The Hobbit (2012/2013)

[Cyrrex]

Heh.  "No animals harming during the filming of the movie."  Up to 27 dying of natural and unnatural causes outside of filiming, however.  And goodness knows how many tasty, tasty animals were slaughtered for meals for cast and crew.  I stopped reading when I saw the letters p, e, t and a.

Meanwhile, according to a random google search I just made, roughly 4,500,000 animals were deliberately slaughtered whilst I drove into work this morning.

[Lucas]

10 hours of "They're taking the hobbits to Isengard" just in time to celebrate the opening day! (lol at the two "top comments" on the youtube page  )  :P

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9Uz1icjwrM

[Merusk]

Not to sidetrack the framerate discussion or anything but am I the only person that has no interest in seeing this? Advance word of mouth is so mixed and I'm getting a "Peter thinks he's the shit now and doesn't need an editor" vibe from what I'm hearing. I'll probably watch it on Blu Ray but have resisted attempts by friends to rope me into seeing it in the theater.

No, you're not the only person. All the reviews I've read say it's a tedious film that obsesses on minutiae and drags a decent story out into an interminably long slog.

I'm uninterested in the 48fps/3D/whatever since I cannot watch films in cinemas any more, only when they come out on BluRay, etc.

This movie looks like utter shit. Literally the trailers seem to get worse and worse every time I come across them. If I manage to see more than half of it on cable some random day I'll be surprised.

I wouldn't say it looks like shit, but I'll agree that the trailers leave me less and less enthusiastic.  I bought the idea it could be two movies with the inclusion of Simarillon stuff and the often-omitted Beorn.   Seeing it's going to be 3 movies just makes me worried the pacing will be all fucked and drag-on worse than the Return of the King did.

[Furiously]

Heh.  "No animals harming during the filming of the movie."  Up to 27 dying of natural and unnatural causes outside of filiming, however.  And goodness knows how many tasty, tasty animals were slaughtered for meals for cast and crew.  I stopped reading when I saw the letters p, e, t and a.

Meanwhile, according to a random google search I just made, roughly 4,500,000 animals were deliberately slaughtered whilst I drove into work this morning.

Reminds me of a joke, "How many PETA members does it take to change a lightbulb?"

[palmer_eldritch]

Slow day at work and I just read through this whole thread after having buggered off on page 1. You all are some magnificent, crazy bastards.

Anyway, for anyone on the fence, they let a whole bunch of animals die in production.

It makes me sick to imagine so many animals dying in vain so I'm going to see this movie, maybe twice. Shame on anyone who doesn't.

[Ratman_tf]

Reminds me of a joke, "How many PETA members does it take to change a lightbulb?"

I loled because it's true and PETA are horrible arseholes.

[Lucas]

Back home, my opinions:

(Watched it in 2D, dubbed in italian)

[Samwise]

My favorite part of the LotR movies was all the scene-setting stuff in the Shire, so I'm not surprised to hear that might be my favorite part of Hobbit too.

[Lakov_Sanite]

Why you would ever watch a movie dubbed is beyond me, even if you can't speak the language there is SO much you miss without the actors actual voice.

[Ghambit]

My favorite part of the LotR movies was all the scene-setting stuff in the Shire, so I'm not surprised to hear that might be my favorite part of Hobbit too.

This go 'round The Shire is actually real.  As in the hovels are stone and wood instead of polystyrene and the place is now actually zoned as "Hobbiton."  The entire village is now a big tourist attraction in NZ.

[Lucas]

Why you would ever watch a movie dubbed is beyond me, even if you can't speak the language there is SO much you miss without the actors actual voice.

Sometimes (but not each one),  theatres here in Italy screen movies in original language, but like I said, that's a seldom occurance. So you have to stick with dubbers if you want to go to the theatre (and the italian dubbers industry is often regarded as the best in the world, so go figure :P).

But yeah, at home I always watch american/english TV shows and movies in english.

[calapine]

Back home, my opinions:

(Watched it in 2D, dubbed in italian)

Aside from point 1 and 5 I agree 100% with Lucas.

