BEFORE: I've got to step back a bit and explain background with "The Lord of the Rings", which is sort of connected to my "Star Wars" history, since the first LOTR film came out in 1978, right after the first "Star Wars" film. My Mom introduced me to the books, she'd been hospitalized for a time and bought the books at the hospital gift shop, then read them cover to cover and encouraged me to do the same. Since then I've grown up and now I tell the young kids about a time when we had ONLY three Star Wars films, and "Lord of the Rings" was just one animated feature, plus two crappy TV specials ("The Hobbit" and "Return of the King"). I've now made the pilgrimage to the Church of Comic-Con many times, where all faiths are welcome: Star Wars, Star Trek, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Pirates of the Caribbean, and even (ugh) Twilighters. Jeez, I've also hung out with Ralph Bakshi and seen Sean Astin signing autographs...
So linking from "Jack the Giant Slayer", I'm going through "Star Wars: Episode II", where Ewan McGregor co-starred with Christopher Lee (last seen in "Hugo"). And I'll connect to tomorrow's film through "Star Wars" as well.
THE PLOT: A reluctant Hobbit, Bilbo Baggins, sets out on an "unexpected journey" to the Lonely Mountain with a spirited group of Dwarves to reclaim their stolen mountain home from a dragon named Smaug.
AFTER: This turned out to be a great place to drop in the "Hobbit" movie, because of all the connections to last night's film. Giants abound in both films, plus there's a glimpse of a treasure room in both films, and both work off the themes of little people vs. bigger people.
If you read my (so-called) reviews regularly, you might conclude that I either love a film, or nitpick it to death. Tonight will be one of those rare occasions where I do both. Time for an open letter to director Peter Jackson: (ahem...)
What were you THINKing? I love ya, Mr. Jackson, but you're messing with J.R.R. freakin' Tolkien here, how DARE you! (OK, now that's out of the way, please allow me to explain.)
The "Hobbit" book was meant to be a teaser, a book shorter than the other three, in fact you can probably knock it out during a long bus trip. (OK, maybe two, but if you've got to make a round trip, you're covered.) But now if this film is pushing 3 hours, and the next two do the same, then we're looking at NINE hours of Hobbit story, and that's longer than it takes to read the damn thing. Since a film doesn't have to describe everything with wordage, it's supposed to be SHORTER than its source material, not longer. (Possible exception: "The Ten Commandments")
I'm no doctor, but what you've got appears to be a severe case of Prequelitis - George Lucas had a bad case of this, setting up one's own previous work, but eventually he worked through it. This occurs when we all know what happens at the start of Movie #4, so therefore we all know how Movie #3 has to end. But this is a more severe case, with characters from the LOTR saga like Elrond, Galadriel (and later, Legolas, I've heard) showing up, presumably, throughout the whole "Hobbit" saga.
Let me frame my complaints (Oh, who am I kidding, I'm gonna give this thing a high score in the end...) by telling a story about a subway graffiti artist. His identity remains unknown, but I'm a fan of his work - he didn't just write "gay" on people's foreheads or give people eyepatches and blocked-out teeth, this guy was to defacing posters what Picasso was to cubism. He changed the game by seeking out the letters he needed from one poster, extracting them with an X-Acto blade and affixing them to the next poster, completely changing its meaning. This is a bad example, but if the slogan on one poster read "Beef. It's what's for dinner.", he would find an appropriate letter "R" on another poster, and affix it so the slogan would now read "Beer. It's what's for dinner." Most of his work was in fact more clever than this, but you get the idea. He only made the changes that were necessary to enhance the original message.
(ASIDE: I had a roommate years ago who attempted something similar, when he saw a poster that said "Art Rocks at the Whitney Museum", he used a Sharpie to change "Rocks" to "Rots". Yeah, he got arrested for that one.)
Let's start with the opening framing sequence - with Bilbo writing his memoir, with the unnecessary addition of Frodo. We GET it, Bilbo is younger than he used to be (unlike me). But Frodo was NOT in the Hobbit book, so he doesn't belong here. We don't need this connection to LOTR, because that comes naturally later when Frodo is introduced to take up the mantle of the Ring. When the party invitations came in the mail, I thought we were going to see Bilbo's goodbye party all over again, but finally this time with the addition of Tom Bombadil...
Next comes the history of the Arkenstone - which constitutes a flashback within a flashback (or is it a flashforward). These should be avoided at all costs - it's too easy for an audience to lose their place when you "Inception" a scene within a scene like this. All things considered, this was a welcome addition because it creates more understanding about the dwarves' motivation, but this could have easily been moved to the scene where the dwarves hire Bilbo, and this would have given Bilbo more motivation to join them as well.
Now I come to the lead orc - Azog, is it? I'm thinking he wasn't named in the novel, and he didn't have as much of a back story. But I'll allow this one too, since it makes the pursuit of the dwarves by the orcs more personal, and thus less tangential to the overall quest.
But Radegast the Brown? A wizard who's BARELY in the LOTR trilogy, and was in fact cut from those films? What does he bring to the table, this crazy old nut who eats too many mushrooms (as opposed to Gandalf, who smokes too much weed...) This guy rides on a sled pulled by rabbits, which admittedly is pretty cool, but plotwise, this guy brings nothing to the table, except to let us know that a bunch of bad stuff is coming. WE KNOW THAT! So instead of telling us this, just show us the bad stuff already!
As for the Necromancer - plot-wise this is a dead end, except that it seems to set up the presence of Sauron in the LOTR trilogy. But if I'm reviewing THIS film on its own merits, the Neuromancer is too vague of a threat, and doesn't seem to interact with any of the main characters - so why bring him into it at all?
NITPICK POINT: Let's talk about flying eagles for a second. I realize that like many of this film's elements, they set up a major point in the following trilogy, so this is foreshadowing at its finest. They also help pull off a save at what seems to be our heroes' darkest hour. But why didn't Gandalf just arrange for them to fly on eagles all the way to the Lonely Mountain? Wouldn't this have been a lot faster? But this is a TOLKIEN N.P., not a Peter Jackson one.
So, Mr. Jackson, let's play the riddle game - what has a beginning, middle and end, yet seems to go on forever? OK, yes, my watchlist does that too, but I think you see my point. You're doing a great job, all things considered, but just quit ADDING stuff. I might have rated this one point higher, making this film a contender for Best Film Seen in 2014, if you had exercised just a modicum of restraint.
Also starring Martin Freeman (last heard in "The Pirates! Band of Misfits"), Ian McKellen (last seen in "Six Degrees of Separation"), Ian Holm (last seen in "Naked Lunch"), Richard Armitrage (last seen in "Captain America: The First Avenger"), Andy Serkis (last heard in "Arthur Christmas"), Cate Blanchett (last seen in "Elizabeth: The Golden Age"), Hugo Weaving (last heard in "Happy Feet Two"), with cameos from Elijah Wood (ditto), Lee Pace (last seen in "Lincoln"), Barry Humphries (last seen in "Nicholas Nickleby"), Bret McKenzie, Benedict Cumberbatch (last seen in "War Horse").
RATING: 8 out of 10 wargs
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