I just came back from a moviedate with my husband, an early birthdaygift. We went to see the Hobbit – an unexpected journey. I’ve tried to avoid spoilers as much as I could and have read no reviews.
I have one negative thing to say about this movie. The other people at the cinema sucked. One spoke in the intro. Several went back and forth, (pee before the movie,nimrods!) and one broke the cardinal sin of movie theaters – not only forgetting to silence or turn off their phone, but ANSWERING IT. I was *this* close to shushing everyone at one point. Not to forget the twats checking facebook mid-movie. I mean come ON.
And there it is. I’ve heard negative comments in passing (well, seen in scrolling, actually, but you know) about it not being true enough to the book. Maybe it wasn’t. It’s been a few years since I read the book – and I was happy with that afterwards. The things I remembered best from the book was like I remembered them, when the dwarves first come to the Shire, and Gollum. The rest – I thought if nothing else, it’s a perfect supplement to the Tolkienverse we know from the Lord of the Rings movies.
I loved it. I held my breath a few times it was exciting and breathtaking and fun and I cannot wait till the next comes out! The fightscenes were a bit hard to find a place to fix my eyes on but that’s not just in this – combat scenes are too swift for me in general.
..and of course the cosplayerpart of me is now of course contemplating not if I should cosplay a dwarf – but which one. I am thinking Thorin Oakenshield would be awesome, but Bombur might be the one I ultimatey choose. Thorins armour would be lots of hard work, there’s no doubt about that. All in all it’s a magnificent piece of film. I can’t WAIT to see Smaug more. The animations and cg and voice of Andy Serkiss, brilliant. And Martin Freeman keeps impressing me in everything he does. The costumers and setmakers need HUGE kudos. For Rivendell especially. I could rant about this for another five paragraphs or so, but I think you get the jist. If you haven’t seen it – do it. I realized afterwards that I’d gotten a slight headache (due to the 3D I guess?) but SO worth it.
Full marks for the Hobbit!
MarielleNerder 
I’m glad you enjoyed the movie, I did too~ Can’t wait for the new parts to be released! : ) And I think it might have been the lenght of the film that made you get a headache, three hours is pretty long, especially in 3D!
It’s weird, but still worth it!
Agreed! My only real disappointment so far concerns the beginning of the second film (minispoiler — they removed all the humour to shorten the sequence with Beorn, I felt, not to mention his bear design was just like a boring bigger warg with a shorter tail — and I also missed the part where the dwarves want to steal his ponies). With the first one, the closest I get to a complaint is I felt the lost a golden opportunity to explain Gandalf’s relationship to the eagles more, and why they don’t just eagle-taxy to the Mountain (or to Mount Doom in LotR). Would not have been hard to drop a couple of lines of exposition to fill that plot hole, and this was the place where it would have seemed most natural. Sigh. Wasted opportunity.
I also don’t understand the need for 3D, but then I never do. Doesn’t add anything to my moviegoing experience except having to wear slightly uncomfortable plastic glasses throughout it.
I am one of those weirdoes that is gaga for 3d. I love it. Used correctly it can be a wonderful layer of texture to the experience of cinema.
But agreed with your points there.
That’s so strange. I just don’t get it. It looks kind of cool for the first 120 seconds of a movie, and then my eyes get used to it and I don’t think about it anymore until there’s a scene where they go «Look we have 3D» with some kind of huge cliff perspective or an item being hurdled at the screen. The only times I’ve liked it is when there is snow or rain. It really feels like the downpour is everywhere around you. I do love that. But from all the 3D movies I’ve seen, that’s the only scenes I can think of where it ever added anything to my enjoyment.
Glad we’re in agreement on the films themselves, though. And Smaug was … stupendous.
Smaug was stupendous indeed.
I dunno, the 3d thing just makes it easier to believe imho. I love being so into the movie, it doesn’t feel like a movie anymore.
Ah, to me it is the opposite. 9 out of 10 scenes I can’t really tell it is 3D (if I don’t specifically think about it), and then the 10th one comes, and instead of being immersed I am completely taken out of it, going «ah, there is the compolsury «showing off our 3D shot», that’s right, I’m watching a movie!» Car chases in action films do the same thing. When I can see the director’s checklist being ticked off, it takes me out of it.
I can’t _think_ while watching a movie. If I analyze it,there’s no point in me watching it. Analyzing it kills the magic, and should be saved for 6th or 7th viewings.
Wholeheartedly agree. Which is why 3D (and car chases) is bad for my experience, as it takes me out of the movie and thus immediately causes me to start thinking and analyzing.
aaah..triggerpoints. Car chases as dull in most cases,imho – it’s one of my peeves.