Watched it dubbed as well(German, in my case), for the simple reason there was no original version airing.

[Ubvman]

Saw it yesterday evening in english:
Long movie, it ran from 9:20pm to 12:00am

I give the movie 3.5 out of 5 - it's still good enough that I enjoyed myself.
One extra bonus point because it's part of the Tolkien universe which I have a lot of affection for.
As a standalone movie, I give it just a simple 2.5 out of 5 for excessive length and padding.

My cinema was in glorious low-fi 2D, so I wouldn't know about the 48 frame thing.

PS: I agree with the above reviews. +1 that I found the addition of characters not in the original novel to be distracting and padding. I would think, there is a lot more special effects and makeup employed on Kate Blanchett than on any of the orcs and goblins.
 

[Abagadro]

Definitely overstuffed. Had long sections of really great stuff and then a bunch of filler (mostly battles that became repetitive). The key scenes are all well done though and I liked the actors that they got for the main parts.

[ezrast]

Meanwhile, according to a random google search I just made, roughly 4,500,000 animals were deliberately slaughtered whilst I drove into work this morning.

Because that's somehow relevant.

[Cyrrex]

Meanwhile, according to a random google search I just made, roughly 4,500,000 animals were deliberately slaughtered whilst I drove into work this morning.

Because that's somehow relevant.

I'll admit I did not read the whole article.  I actually did stop when I saw "PETA" as the complaintant.  And I was being snarky, as is my wont.  Still, considering the staggering volume of animals that die all the time for any number of reasons, I wasn't moved.  I mean, were they deliberately torturing them to death or something?

[ezrast]

Nah, the complaints were raised by the American Humane Association and by animal handlers who worked on-site. The article only referenced PETA because hey, it's a bit about animal rights, surely they'll give us some juicy quotes. Mostly the production company didn't think that dropping a bunch of ruminants into an area full of sinkholes without proper fencing was a bad idea.

Admittedly, I linked the article partially because I thought it was of interest, but partially because I wanted to see if I could derail the The Hobbit thread again.

[Ghambit]

I saw it in 24fps true 5-story IMAX 3D and it was glorious.  I'm a child of the 80's though, so I appreciated what Jackson was getting at (Lucas said exactly what I blurted out at the end of the movie).  The movie is old-school adventure, akin to stuff like Krull, Neverending Story, Goonies, etc.  More like a night of D&D than anything else, with similar pacing.  I'd place it just after the two Towers as my fav. 

As for the 3D, I went into the movie interested in how this REDCam technology would turn out and I must say I really liked the presentation.  They could adjust the apertures on the fly so the movie never fell out of visual depth and they could pop and layer important elements at will.  Added a nice extra bit of cinematography pron.  Probably my fav. 3d movie with the new Spiderman close 2nd.

I wouldn't see this in 48fps simply due to the amount of CGI (which is the most of any of the movies so far), and how it'd likely clash with the purity of the natural parts of the film.  And the 5k resolution can best be appreciated in true IMAX; the movie really pops.  The comparisons to Avatar are appropriate.  On a normal screen a lot of this will be lost.

Honestly, I dont understand the tentative hate on the film so far.  It was a good flick for sure.

[Der Helm]

10 hours of "They're taking the hobbits to Isengard" just in time to celebrate the opening day! (lol at the two "top comments" on the youtube page  )  :P

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9Uz1icjwrM

Well, thanks. Now I have to watch Vampire's Kiss.

[shiznitz]

Slow day at work and I just read through this whole thread after having buggered off on page 1. You all are some magnificent, crazy bastards.

Anyway, for anyone on the fence, they let a whole bunch of animals die in production.

That seals it. I am DEFINITELY seeing this movie.

[Khaldun]

Saw it in 3D HFR.

So first, as a flick? It's good. Not great. Padded in parts. Dwarf comedy bits get old pretty fast. Sylvester McCoy as Radagast is right on the tipping point between amusing and annoying. But there's some very nice stuff, some key scenes handled very well, the backstory is delivered pretty well (I wrote a piece back in the summer about how I thought they do it, and that Azog or Bolg would cerrtainly be turned into a major running antagonist, and I was pretty much on target with my guesses, except that they didn't choose to do Gandalf's encounter with Thrain in Dol Guldur as backstory).

