Saturday 12 January 2013

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Mini Blog

When Lord Of The Rings came out I worked in a cinema. Hard to believe that was more than 10 years ago. How time flies. And now Peter Jackson's gone and made three more incredibly ass numbing films. Yay!

I know that sounds like I don't like the Lord Of The Rings movies. I do. I'm just not crazy about them. For example, I own all three (extended editions no less) but I haven't watched them for a very long time. And I haven't seen Return Of The King other than the one time I saw it at the cinema.

But I still wanted to see The Hobbit. I have not read the book and I know for many this will be a turn off point of the review. How can you possibly judge the film without first reading the book it's based on? Well simple, because this is a film review, not a book review and as someone who has read a lot of books that have been made into films I can say that many a time, one has little bearing on the other. Endings change, entire plot lines change, characters change. So really I don't think I need to have read the book in order to judge the film-making process here.

I'm not going to go into the story as it's basically 'Hobbit goes on an adventure', just like it says in the trailer. What I will say is that if you're a fan of the Lord Of The Rings movies this will be right up your street as Jackson stays pretty much on point, with casting, with costumes, with make up, with everything. The only thing that's slightly different, and I think it's because I saw it in 3D (which I didn't think really added anything), is that the film seemed to be speeded up in places. Like they'd fast forwarded through a scene? I didn't particularly enjoy that feeling and it was all the way through the film.

Other than that I enjoyed The Hobbit. Yes it was long but it was beautiful to look at, perfectly cast and with a few surprises along the way owing to my lack of reading. And as the adventure has only just begun I can definitely say that I'll be back for parts 2 and 3. But I may take a cushion. 8 out of 10.




Viewing Date - 6th January 2013
UK Release Date - 13th December 2012

Cast Overview:
Ian McKellan ~ Gandalf
Martin Freeman ~ Bilbo
Richard Armitage ~ Thorin
Ken Stott ~ Balin
James Nesbitt ~ Bofur
Dean O'Gorman ~ Fili
Aiden Turner ~ Kili
Ian Holm ~ Old Bilbo
Hugo Weaving ~ Elrond
Cate Blanchett ~ Galadriel
Andy Serkis ~ Gollum
Sylvester McCoy ~ Radagast

Director ~ Peter Jackson
Writer(s) ~ Fran Walsh (Screenplay), Philippa Boyens (Screenplay), Peter Jackson (Screenplay), Guillermo del Toro (Screenplay) and J.R.R. Tolkien (Novel The Hobbit)

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