The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

[Samwise]

He threatens Frodo, nearly kills Gollum and drags them to Gondor.  Why?  So maybe his dad will say 'good job' as he gets his mitts on the Ring.

Faramir wises up and frees Frodo, knowing this will incur even more ire from his dad.  Sure enough, Pop sends him on a suicide mission and off goes Faramir to the meat grinder.  Faramir would die to gain even a small amount of love from his father. 

I agree, Movie Faramir is a giant unlikeable pussy.

[shiznitz]

The problem is Book Faramir has no arc.  Noble Faramir falls over himself to help this strange 'hobbit' on his way to Mordor with the Ring of Power. "Best of luck!  Have fun storming Mount Doom!"

Movie Faramir starts as a suspicious jerk.  He threatens Frodo, nearly kills Gollum and drags them to Gondor.  Why?  So maybe his dad will say 'good job' as he gets his mitts on the Ring.

Faramir wises up and frees Frodo, knowing this will incur even more ire from his dad.  Sure enough, Pop sends him on a suicide mission and off goes Faramir to the meat grinder.  Faramir would die to gain even a small amount of love from his father.  Movie Faramir represents the strength of the Men of Gondor.  Not Boromir, fatally tempted by the ring and certainly not Denethor who thought he could withstand the gaze of Sauron. You need Movie Faramir to show Gondor was worth saving, that there still was strength and nobility in the land of Men.  It also makes it more plausible that Aragorn can lead the Gondorians all the way to the Black Gate, to almost certain ruin.

Controversial? Sure, I was surprised too but I understand very well why they changed him. 

Let's face it.  The characters in the books are a bit thin.  Good films need strong characters for the audience to sympathize with or despise.  Jackson had to add some stuffing to the characters or the movies would have played hollow.  The Watchmen demonstrated this.  The movie hugged the story as drawn but did not effectively incorporate the parts of the book that were not visually depicted.

Was everything Jackson added to the characters necessary? Hell no, but no single man's vision is going to mesh with every other man's vision.  Jackson managed a powerfully presented trilogy that made a billion dollars by pleasing the fans enough and engaging the ignorant as well.

[Khaldun]

I'm totally ok with the changes to Faramir.

Faramir in the books isn't just thin, he is the primary carrier of Tolkien's creepily uncomplicated hard-on for "noble blood". I get that high fantasy is going to have elements of pseudo-medieval celebration of aristocratic bloodlines etc. but Faramir doesn't have to earn one iota of his nobility. It's just the blood of Numenor proving true in his pale, fair-haired, Nordic body. Even Aragorn has to struggle with the fact that his ancestor screwed the fucking pooch with the One Ring back in the day, though in the books he is less conflicted about that compared to movie Aragorn. But book Faramir is boring no matter how you slice it. 

[Raph]

So, just watched a press screening.

People who liked the movies to date will like this one. People who didn't may find it slightly more annoying than the other two. More Jackson directorial quirks (playing with focus knob, playing with slow-mo, playing with weird zoom in-zoom outs, a little too much floating on the part of elves, a couple of moments of misplaced humor) that started to rub me wrong after a while.

But it sets up the first trilogy nicely, and was a fun ride. My daughter, a 17 year old who cries at movies, cried three times. As a benchmark, that is also how many times she cried for Big Hero 6. :)

[Soulflame]

I can think of two obvious spots where tears might flow during Big Hero 6, but I'm having trouble with that third spot.  So many to choose from...

[Raph]

The three were

[Ghambit]

Just got out of the true IMAX version (in a museum).  Not that great of an IMAX movie really, as the fight scenes are mostly close up...  as typical with the Hobbit series.  Still well worth seeing on a bigger than normal screen, however.  It's the most combat heavy of all the Tolkien movies, just not on an epic scale. 

I second the tearjerker elements.  A lot of geeky girls around me were crying; but I think that was more due to the fact the journey is over.  Boyd's "goodbye" song got a few tears too.  I must say I was pretty sad at the end.  It's been an 18-yr journey.  Honestly, I'd rather play some more in Tolkien's world rather than start seeing all the pretenders we're about to inevitably see...  7th son?

If they dust off Silmarrilion it'll be nice to see someone besides PJ do it.  A Nolan version of that story would be instant gold.

Squee moments:

Note: they did NOT use Beorn at all really, though PJ has said Beorn will feature in the DVD.

[Samwise]

Note: they did NOT use Beorn at all really, though PJ has said Beorn will feature in the DVD.

 

[Ironwood]

Didn't Beorn arrive to save Head Dwarf when he was getting his melt kicked in ?