The HFR I can only echo what the common critical response has been. It flips rather astonishingly between being wonderful or exciting and being really jarring and immersion-breaking. I would have to see it again to see if I can figure out what the systematic reasons are for the difference. Pure CGI elements look great. Some sets look fine when shot at one angle or in one light--almost magical--and then suddenly look like a cheesy shit ride at Disneyland at another angle or in another light. Outdoor shots vary in about the same way--you think "Wow, that is really fucking Middle-Earth with real dwarves and a wizard in it" and then suddenly think, "That looks like some kids down the block dressed up for Halloween only they took a right turn at the corner and ended up lost in the Alps."  When it doesn't work, it really really really doesn't work. I think for it to be successful in a film of this kind in the future, it's going to take a whole new generation of costumers, make-up artists, and set designers who understand how to make shit look absolutely 100% real--or things will need to be pure CGI. The technology has outpaced the supporting skills.

[Hoax]

It's not very good, this new Hobbit. It's a two-hour-and-fifty-minute movie that feels like it lasts for five or six years. Jackson pioneered a new technique in filming the movie, shooting at 48 frames per second, twice the usual speed, which lends an unwanted, disorienting clarity to the proceedings. Much of the film looks like a video-game cut scene; or, more accurately, a movie set on which actors are acting, since you can see with terrible precision the costumes and the makeup and wigs and the fake rocks. High definition has been a miracle for sports and a largely unresolved catastrophe for nearly everything else. Anyone who has ever been on a movie or TV set knows just how much artifice and trickery and elaborate lighting and angles go into making it all look real. Filming in 3-D, and with a higher frame rate, doesn't enhance that artifice; it exposes it. You can see the paycheck sticking out of Sir Ian McKellen's beard.

More Here.

[Ghambit]

Look. Do not see it at 48fps.  Just dont.  The 3D is worth it and so is the museum-IMAX price since it's in 5k.  But not the HFR.

It's not very good, this new Hobbit. It's a two-hour-and-fifty-minute movie that feels like it lasts for five or six years. Jackson pioneered a new technique in filming the movie, shooting at 48 frames per second, twice the usual speed, which lends an unwanted, disorienting clarity to the proceedings. Much of the film looks like a video-game cut scene; or, more accurately, a movie set on which actors are acting, since you can see with terrible precision the costumes and the makeup and wigs and the fake rocks. High definition has been a miracle for sports and a largely unresolved catastrophe for nearly everything else. Anyone who has ever been on a movie or TV set knows just how much artifice and trickery and elaborate lighting and angles go into making it all look real. Filming in 3-D, and with a higher frame rate, doesn't enhance that artifice; it exposes it. You can see the paycheck sticking out of Sir Ian McKellen's beard.

More Here.

Wtf is he prattling on about?  That is not a good review.
It's almost like people have to have perfection with this thing or it auto-sux.  It's the 2nd best Tolkien movie... I mean, cant this like be enough?  Damn.

It's like those fucks that hated Temple of Doom because Lost Ark was slightly better.   

[HaemishM]

Temple of Doom sucked monkey ass.

This, however, did not. There's a lot I don't remember about the books but I don't remember Thorin being such SRZBZNS in the book. There were some scenes that felt padded, they added a lot more about the Necromancer than I thought they would in the first movie. The meeting with Gollum was really really well done. Only two things really bothered me. The first was Radagast's rabbit sled. Every single fucking time this thing showed up on screen, I laughed my goddamn ass off. I couldn't help it. It tickled me to no end. It wasn't bad and I understand this is what he was described as. But that shit was funny.

The part that I really sat up with a WHAT THE FUCK WERE YOU THINKING? moment was when the Rock-em-Sock-Em Stone Giant robots came out of fucking nowhere and started fighting. Not only was that not in the book, it was so JARRINGLY RIDICULOUS that it threw me right out of the fucking movie. We do not need Optimus Prime fighting Megatron in the middle of the Hobbit.

