Directed By:
Peter Jackson (The Lord of the Rings trilogy)
Starring:
Martin Freeman, Ian McKellen, Richard Armitage
Rating:
PG-13 for extended sequences of intense fantasy violence, and frightening
images
Run Time:
2 hours, 49 minutes
Synopsis:
An unadventurous hobbit named Bilbo Baggins (Freeman) is sucked into taking
part in a mission by Gandalf the Grey (McKellen), to help the dwarf prince
Thorin Oakenshield (Armtiage) and his company of dwarves march to their former home
in the Lonely Mountain and take it back from an evil dragon.
REVIEW
(Editor's Note: This is our longest review to date. If you're not familiar with our review style, the following is a transcription of our actual conversation about the movie immediately after we saw it. Fair warning - we talked for 40 minutes. Normally we go no longer than 20. Enjoy the review!)
Andrew:
Hello readers! Last night Sarah and I were fortunate enough to catch an advance
screening of Peter Jackson’s highly anticipated return to Middle Earth, TheHobbit: An Unexpected Journey. It is the first part of Jackson’s new
film adaptation trilogy of J.R.R. Tolkien’s “The Hobbit,” Sarah’s all-time
favorite book.
Now, this isn’t one that
we’ve had a chance to really delve into and preview on our site yet, though we
have talked about it in some columns prior to this, and we recently recorded an
episode of the As You Watch podcasts as guests again, talking exclusively
about The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings trilogy. That
will be coming out sometime next week.
But we’re going to talk
about this in a full review right here, and I get the feeling that this is
going to be a bit of a lengthy one. So Sarah, like I just said, this is your
favorite book, bar none, and we’ve had some hesitations and some excitement
heading in. Now that we’ve seen it, what did you think of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey?
Sarah:
I actually want to know what you thought of it first.
A:
Really?
S:
Yup.
A:
Alright. I would say that…hmm…I guess in sort of a general sense, it’s a good
movie but it’s not a great movie, and it certainly does not compare to The
Lord of the Rings. Now, this is partially because the source material
is more of a children’s book. It’s a 300 page book…
S:
Not even.
A:
It’s a quick read. And so a lot of the material for this film was also a bit
light-hearted. This particular film is definitely more of a set-up of things
that are going to come in the next two films, but they try and shoehorn in some
action pieces. Some of those worked for me, some of them didn’t.
The acting performances
throughout aren’t amazing, but they’re not bad either. I thought Martin Freeman
(BBC’s Sherlock) did a really good job as Bilbo Baggins, especially
later on in the film, I really think he hits his stride with the riddle scene
with Gollum and thereafter.
But I wouldn’t say I
loved this movie, by any stretch of the imagination. And we’ll get to this
later, but we saw this film in the new HFR format…
S:
We saw this in the format that Peter Jackson intended it to be seen in.
 |
| Martin Freeman (center) stars as Bilbo Baggins in The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, previously portrayed by Ian Holm in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy |
A:
Exactly. And they’re calling it High Frame Rate, which is fine. It was filmed
and projected at 48 frames per second as opposed to the traditional 24 frames
per second. But we’ll dive into that more later, but I’ll say this real quick –
I didn’t like it at all. I hated it, to be more precise. But we’ll get to that
later. Now…what did you think of the
film?
