Peter Jackson says Hobbit trilogy was a shambles

Peter Jackson says he was flying by the seat of his pants when he made the Hobbit trilogy, admitting he shot scenes with unfinished sets and scripts.

Jackson and others associated with the three Hobbit films have opened up about the films' rushed creation in new interviews released as part of The Battle of Five Armies DVD, released this week.

In the six-minute clip, available for viewing on YouTube and called "The Problem with The Battle of Five Armies", Jackson describes how he "made it up as I went along".

"I spent so much of The Hobbit feeling like I was not on top of it," Jackson admits candidly, saying it was a "high pressure situation".

"Because Guillermo Del Toro had to leave and I jumped in and took over, we didn't wind the clock back a year and a half and give me a year and a half prep to design the movie, which was different to what he was doing," Jackson says.

"It was impossible, and as a result of it being impossible I just started shooting the movie with most of it not prepped at all ... You're going on to a set and you're winging it, you've got these massively complicated scenes, no storyboards and you're making it up there and then on the spot."

Others spoken to in the clip say Jackson would arrive on set tired from working on the Tintin movie, and at one point disappeared for weeks because he got sick.

Jackson took over directing duties on the trilogy in 2010 when Del Toro left because of delays, and says he was forced to call shooting to a halt for two months to organise the climactic battle sequence of The Battle of Five Armies.

"We had allowed two months of shooting for that in 2012, and at some point when we were approaching that I went to our producers and the studio and said: 'Because I don't know what the hell I'm doing now, because I haven't got storyboards and prep, why don't we just finish earlier?'

"And so what that delay gives you is time for the director to clear his head and have some quiet time for inspiration to come about the battle, and start to really put something together."

The Battle of Five Armies was the worst-reviewed film of the series, reported The Guardian, with a 60 per cent approval rating on review aggregate site Rotten Tomatoes.

- nzherald.co.nz