I really don't wanna see this movie anymore

[Khaldun]

Wait the fuck. It's 144 minutes of battle after building this thing up to three movies and he couldn't find a way to make the sudden appearance of a guy who can change into a fucking bear and disembowel orcs happen? Like, the one who in the book keeps Thorin from getting insta-gibbed?

[01101010]

Wait the fuck. It's 144 minutes of battle after building this thing up to three movies and he couldn't find a way to make the sudden appearance of a guy who can change into a fucking bear and disembowel orcs happen? Like, the one who in the book keeps Thorin from getting insta-gibbed?

Well, no one likes druids anyway... 

[Merusk]

So glad I haven't paid a dime to Jackson since the first Hobbit. What a clusterfuck this has become.

[Ghambit]

Didn't Beorn arrive to save Head Dwarf when he was getting his melt kicked in ?

I really don't wanna see this movie anymore

Not a bad spolier, but
edit:
Like I said, PJ caught a shitton of heat for that since the movie was screened.  His defense is the usual; needed to edit it down, it wasn't paramount to the story, and "buy the DVD."  Truth be told, PJ has this obsession with the DVD medium...  as everyone knows.  They make a pretty coin on those collectible boxes, though most people dont really even use/watch DVDs/bluray anymore.

[Ironwood]

Just... Fuck Off...

(Not anyone here, I mean.  In General.)

[Ghambit]

Well, everyone was mad that the movies were 3hrs long.  This one is 2.5.  Something had to get shaved.  Connolly is obviously gonna get his screentime as Dain, and Lilly hers as a girly elf; so there's not much left after that.  The reality is, this movie needed a Blackhawk Down type of director (it's rapidfire combat).  It's a military film; PJ, Del Toro, etc. are not military guys.  The flow between the battlefronts is neglected, most of all the eagles' airquake and Beorn.  It's a footnote, yet it changed the battle.

What you get instead is a lot of Lilly struggling with love and Thorin's obsession with gold.  The movie beats you over the head with those and neglects the cool parts.  Good movie, but an obvious missed opportunity for the sake of excessive melodrama.

It's a bit like if (hypothetically) in the Two Towers PJ spent half the movie talking about Theoden's curse instead of effectively depicting the siege at helm's deep.  A mistake to be sure.  He didn't make it there, but he did here.

[Slyfeind]

It's a bit like if (hypothetically) in the Two Towers PJ spent half the movie talking about Theoden's curse instead of effectively depicting the siege at helm's deep.  A mistake to be sure.  He didn't make it there, but he did here.

I think this nails it.

I mean... why? Why did... why... um... really? REALLY? We're focusing on this or that instead of this really cool-ass inherently cinematic moment that just begs to be filmed?!

Billy Connolly was great as Dain. I liked the individual fight scenes for the most part. The rest was just confusing to watch. Not bad, just really really weird.

[Raph]

Well, to be fair, the gold sickness was true to the underlying myths. And it made Thorin's story much more powerful. In the end, this movie was basically Thorin's. Bilbo is more a bystander. Tauriel's plot is big and huge and seems to exist mostly to set up Legolas' friendship with Gimli in the other trilogy. The battles are literally played as beats in the arc of Thorin's character, not as plot points in their own right.

[Slyfeind]

I did enjoy Thorin's conversations with the other dwarves. Those were very moving. And I didn't think I'd like getting inside Thorin's head, because that got a little weird and psychedelic, but it conveyed the emotions well enough. But WHERE WAS THE
/weep

[Tannhauser]

Great movie with some flaws.  Holy cow that ultra-high resolution was crazy!  Had two people leave very early, maybe they had problems with it. Theater not crowded at all.  Nice end to the franchise.  Richard Armitrage did a great job as Thorin, everyone else was OK.  The CGI orcs didn't bother me as much as in the past. Maybe I'm used to them moving like crack-addicted ninjas now.

[Ratman_tf]

I wasn't expecting much from the Hobbit flicks, but the 2nd movie where they talked about FISH POLITICS is where I checked out of even caring like a good Tolkien grump. This shit is just too silly to even bitch about.

I'll catch this one on Cable someday when I'm bored and there's nothing better to do.

[Khaldun]

Holy shit, but I was ready to kick Peter Jackson in his junk after about the fourth or fifth time that the fucking Son of the Master of Lake-Town got more attention than GODDAMN BILBO BAGGINS in this movie. Seriously, I would wager that their total screen time is not all that far apart. "Oh, my, I didn't have enough time for Beorn, I was too busy paying attention to the Benny Hillesque cross-dressing hilarity of a guy with bad teeth trying to get away with gold in the middle of a battle".

