Peter Jackson’s got some new rivals: a group of schoolboys who’ve made their own feature film adaptation of The Hobbit.

70 boys aged eight to thirteen from Tower House prep school in south-west London appear in the movie, which was made on a shoestring budget at various locations across the country.

Despite the lack of funds, the film boasts a CGI dragon and better production values than you might imagine, courtesy of a production company run by the father of one of the young actors.

In the trailer, Bilbo Baggins can be seen meeting with the wizard Gandalf (played by a boy who sounds uncannily like Outnumbered’s Daniel Roche) and setting off on his quest:

Tower House’s head of drama Paul Geary, who directed the film, told the Evening Standard: "The boys showed great dedication to this project which shows the quality of drama that a school can produce.

"It was our ambition to do something totally unique, something no other school has ever done. As far as I am aware we are the first prep school to do a full feature-length film."

Joey Whittaker, the 13-year-old from Richmond who played Bilbo Baggins, said: “It was a really great experience. It is interesting seeing it and seeing you have spent two hours on something that goes by in a minute.”  

The film was premiered at London’s Curzon Renoir Cinema earlier this month and has since been screened at Tower House.