Didn't the director change halfway through with Peter Jackson left essentially trying to polish a turd? There was too much cgi which just looked crap. Look at the orcs in the hobbit and compare them to the orcs in lotr. Plus all the added nonsense of Legolas and the women elf whatever she was called.
Loved LOTR books and movies and The Hobbit movies just helped carry it all on for me so it’s a big thumbs up from me!
Me to. Way to much over thinking on this thread. I doubt even the biggest Hobbit fan doesn't thing the 3 film franchise wasn't a bit overblown. But hey it was a fun romp. Even the most corny lines "because it's real" are just a bit of fun 😊.
If you think the film's and the book are shit (they aren't) why give anything to do with the Hobbit a moments thought ??
The films did a good job of how tragic the dwarves are, and Thorin comes across as a hero better than I remember from the book.
But ultimately that's because the focus comes away from Bilbo and his very sheltered perspective. It goes that way from the first moment, when we see, immediately, the destruction of Dale in flashback from an ancient Bilbo writing his memoirs just before his eleventy-first birthday. In the book, we open with a small, smug, unpromising little person who knows nothing about the world and grows through the book from the disaster of uninvited guests cutting the cheese wrong through to people he knows well being killed, via a lot of learning about the dangerousness and tragedy of the world and a lot of learning how to live in it. Even so, at the start of The Fellowship of the Ring, Bilbo still lacks any inkling that (for example) Gandalf can fight a Balrog. There's a whole new journey into confusion and terror left for Frodo to make in LOTR.
The Hobbit films plug us straight into the wider story that the hobbits themselves are unaware of. We get burdened by everything that is bothering Gandalf, Galadriel and Saruman about the return of the Necromancer, and it inevitably changes a lot in doing that. It could have made that radical change of tone from the book and still been amazing, but for me it's flashes of brilliance in a very long 9 hours! LOTR by contrast feels mostly amazing. Hey ho.
I wonder how much of it was down to studio interference. There was definitely a decent film hiding inbetween the needless padding and bad CGI. I honestly thought Martin Freeman was excellent as Bilbo.
Don't know if it's studio or Jackson. After LOTR he went OTT with the length of King Kong (and there's an extended version) and CGI.
He was at his best with The Frighteners (maybe even Bad Taste).
But yeah, the padded story of all the other characters, some which Bilbo and the audience (if this is the first they watch) haven't met yet, is just unnecessary. It detracts from the fun little tale of Bilbo and dwarfs going in search of the gold and the adventures they have on the way.
it's the 'mood-enhancing' music/sound that does my head in. Any time the audience is supposed to feel anything the orchestra chimes in. So many modern films are guilty of this. Just let the action and dialogue drive it!
Like the book. Like LOTR too (book and films).
Hobbit films are turgid. Pointlessly deviate from the source material and end up with an overly long horrendous CGI mess. That scene in the second one when they’re floating in barrels down the river is one of the worst I’ve seen.
Escaping in barrels is in the book, but without all the orc action.
I wonder when Jackson will tackle the Silmarillion...
...and how many films will it take (sweepstake anyone).
Isn’t this on TV tonight ?
Bet you’re all asleep by 2130.. 😜👎👎
Wasn’t the escaping in barrels that I was bothered about, it is as the awful CGI and the elf running on heads of orcs whilst shooting other orcs that did for me.
