With The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies released this week, director Peter Jackson puts a nice bow ribbon on his tales from Middle Earth... at least for now, for the director is not ruling out a return just yet. For now, though, his next project will, decidedly, be smaller: as he is currently working on adapting several true New Zealand stories into his next film.

In Variety's profile piece on the filmmaker, he revealed he and his writing partner/wife Fran Walsh currently are writing this new project. The currently untitled film will be "similar in tone and scope," he says, to his acclaimed drama Heavenly Creatures.

“We really feel a bigger urge now to not continue with another Hollywood blockbuster for a while, but to go back and tell some New Zealand stories," Jackson said.

After making three big blockbusters in a row, it's not hard to see why Jackson would like to scale down for his next film or two. Just because he's stepping away from the studio system for a bit now, though, doesn't mean he's leaving blockbusters and new-age technology anytime soon. In fact, at the moment, he is also working on "toying with virtual reality" and "studying entertainment opportunities," and will also contemplate making another trip to Middle Earth if the J.R.R. Tolkein estate lets their other properties be adapted.

"If I had to start tomorrow, I would say no, because I definitely would appreciate a break to clear my head and get my little New Zealand stories done, which is where my passion and my heart is heading now," Jackson said on the Middle Earth matter. "But ask me in two or three years, and I’d probably say yes. It would be hard to see another filmmaker go into this world, because I certainly have an emotional ownership of it.”

Where these updates leave some of his other rumored projects is up in the air. At one point, Jackson said he was making a sequel to The Adventures of Tintin next, but the article makes no mention of the film. He was also on Warner Bros. shortlist to adapt Ready Player One, but it seems like he'll pass on that opportunity, if he didn't already.

Regardless of what Jackson makes next, he'll likely find an audience to see his projects, no matter how they turn out.

Image courtesy of INFPhoto.com