cast members from the Lord of the Rings films include Ian McKellen as the beloved wizard Gandalf the Grey, with Hugo Weaving and Cate Blanchett as eleven higher-ups Elrond and Galadriel, while Martin Freeman (The Office, Sherlock) will take over from Ian Holm as a younger version of the titular 'hobbit': Bilbo Baggins.

Locally, Hobbit-associated fanfare is in full swing, with a mini-seminar on Tolkien's work and its enduring influence, organised by Justin Camilleri and Fleur Vella, taking place at the General Workers' Union building held last Monday, while Eden Cinemas have announced that, with the release of The Hobbit, they will be inaugurating a new digital projector at their premises which will enable them to screen the film at 48 - as opposed to the standard 24 - frames per second, "which is the way it's meant to be seen".

The premiere of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey also coincides with the novel's 75th anniversary. Effectively written as a bedtime story for his children, Tolkien published the slim volume on 21 September, 1937, without any direct plans to expand it into the now world-famous, pioneering fantasy trilogy.

The relatively simple tale tells the story of an unassuming 'hobbit' - a breed of obstinately unadventurous, diminutive folk bearing large hairy feet and nestling in the sleepy village of 'the Shire' - Bilbo Baggins, whose comfortable existence is disturbed by an unexpected visit from Gandalf the Grey, a wizard who sends him off on an adventure, 13 hardy-and-rowdy 'dwarves' in tow, to retrieve a stash of gold stolen by the devious dragon Smaug.

Crucially however, Bilbo stumbles across an important piece of jewellery around half-way through the adventure he has been thrust into: the fateful 'One Ring', which he 'wins' from a game of riddles he plays with the strange cave creature Gollum...

During last Monday's seminar at the GWU building - attended by a healthy smattering of local Tolkien fans - literary students and fantasy enthusiasts got together to celebrate the legacy of Tolkien's literary output.

One of the speakers at the event, Mark-Anthony Fenech - who penned a B.A. dissertation on Tolkien's meticulously constructed fantasy world - spoke about one of Tolkien's motivations: the desire to create, through Middle Earth, a mythology that was exclusive to Britain, because he "feared that the country had no mythology of his own".

Another participant, Michael Spiteri, predicted that The Hobbit films - which, like The Lord of the Rings, will be expanded into a trilogy - will have a comparable impact to that of its original, 'parent' trilogy.

"A new generation will keep this fandom going on even further, especially since they will have something to look forward to these coming years. I think the local fan base is very excited, though obviously not as excited as way back in 2001, because LOTR was given a fresh outlook through modern technology."

The increasing popularity of 3D features, as well as the aforementioned 48 frames-per-second screening option, ensure that Peter Jackson's oeuvre will once again received the most high-tech treatment possible - a prospect Eden Leisure Group's Director, Simon De Cesare appears keen to capitalise on.

"We are constantly striving to remain at the forefront of the cinema experience in Malta and through a significant investment, we are now able to show our customers the future of cinema. Peter Jackson himself is passionately urging people to see it in 48 frames per second which is the way it was meant to be seen," De Cesare said.