Plus the goddamn asshole padding of sending half the cast away from the rest up on the mountain so they could all have mano-a-mano individual battles in perfect isolation from the rest of the scrum. It was completely like watching a bunch of QTE in a video game you aren't controlling. Endless QTEs. Endless. The only saving grace is not having to replay Legolas doing elven wire-fu twenty times until the whole thing is done.

Peter Jackson just took his place alongside George Lucas. At least PJ only seems to have done it for the money rather than for some colossal egotistical bullshit control over his vision or whatever, so that's lightly forgiveable.

[MahrinSkel]

Sometimes it seems like PJ is trying to fuck with the inevitable 'just what was in the book' fan-edit by not putting people where they're supposed to be for certain scenes. But maybe it's just me.

--Dave

[Khaldun]

But this wasn't about fucking with people, it was about making a movie where you take a sequence that was one beat in a big scene and making that sequence into an hour-long QTE just to burn time. Said QTEs weren't absolutely wretched, but the instrumental need to streeeetttttch it out was the main logic of it all. Even Tauriel, it turns out, isn't there to keep it from being a sausagefest as much as she is to make all of them loooooooonger. I remember thinking, "I bet he can make them longer somewhat artfully" before I saw the first one. Well, not so. Not at all.

I mean, try this on for size:

The Hobbit, original text:

"Suddenly there was a great shout, and from the Gate came a trumpet call. They had forgotten Thorin! Part of the wall, moved by levers, fell outward with a crash into the pool. Out leapt the King under the Mountain, and his companions followed him. Hood and cloak were gone; they were in shining armour, and red light leapt from their eyes. In the gloom the great dwarf gleamed like gold in a dying fire.

Rocks were hurled down from on high by the goblins above; but they held on, leapt down to the falls’ foot, and rushed forward to battle. Wolf and rider fell or fled before them. Thorin wielded his axe with mighty strokes, and nothing seemed to harm him.'To me! To me! Elves and Men! To me, o my kinsfolk!', he cried, and his voice shook like a horn in the valley.

Down, heedless of order, rushed all the dwarves of Dain to his help. Down too came all the Lake-men, for Bard could not restrain them; and upon the other side came many of the spearmen of the elves. Once again the goblins were stricken in the valley; and they were piled in heaps till Dale was dark and hideous with their corpses. The Wargs were scattered and Thorin drove right against the bodyguard of Bolg. But he could not pierce their ranks.

Already behind him among the goblin dead lay many men and many dwarves, and many a fair elf that should have lived yet long ages merrily in the wood. And as the valley widened his onset grew ever slower. His numbers were too few. His flanks were unguarded. Soon the attackers were attacked, and they were forced into a great ring, facing every way, hemmed all about with goblins and wolves returning to the assault. The bodyguard of Bolg came howling against them, and drove in upon their ranks like waves upon cliffs of sand. Their friends could not help them, for the assault from the Mountain was renewed with redoubled force, and upon either side men and elves were being slowly beaten down."

I mean, Tolkien is not the most cinematic of authors, but I can really see that scene in my mind, and it's a good 15-20 minutes of action if you do it right. But Thorin and Fili and Kili are in this integrally connected to the shared action and fate of all the rest, not isolated off for set-piece action sequences.

So here's how the sketch of a written-up version would look for PJ's Battle of Five Armies. As prose it would probably go on for ten or fifteen times as long as that sequence does in The Hobbit and be more unreadable than the worst fanfic:

[Khaldun]

"If this is love, why does it hurt so much?"

"Because it was real."

CHALLENGES

"I don't like sand. It's coarse and rough and irritating and it gets everywhere. Not like here. Here everything is soft and smooth".

[Shannow]

Two hours of meh. Hasn't been a truly great one since the Fellowship of the Ring

[Soulflame]

I dunno.  I thought that was a touching scene between Thranduil and Tauriel.  And I was baffled by that romance.  Didn't care for it at all.  It felt out of place, wasn't remotely mentioned in the book, didn't make the slightest bit of sense in Tolkien's world.  Ah well, I guess it was Jackson's way of setting up the bromance between Legolas and Gimli?

I thought Thorin's performance kept the movie from being completely meh.  Very well done.

I do wish Beorn had gotten more screen time.  His arrival was pretty crucial in the book, here it was ten seconds, then that army was kind of never seen again.  I think.  It was hard to tell with all the cuts.  Removing that jackass (The Master's deputy?  Or whatever.) would have let there be more screen time for much more deserving characters.

I do think that the end of the second movie should have had Smaug's ending.  Then showed the leaders of various forces determined to move to take the mountain.  Sets up a very different cliffhanger, but one that's resolved during the course of the entire movie.  Rather than one that's rapidly dispensed with at the beginning.

I do want to know where those goddamn rams came from though.  We're still bothered by their sudden appearance.  Where did they even come from?

