I've seen the Hobbit twice now, (2D 24fps &3D 24fps) and personally, I've never really gotten on with 3D in films. I find it a bit distracting.
That aside, I Thought this was a great film. The tone changed throughout, which in my opinion followed the story well. The acting was incredibly good. Particularly from Martin Freeman and Andy Serkis, where the oppressive feeling of threat and dread made the scene between them the best in the film. Though special mention should really go to Ken Stott, who was excellent as Balin.

I also want to say how nice it is to see that costumes and props that appear in the LOTR films have not been altered slightly so as to sell a whole new batch of merchandise. That really gets my goat. Special effects were wonderful. (What else would you expect from Weta).

Watching it again, I could see how the various aspects surrounding the main story began to weave a tale that shows its place in the grand 'history' of middle earth. The aspects that until now only hardcore Tolkein fans would have previously been aware of. In this respect, it seems that the perspective of this film will alter when the second and third ones are released.

However, some of the scenes were too long and rambling. In LOTR, Jackson removed some characters to streamline and keep the plot going (Tom Bombadil, Glorfindol, Beregond etc), yet seems to have kept every little detail of this book in. This reduced the plot to a crawl at points and I would say that some of the scenes should have been shortened considerably.

Personally I would have reduced the length of the Troll scene, the Bag-End could have lost a few minutes and removed the fighting rock giants entirely. (A great scene on its own, but it slowed the plot down too much.) I would have also shortened the goblin caves. Take about 20 minutes out and it would be even better. For my own sake I have never gotten on with slow-motion of someone saying something. e.g. towards the end of Return of the King, Every name Frodo said seemed to be in slo-mo. SSAAAAAAAAAMMMMMMM, GGGGIIIIMMMLLLLIII. There's just no need. My one criticism of Peter Jackson's film-making is that I find his over the top use of Slo-mo for everything quite annoying. There was a fair amount of it in the Hobbit.

Criticism aside, I loved this film. It's not often that I go to the cinema to see a film twice. For me a excellent 8/10

Review Home • Submit a Review