The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - Review Thread (Spoilers)

[Velmeran]

Originally Posted by Grand Bob

One thing I find somewhat odd about this topic is

[Show spoiler] that Jackson has elevated the thematic content from children's book tale to more adult-oriented material on the basis of trying to tie this movie to his Lord of the Rings movies. In particular, he is using the Ring as one of the main links. That being the case, I was convinced that he would skillfully use the extra time afforded by three movies to include Thror and Thrain's motivation for going to Moria in the first place, which included using the Dwarf Ring of Power (one of the seven which was finally taken from Thrain in Dol Guldur) - a unifying parameter that would have convincingly tied another ring of power into the main theme. I was perplexed to find that the Moria sequence was inserted only to feature the final battle, a huge and disappointing waste of potential.

I'm hoping that we get at least a few minutes on that in the EE.

[frogmort]

Originally Posted by Duffy12

"Your love for the halfling's leaf has clearly slowed your mind."

I don't mind pot references in a movie if it is germane to the story. But when I first watched that scene many years ago I rolled my eyes and let out a groan.

.

There is also the scene near the beginning of FotR when Gandalf and Bilbo are sitting on the hill looking down on the festivities of Bilbo's birthday party celebration enjoying some Old Toby, and the scenes at the end of TT and the beginning of RotK with Merry and Pippin just inside the gates of Isengard in the movie where they appear almost high after finding some "Horn Blower", if I'm not mistaken, but it was always referencing the original story, somewhat.

I always thought that Tolkien's references to pipe-weed was at least somewhat ambiguous. If I'm not mistaken, this quote comes from the master himself:

"You might find that smoke blown out cleared your mind of shadows within. Anyway, it gives patience, to listen to error without anger."

I find the LotR references to be much more tasteful than Radagast blowing smoke out of his ears though.

[poke smot]

Originally Posted by Duffy12

"Your love for the halfling's leaf has clearly slowed your mind."

I don't mind pot references in a movie if it is germane to the story. But when I first watched that scene many years ago I rolled my eyes and let out a groan.

.

did someone say pot? love the smoke references in LOTR.

all this talk of the goblin king...i just didnt like the voice. he sounded too human.

[mattymoron]

Saw it two days ago, regrettably in 2D 24fps. I liked it more than I thought I would after seeing all the lukewarm reviews. The pacing seemed a little slow throughout, but I kind of expected it with this being the first of three, I knew it'd suffer more than the other two are likely to. I also didn't like the use of CGI for all of the goblins. It didn't feel as authentic as LOTR in that regard. I'm loving all the casting choices though and am totally anticipating the next two and the blu-ray.

OH! And the bird-shit caked on Radaghast's face. I loved his character and how they used him, but that was just awful.

[snakemaster7]

Originally Posted by mattymoron

OH! And the bird-shit caked on Radaghast's face. I loved his character and how they used him, but that was just awful.

I honestly didn't even notice the bird poop while watching it XD

[Show spoiler]

[frogmort]

Yo, you wanna hit this dude?

Gandalf Smoking Weed with Radagast the Brown ( Old Toby ) Edit The Hobbit Movie - YouTube

[Buddy Ackerman]

Originally Posted by Duffy12

Yea, same here for me too. Your Goblin King thoughts are pretty much identical to mine also.

And also how I loved this little guy too-

[Show spoiler]

Same here - considering he only had a few seconds of screentime he almost stole the film for me. A brilliant bit of design and animation. Apparently we'll get a bit more of him in the EE but I hope it's not a scene of him reporting to Azog and then getting eaten by his Warg.

However like was stated earlier, I wish that they would stay away from the Cheech and Chong jokes. They did not work for me in LotR and they STILL do not work now.

The Radagast scene is the aforementioned joke that fell flat for me. Certainly not enough for me to dislike the film (or even that scene) but it's the only time that the silly jokes and Radagast didn't work for me. Enough people laugh at it in screenings though - possibly just immature teenagers but I guess they need their moments too.

Having said that I didn't mind any of them in LOTR. I always thought Saruman's dig at Gandalf was quite well played and more about him looking down his nose at Gandalf for enagaing in such trivial pursuits with common folk (and setting up his hypocrisy). And the Merry and Pippin at Isengard is worth it for Gandalf's tuttingly dismissive "Hobbits..." aside - a small moment but I like it. Ironically though, looking at the Tolkien quote that Frogmort used, it seems that the use of it in The Hobbit is fairly close to what Tolkien intended:

Originally Posted by frogmort

"You might find that smoke blown out cleared your mind of shadows within."

I just think the moment is overplayed and doesn't work for me, which is a shame because I quite like it as a moment of bonding and friendship between the two wizards. It's clear that Gandlaf cares about Radagast.