Kind of weird how it wasn't really covered how things fell out.  As I recall, the Arkenstone was laid on Thorin, Thranduil got his wife's jewelry, Dain became King Under the Mountain, etc.  Instead we get a five minute long view of Bilbo's trip back to the Shire, with the silly image of him carrying a chest that's full of gold, under one arm.  Maybe, once again, more stuff for the Director's Cut?

[Abagadro]

There is a shot in the trailer of a bunch of guys on the rams, so likely a cutting room floor bit that will show up on the DVD.  Baffling that he didn't have the killing of Smaug as the climax of 2 (it was too long as it is so probably pushed it into 3 considering it was all just battle). Tried to have a Wormtongue Jr. but it just distracted from all the other shit going on. Thorin's arc was the key to the film (and I agree, very well acted) but was somewhat buried in all the other stuff.  Really should have been 2 movies like PJ intended without the dumb lady elf crap (I see Boyen's hand in that) and Legolas could have been ejected entirely (in fact it undercuts some of the initial hostility in FoTR).  Once the DVD's come out there will be a kick-ass fan edit down to about 2 hrs 45 of the the whole thing.

[Khaldun]

The last time you see Bard? It's to tell Mrs. Wormtongue, "Your slip is showing". All the stuff that's been set up about his fear of taking power? Forgotten.

Last time you see Dain? In the battle. Nothing about him becoming king, which has some uneasiness to it in this version especially, considering that Dain refused Thorin's plea to help retake the Mountain, or so we were told way back in the beginning. That's why Thorin went off with a motley crew of craftsmen rather than a Special Forces squad of dwarf ninjas.

You don't see Thorin placed in his tomb nor the Arkenstone laid on his chest.

But you do get probably twenty minutes of screen time and tons of dialogue for a subpar semi-comedic henchman. I just don't understand Jackson's thinking unless it's literally to make more money by withholding stuff people want to see (that also makes for a tighter dramatic narrative) so he can make money off the Extended Version. Which is like crippling a game release so you can sell first-day DLC.

The only closed arc you see is Thranduil, Tauriel and Legolas, and that's hamfisted on every level.

About the only thing I'd always wanted to see that was actually pretty well done was the White Council's assault on Dol Guldur. Ties in even to Tolkien's notes, which suggested that Saruman went off into the East, met with the Blue Wizards, and maybe made his pact with Sauron then, before Sauron made his way back to Mordor. Galadriel is the last of the Noldor in Middle-Earth so I thought Jackson did a fairly good job at showing what that really means.

[Phildo]

About the only thing I'd always wanted to see that was actually pretty well done was the White Council's assault on Dol Guldur. Ties in even to Tolkien's notes, which suggested that Saruman went off into the East, met with the Blue Wizards, and maybe made his pact with Sauron then, before Sauron made his way back to Mordor. Galadriel is the last of the Noldor in Middle-Earth so I thought Jackson did a fairly good job at showing what that really means.

This is the first thing anyone's said that's made me want to see this movie in theaters.  AKA I'm a huge nerd.

[Khaldun]

Well, it's really just one line, and knowing what it references. I almost wonder if Christopher Lee didn't insist on saying it, because he's a colossal Tolkien nerd who has read all the of stuff Christopher Tolkien has published.

[Ginaz]

I saw this today and while I enjoyed it, this series certainly isn't on the level of 1st 3 movies.  Even at 2.5 hours, it felt really rushed.  Having Smaug killed in the first few minutes was a strange decision.  I agree with others that it should have been in the last movie at the end.  The whole Legolas doing bullshit Legolas shit was really over the top.  I face palmed when he was running on the falling stones and lots of people around me just laughed.  Hard to believe it could get more out there than his ride on the elephant.  The whole love story seemed tacked on and out of place.  Handsome dwarves???  WTF??? It will be interesting to see what was left out and what makes it onto the dvd.

[Lantyssa]

I really don't get why everyone is so against any good-looking dwarves.

[01101010]

I really don't get why everyone is so against any good-looking dwarves.

It tears at the very fabric of what is acceptable and proper in the world (Middle Earth).   

[Phildo]

The race of Dwarves were created by Aule the Smith, not Iluvatar as were Men and Elves.  So of course they appear ugly to our eyes, as do the Orcs who were created by Melkor.

[Sir T]

Actually Melkor didn't "create" Orcs as such. Orcs were originally elves that he twisted and tortured into their present forms. He wanted to "improve them" and create a better race and wound up with these half crippled things

And technically Iluvatar had to breath the breath of life into the Dwarves, otherwise they just stood there doing nothing if Aule wasn't thinking hem onto doing stuff.