Peter Jackson sometimes likes leaving things late. Just one day before shooting was to begin on The Lovely Bones and he has ditched one of Hollywood’s brightest young stars to go with someone older and more experienced.

It happened with Lord of the Rings all those years ago when Viggo Mortensen replaced Stuart Townsend (sadly, his career has gone no where since) for the role of Aragon and it’s now it’s happened with Ryan Gosling, as Mark Wahlberg will be taking over his role in The Lovely Bones.

Wahlberg who has had a string of hit movies and roles recently, will play Jack Salmon, the grieving father of the young murdered girl whose story is told from Heaven looking down below on everyone’s lives her loss has effected. It’s said Gosling dropped out of the picture on Friday because of creative differences, after going so far as gaining 20 pounds and growing a beard for the role.

Jackson quickly called up Wahlberg and after he read the script, he signed on the dotted line just yesterday.

So what do we make of this?

Well we were all rather curious at the casting of Gosling as his wife in the film was already slotted to be Rachel Weisz, who is consideraby older than Gosling. Many thought Jackson had most definitely cast too young and despite Gosling being uber talented, I dare say the addition of Wahlberg will please many.

Even though he probably hasn’t had much time to learn his part before being put in front of the camera.

So high drama once again on a Peter Jackson film.

I like Wahlberg just fine, he should do a good job here and having not read the book and just being an outsider looking in, I can see far more chemistry between him and Weisz. Interestingly, Wahlberg was saying he had been training hard everyday for the boxing biopic The Fighter, which now looks as if it has been delayed until next year, with Aronofsky helming The Wrestler instead.

Will Mark be too buff for this then and did it play a factor in his casting?