Originally Posted by Duffy12

Buddy:

[Show spoiler]Jackson has also stated in another interview that the White Council gets to kick major ass in the second film too. Plus throw in those spiders too which I am sure that Jackson will not make a short scene, and I am really baffled on all the stuff crammed into the 2nd film, and then leaving not much else for the 3rd.

That's why I think

[Show spoiler]Smaug's attack on Laketown and his death

will have to wait until the third film. The scene you mention will make for a big enough action sequence to climax the film with (not totally, of course, the ending will still be the dwarves and Bilbo) and

[Show spoiler]Smaug on the loose

will serve as a nice cliffhanger going forward.

BTW, I LOVE your avatar. Probably the best one here.

Thanks But you're just biased towards avatars with eyes in them

[TheWildWhelk]

Originally Posted by Buddy Ackerman

Thanks But you're just biased towards avatars with eyes in them

It is rather cool, i may have to nick it myself some time. I'm using Jeremy Clarkson at the moment as i am reading his latest book 'The Top Gear Years' and am also going to be in the audience for the first episode of Top Gear season 19!

Back to the film; having the second film end on a cliffhanger can be difficult, but i entrust Jackson to pull it off. Do people remember how staggeringly hamfisted the ending to The Matrix Reloaded was? Exactly!

[Buddy Ackerman]

Originally Posted by TheWildWhelk

It is rather cool, i may have to nick it myself some time. I'm using Jeremy Clarkson at the moment as i am reading his latest book 'The Top Gear Years' and am also going to be in the audience for the first episode of Top Gear season 19!

That's really cool. Hope you enjoy it!

Originally Posted by TheWildWhelk

Back to the film; having the second film end on a cliffhanger can be difficult, but i entrust Jackson to pull it off. Do people remember how staggeringly hamfisted the ending to The Matrix Reloaded was? Exactly!

Oh yes. Very clearly. I'm a fan of Reloaded, even with it's faults, but that ending was just garbage. (A shame because the human Smith was one of the very, very few things I liked about Revolutions - the actor playing him was fantastic).

By 'cliffhanger' though I'm more thinking of something like The Two Towers ending, or even An Unexpected Journey. Enough of a taste of things to come to keep the audience interested ("the battle for Middle-Earth has just begun") and a nice, unsettling tone that things are about to go badly (Gollum's "she could do it..." speech followed by that wonderfully unsettling music and the pan up to Mordor).

[Show spoiler]Not so much a cliffhanger as a taster. Smaug having flown off in a rage to exact vengeance on persons unknown does that quite well I think, especially with the dwarves in the mountain not knowing if he's returning.

Speaking off 'cliffhangers', I saw the Hobbit again the other day with a family sat behind me. A very quiet screening but, at the end when

[Show spoiler]Smaug's eye opened

* the mum suddenly yelled "oh my God!". It was an unexpected but awesome reaction.

* I realise the irony in me putting spoiler tags around this

[raygendreau]

Oscar nomination for Hairstyling. No surprise there. There was a lot of hair in this movie.

[Buddy Ackerman]

Originally Posted by raygendreau

Oscar nomination for Hairstyling. No surprise there. There was a lot of hair in this movie.

One of my favourite little touches was the fact that being roused from their sleep left Nori with bed hair for the Goblintown sequence. Could have just left it as they didn't dwell on it (and I didn't even notice it on first viewing) but it was a nice little detail.

[raygendreau]

Originally Posted by Buddy Ackerman

One of my favourite little touches was the fact that being roused from their sleep left Nori with bed hair for the Goblintown sequence. Could have just left it as they didn't dwell on it (and I didn't even notice it on first viewing) but it was a nice little detail.

It was probably Radagast's hair that got the nomination. Hair salons will probably be offering styles with gobs of glistening white and green goo if The Hobbit wins the Oscar in this category.

[threefiftyrocket]

Originally Posted by Ernest Rister

3-50...

I think they went that direction planning for a future where people watch these films in order. That's an assumption of mine that they don't want to spoil Saruman's betrayal in FOTR, so to make Saruman's resistance in believing Radagast's information plausible, they turn Radagast into a joke. The thing I'm struggling with is that this is really a 9-hour movie broken into three parts, and the first is largely exposition, so we don't really know how this is all going to play out. But the continued inference that Hobbits love to get stoned all the time was vulgar last time out, and it's amplified now, with Radagast blowing pot smoke out of his ears. What in the world were they thinking? I admire many of Jackson's films, but the man has issues with pacing and taste and tone. I watched the Frighteners with my wife and her parents last week, and I had forgotten how the movie is almost completely derailed by the Crispin Glover-esque investigator who is so off the hook, it shatters the tension in the film. Jackson made films of the LOTR books, that won a lot of awards, but he did it by standing on the shoulders of a giant and they won those awards *despite* the lapses in taste and screenwriting. With The Hobbit, instead of hearing the criticism, he chose instead to double down on them, and it is no surprise at all to me to see Hobbit Pt. 1 passed over by the BAFTAs and the Guilds, versus how the films were received previously.

