Into the Mountains

I don’t actually believe, given the personnel problems with The Hobbit, and Peter Jackson’s other commitments, that the movie’s really going to be made any time soon. But that said, if it does happen, Martin Freeman would be a dandy Bilbo Baggins. I didn’t adore the movie adaptation of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, both because I think it’s a hard book to adapt — too much colliding at once, and without the time to unfold that Doctor Who has — and in part because my favorite book in the series is actually So Long, And Thanks for All the Fish. But Freeman has a nice, relaxed air to him, and a round face that lends itself to a sense of wonder. In Love, Actually he made the act of asking a woman out to coffee seem like an adventure (which, of course, it is). The question for me is whether he’s got the drive and curiosity to show the desire for a quest, or to want something enough to trick someone to get it. I’d certainly like to see him get a chance to try.