The Hobbit

[beren]

Saw the first installment tonight in 3D.....loved it :)......entertaining all the way through, stunning action sequences and Martin Freeman as Bilbo is perfect. Being a avid fan of Tolkien's books and the LOTR films it's just great the The Hobbit journey has begun :thumbsup:

PS: Like Neil Finn's closing credit song Song of the Lonely Mountain

[ourkind]

How good was that!?!?!?

I watched it yesterday morning and likewise ... LOVED IT!

[mikerr]

I'm waiting for it to come on the Wireless!

Michael

[goober]

Agreed, very good. Went to see Skyfall last night (sold out!), so saw this in 3D in an almost empty theatre. The 200 minutes flew by.

Possible spoilers below ....
















Loved the visualization of Erebor. Radagast was ... interesting! He only gets a paragraph or two in the books. The actor who played Thorin was very good, moody and driven. Great that it used a lot of other sources to fill out the story, such as the White Council/Dol Goldur. Was not expecting that, and very pleasing to this Tolkien junkie.

[lacad01]

ditto :thumbsup: but wish the next two installments would be released sooner :)

[mithrandir]

I was just reading CNN's 10 best and worst movies of 2012. I don't remember ever hearing of most of their "best".

The Hobbit (3D) is in the worst list. Their comments:


Too long - 1/3 padding.
The plastic high-def 48 fps 3D.
Looks like a PS3 game.

Yanks running down a "foreign" film?
They sent a Jane Austen fan to a fantasy movie? (Hmmm. I'll have that problem when we go. SWMBO didn't like LOTR-ROTK - too dark and violent.)

[MortonH]

Glad to hear positive reviews from you guys. I was concerned about Martin Freeman being cast as Bilbo but seems he's ok in the role. I'm just not sure whether to go 3D or 2D. Haven't been to a 3D movie before and from what I've seen of 3D TVs in the shops I'm not sure I'm missing much.

[Octane]

3D is great. Go do it.

Look forward to seeing some eye candy when I get back from holidays and the rush has died down. :)

H

[multiweb]

Saw it in 3D with the family. Liked the very beginning best. It got a little bit longish in places after that and lacked a bit of pace but I reckon it's setting up the stage nicely for the next installments. Visuals were stunning though.

[LewisM]

Hate to say it, but I REALLY REALLY dislike Neil Finn's song.

The movie to me is like the rest of the series - too long and somewhat convoluted, though enjoyable enough. Never have been a LOTR books, let alone the movies.

[Ric]

I'm a big fan of the Hobbit and LOTR books so I'm quite looking forward to seeing the Hobbit come to life on the big screen.

I'll prefer to see it in 2D rather than 3D, for some reason 3D always hurts my eyes. I think I must strain to hard to see everything.

[beren]

I was worried about the 48fps making the film to "real", but in 3D think it works well, be interesting see how it works on the home screen when released on blue-ray. I thought the pace of the film was good didn't seem long to me but I admit the posterior was aching towards the end :). Worried also about how Jackson would translate the lighter feel of the Hobbit {and infusion of low brow humour} but glad it seemed to all work along with indications of the tie in with the events of the War of the Ring. The backstory of the dwarves was nicely done, Richard Artimage as Thorin excellent, along with the riddles in the dark sequence. I like all the little refrences portrayed in the film and the LOTR trilogy of middle earth history that a diehard fan would pick up on :). Not to keen on Radagast's 'alice in wonderland ' feel and some of the CGI affects . The last scene with the party looking out east towards distant Erebor and the Lonely Mountain is a nice reminder on the long wait for the second installment " The Desolation of Smaug"......and Evangeline Tillys appearance :D.

[TrevorW]

Why 3 movies just can't get that, "The Hobbit" in book form is only around 350 pages while the LOTR's is a 1000 odd, so how did they come up with an equal amount of film time, to much poetic license IMO.

[OICURMT]

MGM is a private American firm
New Line is owned by Time Warner, a publically traded American firm.

The film is "American", produced by a "foreigner" in made in a "foreign" land (i.e. Middle Earth :P) ...

My guess is most movies are now using similar business models. Spread the load, share the wealth, share the risk.


BTW: Rotten Tomatoes is currently rating the movie at 65%/42%... not so good...
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/the_hobbit_an_unexpected_journey/

[barx1963]

Saw it Boxing Day in 2D. Enjoyed it, Martin Freeman was good, much better character than what his name that was Frodo in LOTR. Only prob was evrytime I saw him I kept thinking of the scenes in Love Actually where he played a nude body double!
I though the fight scenes were a lttle over done, especially the Trolls and the Stone Giants. But I guess given this is the first of 3 installments it had to be done that way.
I was not looking forward to seeing Galadriel, but I think they hand;led that quite well by including the White Council.
Radagast was a pain in the butt! Annoying hippy I thought.

Anyways, that's my thoughts!

Malcolm

[beren]

It's too early yet to know how the The Hobbit trilogy will pan out or what creative embellishments Jackson and the screenwriters will include, but being a fan I'm just excited to see the book adapted visually with more latitude to covering the wider events briefly mentioned in the book and the tie into LOTR. When I saw the movie last night I went with a bunch of friends with varying degrees of interest but we all agreed it was a entertaining rush and judging by others around us it seemed to be well received. Being greedy The Silmarillion adapted to film would be perfect, trilogy of films might not be enough to cover it :D and its not much larger in page number then the Hobbit :lol:

[iceman]

I loved it! Thoroughly enjoyable and followed the book quite well, but not a huuuuge fan of the brown wizard sequence.

[04Stefan07]

Have not read anything here as I will be seeing it next weekend :)

[Shark Bait]

I went to see The Hobbit with my Boy today. He doesn't know it, but the movie was a reward for making a big effort with his reading. We read the book together a few months ago. He has just finished his prep year, so I read most of it but he had to read the first page of each chapter (with a little help). Some of the scenes had him hanging on but he got through it.

I was wondering how they could justify stretching the book out to three movies. I have no concerns now. It ticked all the boxes for me.

[clive milne]

The ja ja binks of middle earth.

[iceman]

LOL a good analogy.

[lacad01]

Ah common, he's just had a few too many mushrooms...nothing can be as annoying as Ja Ja :)

[TrevorW]

Watched it last night OK although 3d not my cup of tea nor as impressive as anticipated. Padded out in some spots, I'll have to re read the book to jog my memory but I don't recall all the dwarfs getting captured by the trolls.

No bad but not as good as the original LOTR but there again this may be due to it being out of sync story line wise.

[barx1963]

All the dwarves were captured by the Trolls in the book, but there wasn't the almighty fight. The fight here in the movie was a bit of padding methinks.

Malcolm