Other than that, I'd give it 4 stars out of 5.

[murdoc]

I loved it. It took me a bit to get used to the 48fps and I think that influenced how I felt about the opening scenes in Hobbiton, but right about the time the party ran into the 3 Trolls I was right into it all. The riddle scene with Gollum was fantastic and I actually really liked the meeting of the 'Guardians of Middle Earth'.

It wasn't the Stone Giants that annoyed me, it was how the group always seemed to hang onto whatever ledge they were precariously perched on even if it was swinging around widely. They did this at least twice, once during the scene with the Giants and once while escaping the Goblins.

It was by no means perfect, but I thoroughly enjoyed it and Like Haem, would easily and happily give it 4/5. It was much more whimsical than the LotR movies, but so was the book. Will probably go see it again next weekend.

[Ard]

The stone giants are in the book.  It's just not a very long sequence, nor very well described or detailed.  I was actually thinking they were probably going to skip it since even Tolkien kinda ignored the existence of giants after that through everything else he ever did.

It's been a long time since I read it, but I'm pretty sure the sequence more or less went "oh shit, giants are real?  They're throwing rocks at us.  Run away!", without much more detail on the actual giants than that.

[Abagadro]

Stretching this out to 3 movies means they aren't going to ignore ANYTHING.  The tiniest thing (if it is interesting) will be expanded if they need to fill 8 hours.

[Ingmar]

There they were sheltering under a hanging rock for the night, and he lay beneath a blanket and shook from head to toe. When he peeped out in the lightning-flashes, he saw that across the valley the stone-giants were out and were hurling rocks at one another for a. game, and catching them, and tossing them down into the darkness where they smashed among the trees far below, or splintered into little bits with a bang. [...] They could hear the giants guffawing and shouting all over the mountainsides. [...] "This won't do at all!" said Thorin. "If we don't get blown off or drowned, or struck by lightning, we shall be picked up by some giant and kicked sky-high for a football." [...] As they passed under the arch, it was good to hear the wind and the rain outside instead of all about them, and to feel safe from the giants and their rocks.

Yes, it actually says football.

[Ard]

Hah, oh god, that's even cornier than I remember.

[Abagadro]

Someone said in some forum that in 5 years there will be a kick-ass 3 1/2 hour fan edit of the three films.

[Khaldun]

You could lose 15-20 minutes in Bilbo's house pretty easily and not notice.

But it's a fun film on the whole. I had a good time seeing it.

The giants thing has always bugged people who read Tolkien's world-building as wholly consistent because there's nothing at all anywhere else in his writing that would explain giants of that type or size. Just about everything else in the books gets backdated to either the creation of the world or Morgoth's corruption. I didn't care for this particular visualization of them, at any rate, particularly not the "stuck on a giant's knee" thing. Goofy in a not-good way.

[Ghambit]

As much as I liked it I still wished it was Dragonlance though.

[Ironwood]

Wait, what ?

[Samwise]

I went into the movie determined to enjoy it for the pretty scenery, and pretty much got that.

My biggest beef, if I had to pick one, would be the obligatory "let's have Bilbo go apeshit and stab some orcs so the audience will accept him as the protagonist of this fantasy movie" moment toward the end.  I had to think about this to figure out WHY it bugged me more than anything else, and I concluded that it's for the same reason Faramir bugged me in Return of the King: when I first read these books as a kid, one of the things that resonated with me most was the recognition of these heroic characters who were heroic because they were smart rather than because they were good at killing bad things.  Either PJ doesn't get this or he doesn't think audiences will.

[Khaldun]

Except that really just moves Bilbo's assumption of de facto moral leadership of the group up by about a couple of chapters--and when that comes in the book, it does in fact involve a bit of stabbery with Sting. I think PJ did a reasonable job of setting up the eventual conflict between Thorin and Bilbo right off the bat and then working it consistently throughout. Will give it a bit more punch than in the book even perhaps.