Wrong, sort of. Jackson had told them that he thought they could make The Lord of the Rings into two movies. Jackson did not insist on three movies, he thought two would be fine, he just knew that one wasn't enough. Anyway, it was developed for 18 months as only two movies. But when New Line came in, they wanted 3 movies, and that was great for him.
So, there ya go."We always wanted to make more than one film", explains Jackson. "For starters, we made a decision at the very beginning that you could never do Lord of the Rings as one film, which a lot of people have tried to do. I think that's one of the reasons why it hasn't been made for 50 years, because there have been scripts written and there have been filmmakers who have sort of dabbled with the project over the years that have tried to put it into one script and have failed, so we thought, we're definitely not gonna make one."
Originally, Jackson recalls, "we were gonna make two, and Miramax was developing the project with us for 18 months as two films. And then ultimately when New Line came on board it was New Line's idea to make three. That was perfect for us, because obviously it's like the three books."