The life of Lord of the Rings author JRR Tolkien is to be the subject of two competing biopics, according to the Hollywood Reporter.



Twentieth Century Fox offshoot Fox Searchlight announced plans for Tolkien, which is set to focus on the writer's academic career and experiences during the first world war, in November. Now a smaller independent movie, Tolkien & Lewis, will focus on his friendship with CS Lewis, author of the Narnia books. The Expendables 2's Simon West will direct a movie that aims to target lucrative faith-based US audiences via an Easter release date.



Tolkien, a devout Catholic, was instrumental in re-introducing his previously agnostic friend to Christianity while the pair were academics at Oxford, prior to the second world war. But the pair later fell out over religious differences, as Lewis's fame grew in theological circles.

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"Lewis becoming the poster boy for Christianity upset Tolkien," Wernher Pramschufer, of Tolkien & Lewis production company Attractive Films told the Hollywood Reporter. "And obsessive genius Tolkien is blocked, terrified of finishing The Fellowship of the Ring, for fear of the strange, psychotic visions which torture him."

Fox Searchlight's rival Tolkien biopic, from writer and Tolkien "superfan" David Gleeson, appears to be covering some similar territory. The LA Times said last year that the film would examine the writer's academic career at Pembroke College, Oxford, as well as his struggles as a second lieutenant and later signals officer on the western front of the first world war, showing how these experiences informed Tolkien's creation of the high fantasy genre. It is not known if the film will focus on The Hobbit author's friendship with Lewis, with whom he formed a loose literary unit titled The Inklings.

Both biopics could yet run into objections from Tolkien's heirs and rights holders for the author's back catalogue. An earlier attempt at a story about the writer's work as a codebreaker during the second world war, tentatively titled Mirkwood, stalled after the Tolkien estate refused to offer its support. And Warner Bros and MGM, which brought The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogies to cinemas, might look dimly on any attempt to tie Tolkien's life too closely to his famous creations.

The popularity of films based on Tolkien's work nevertheless suggests both biopics could find plenty of traction with audiences. Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy took more than $3bn (£1.7bn) across the globe, and the New Zealand film-maker's current three-part adaptation of The Hobbit has so far taken almost $2bn (£1.16bn) with one film still to be released.