If I dislike 3D, I bloody hate car chases. But at least they don’t charge me extra for the privilege of suffering through the latter. 😀
Haha! That’s true! The secret is to only watch fantasymovies 😉
There aren’t enough of those for that! But that’s what I do with books. 8)
haha,true. I go perhaps once a year,so..
Ah. I go about once a month. Sometimes less, sometimes more, depending on what’s showing. I quite enjoy the superhero fad of the last decade, especially the Marvel Cinematic Universe, so that alone is two trips a year. Plus the Hobbit, that’s three, and then there’s usually some other superhero thing (like the second Amazing Spider-Man film this year) or other adaptations and sequels I have interest in (for instance, this year brings Sin City 2, the 300 midquel-sequel-thing), and the compulsory Disney movie («Frozen» is awesome) … and suddenly I’ve seen ten and I’ve still to see something on a whim. But the whims are often just as fun. Saw Winter’s Tale last week based on Gaiman’s defense of it on his blog, and it was quite charming.
I would so love to go see anything superhero or fantasy or scifi, but babysitter, one hour trip back and forth..it’ just too much hassle.
Frozen will be awhile before I see. Kiddo has the song on her brain and I am so sick of it I can’t even…
I saw the Gaiman piece about it, but I’ll just wait untill DVD or netflixtime.
Ah, see, we don’t have kids, and we live less than 15 minutes walk from the movie theatre … I imagine if I had one I’d be thrilled to get even one movie seen per year.
Haha, sorry about the song. There have been other very good Disney movies in the past couple of years, though, most without songs entirely. Last year’s Wreck-It-Ralph was great. Brave was a bit of an (admittedly improved) rehash of Brother Bear for my sake, but it was still good. Tangled has a couple of songs, but they shouldn’t be as earwormy as Frozen, and it’s really, really good. And that’s coming from a guy who really wish they would go back to traditional animation and feels biased against all of these films.
Speaking of traditional animation, the Winnie the Pooh film from a few years ago was incredible, too, so if you have a small kid, hopefully you’ll check that out. It rips the plot shamelessly from an underwhelming direct-to-DVD Pooh film my sister had growing up, but it’s so much cosy fun I’ll forgive it anything.
Winter’s Tale isn’t AMAZING or anything. But it was good. Felt like someone tried to find the sweet spot between a Angels Vs. Demons Walking Among Us kind of thing and an epic fairy tale love story.
Ralph is brilliant, loved it. Brave was.. ok. Tangled is fun, but dark, and I don’t even remember there was singing in it.
Kiddo abhores Pooh for some reason, but I’ll probably watch it for myself.
Cool! Will check it out. 🙂
Aw, too bad about abhorring Pooh. I wasn’t crazy about him myself as a kid, though, so I probably shouldn’t expect otherwise of others.
Brave was ok is pretty much how I felt. ^^
I know, I had forgotten there were songs in Tangled too, until I said «wow, I can’t remember the last time a Disney movie had songs» exiting Frozen and my fiancée said Tangled did … So they’re fairly forgettable in comparison.
yep. The witch in tangled is unforgettable, though. Horrid,vile thing.
Brave..was hyped up in my opinion. I like the story, but not the morals.
Nah, Eeyore always made me feel horrible. Why would no one help him, couldn’t enjoy the stories. So I read the Little vampire instead.
I loooove Tangled. 🙂
I don’t know what reputuation Brave had, so don’t know if it was hyped, and I can’t recall it well enough that I know what the morals were. But as I said, it was entertaining enough, even though chunks of it felt like rehashes of Brother Bear.
Hahahaha, see, I LOVED Eeyore. I could relate to him. I aspired to one day be that pessimistic (I might have been a strange child). Or as enthusiastic as Tigger. It was Pooh and Piglet that couldn’t hold my interest back then. In the Disney versions, obviously — for some reason we never read the originals as children at our house. And I’ve never read Little vampire.
See, that was my thing too. I identified with him in a lot of ways. Oh, that’s too bad – defo one of my fav bookseries. Angela Sommerbodenburg I think the author is called.
But I identified with him without feeling bad for him … I was all «he’s sensible, they should listen to him, but they’re dumb, so they don’t. Poor them.»
Ah, I guess I just wanted someone to GET him. Not help, maybe, but GET him.
I think my assumption always was that Christopher Robin did.
Haha, and I never liked that kid.
Oh, nor did I, he seemed boring. But he seemed _nice_ enough, so that was still my assumption.
true.