Fair enough... the smoke out of the ears thing was annoying, but that was just my issue with that character in general... I think this movie would have been leaps and bounds better if they just left him out... and no, I don't think he's far from jar jar... he bothered me that much...

[JamesKurtovich]

My favorite scene is when Gandalf meets young Bilbo. The wide shot of him standing against his staff with Bilbo trying to smoke his pipe and pretend he's not there staring at him is priceless and needs to be a poster!

I loved Radagast too. Sure, I don't like seeing a guy with bird shit on his head, but he gave this film a character we never had in LOTR.. a magical nutcase living in the woods that cares for animals. But he's not really a nutcase (similar to Gandalf not being as frail as he sounds and appears) and can hold his own.

[threefiftyrocket]

Originally Posted by Grand Bob

It's been a few days since I viewed the forum as I am on travel, but I just saw this post. Velmeran, a major-league Tolkien fan, is correct, and I would just like to make a small addition. One thing I find somewhat odd about this topic is

[Show spoiler] that Jackson has elevated the thematic content from children's book tale to more adult-oriented material on the basis of trying to tie this movie to his Lord of the Rings movies. In particular, he is using the Ring as one of the main links. That being the case, I was convinced that he would skillfully use the extra time afforded by three movies to include Thror and Thrain's motivation for going to Moria in the first place, which included using the Dwarf Ring of Power (one of the seven which was finally taken from Thrain in Dol Guldur) - a unifying parameter that would have convincingly tied another ring of power into the main theme. I was perplexed to find that the Moria sequence was inserted only to feature the final battle, a huge and disappointing waste of potential.

Thanks Grand Bob, and I agree! Although I don't know much about the history, seeing more about Thror and Thrain would have been quite nice! Since this is a movie about not just Bilbo, but the Dwarves of Erebor...

[toddly6666]

Originally Posted by snakemaster7

I loved the Goblin King also. I don't know, there was just something about him that was fun to watch.

...his chin? I loved this look and couldn't take my eyes off those testicles.

[snakemaster7]

Originally Posted by toddly6666

...his chin? I loved this look and couldn't take my eyes off those testicles.

[Ernest Rister]

Originally Posted by ashedmaniac

I didn't mind the eccentricities of Radagast (including the bird excrement). To me, as long as the character feels true to itself and the world of the film, it doesn't matter to me if there are moments that some might find are "trying too hard to be funny" or are "misguided humor" - in my view, I think such perceptions can often (although certainly not always) come from judging the film, filmmaker and/or intent without much regard for the experience of the film (outside of reading into intent and the like) or how feasible such things truly are within the world of the story. If a character does something I feel was meant to be funny (within the world of the film or the maker's intent) but I don't find it funny, I consider that a character quirk or character trait (Do people not have friends who sometimes make jokes that fall flat? Or friends who could be perceived as ((even unintentionally)) funny but are more so just awkward? I just view them as that.).

I find a lot of cynicism has been directed toward this film (including Radagast or "not finding him funny" - as though that in itself is an immense failing of the film) since many went in with preconceptions about the book being split into three parts and all of that. Many "official" critics seem to be stuck in that mindset to the point where their criticism reads more as, "I don't like that a studio must be making this into three parts just for money! And I don't like the 48fps format!" and I'm left wondering what they actually thought about this individual film's quality if they could remove those relatively unrelated factors from their view. It's frustrating when only about a third of the critical reviews from the press seem to have really solid or valid points outside of that (when I really enjoy hearing and understanding differing views so I try to avoid discounting them outright). Which is why I'm appreciative of the film fans here who have made clear critical points - whether I agree or disagree - that feel as though they're outside of the realm of pure cynicism (including about Radagast or tonal issues and the like).

So, if someone balks at seeing a Tolkien character sliced through the gullet who then cracks a lame joke, that makes them a cynic? Or blowing pot smoke through their ears? The opposite of your postulate may also be true, that overly enthusastic supporters of Jackson's work are in denial about the creative team's lapses in taste and inappropriate attempts at humour. As for the 48fps, I could care less about all that. I care about writing. On that front, this film let me down, against my best hopes. Gorgeous production, though. Disappointed in the screenplay.

[mattymoron]

Really? People were actually bothered by the smoking scene? That's such an inoffensive joke, I don't even...

[Ernest Rister]

Originally Posted by mattymoron

Really? People were actually bothered by the smoking scene? That's such an inoffensive joke, I don't even...

Fans of the book and the achievement of Professor Tolkien are repulsed by it, yes. Like someone in front of you farting during Hamlet.