Well actually yes, this. I read The Hobbit three times when I was 10, and I pronounced it smawwwg because I figured it was likely to be similar to “augur”, and there sure wasn’t any pronunciation guide in that book. That kind of thing sticks in your mind when you’re young (I loved the name, full of character). So when 30 years later I’m told “Oh, you’re wrong, it’s like this” I’m thinking “Screw that”. Anyway, I just tell people it’s the Australian pronunciation and they look at me oddly, but don’t push the issue.
Cormac
1602
Saw the new movie in HFR today and like everyone has mentioned, it took a bit of getting used to however I think its pretty cool. No more bloody strobing and juddering when the camera moves around! (Didn’t get a chance to watch Hobbit 1 in HFR)
Thought this film was better than the previous one, but I went in with pretty low expectations. There are still too many typical “Jackson” overindulgances in the action set pieces. eg
Ending
Thorin rowing the wheelbarrow on the river of gold and the statue stunt afterwards, that was just an example of a step too far in the sequence.
You could really shave off 30min from each Hobbit movie and come up with a better version. (and this is from someone who really enjoys the extended LotR versions and normally has no problem with long films.)
My main gripe is about the colour: I went to a high end luxury cinema (2K-DLP projector with active XpanD 3D shutter glasses) and was hoping to see the best possible version in town. I’m used to 3D glasses making things darker, but here it also had a strong green tinge. The gold in the end was hardly proper “gold”, just a muddy dull olive tinged version of gold. The difference was pretty shocking when I took the glasses off (or watched the trailers afterwards). Its not the fault of this movie though, I suspect its a side effect of the XpanD 3D technology?
That was a little better but, other than that, this was every bit as bad, if not worse, than the first.
I think the thing that pissed me off the most is this. How hard is it to film a real thrush? Or a real bumble bee? Or a real bear? Or a fucking oak leaf? (I swear, when Biblo stick his head out of the top of Mirkwood, it felt like they were filming on location at a Michael’s Craft store. Nothing but fake plastic oak leaves as far as the eye can see.) But I think that pisses me off less than 14 CG horses riding across a field. Can you really not be bothered to film that? Why not just make it an animated movie at this point?
Anyway, with the exception of the elves, almost everything Jackson added to the story was terrible. The action was, again, completely over the top in a cartoonish way.
‘Are we doing spoilers yet?’
Thorin perching on the nose of Smaug? Really?!
I shouldn’t have been surprised but the trailers and enough time since watching the last train wreck raised my hopes ever so slightly going in.
The one addition I did like was Legolas and Tauriel. I’d watching an entire movie of the two of them hunting orcs.
I saw it in 2D and the colors were muted and muddy. I think this was the result of them trying to correct the horrible, bright color palette of the first movie to something more like the LOTR movies in post processing. I did appreciate the effort as I hated the feel of the first movie.
So it seems like everyone actually likes the addition of Tauriel, which is pretty interesting (I think that everyone thought that’d be a giant mess). I haven’t seen TDoS yet so I have no idea, I just haven’t heard anyone openly poking it to death. Then again, I heard the depiction of “Master” is horrific and the worst thing Jackson has ever done…
Legolas in the trailers looks kind of weird though, like Orlando Bloom bulked up in particular ways.
Smaug pronunciations… yeah I think we all call it one way because that’s what we heard in the Bass-Rankin version, which I am pretty sure was “smog”. The Tolkien way was said in the AUJ, but I think was said by name… once? Or twice?
— Alan
I haven’t read the Hobbit (saw the old cartoon, yes, and I have read LotR), and I thought Beorn was some stupid time waster that was added on to the movie adaption, but I guess it is in the original book. I did leave feeling that it was EXACTLY the sort of scene Jackson et al. would have edited out back in the Fellowship of the Ring days, given how utterly pointless all that was. Couldn’t care less about him being in the third movie, if that’s the case. Unless there is a scene where he mauls Radaghast the Brown.
Telefrog
1607
It’s a lose/lose for Jackson. Beorn is a lot like Tom Bombadil from Fellowship. Jackson caught a lot of shit from fans for not including him in the movie.
I wouldn’t say I like the addition of Tauriel, but I liked Evangeline Lilly fine in the role, and adding Legolas bugged me more anyway. Orlando Bloom does look a little weird. He definitely seemed bulkier, but he’s also wearing a bulkier outfit than I remember him in for LotR. Looks like a lot of makeup too, but not sure why, I don’t know if Bloom has aged noticeably enough that they were trying to cover that up, or if they were trying to make him look younger just because of the timeframe in the movie. Maybe his pores just looked bad against green screens in 3D HFR.
The Master of Lake Town never made much of an impression on me in the books, and re-reading the relevant chapters after seeing the movie, I don’t know why anyone would single out the Master as a problem with the film. Like everything else though, the party’s arrival in Lake Town was padded out and changed to make everything connected and related in ham-fisted ways (like putting Legolas in Mirkwood). So boo to that.
Really, the only scene that worked for me as a fun change from the books was the barrel escape.
Scuzz
1609
Same with me. I will always pronounce Smaug and Sauron wrong in my head.
Mr_Zero
1610
I think Tauriel is getting a pass because she actually has a plotline associated with her. There’s barely any script behind the greenscreen, so for someone to have an actual story – whatever the quality – is a relief.
I haven’t seen the movie yet, but I still can’t believe they are doing a 3rd movie after this one based on the trailers. I shuddered at some of the Jacksonisms in LOTR/Hobbit 1 and I’m still a little bummed at the depiction of Legolas who was ALWAYS imagined as a DARK HAIRED elf in my head when I read the books in high school. The LCG does it justice:
He almost certainly was dark haired, right. Blond elves were very rare in Tolkien’s Middle Earth. The Vanyar, one of the three clans of High Elves that migrated to Valinor prior to the First Age of the Sun, were golden haired, but it was almost unique to them. A few married the more common dark-haired Noldor, and some of their descendents, like Galadriel, also were blond. Her very atypical hair coloring was just one of many ways that Galadriel stood out from the rest of elven kind.
I guessed wrong about where this movie would end, even less from the book happens than I anticipated. It makes this movie even worse, but if there’s any silver lining, it’s that maybe the third movie will just follow the trend of padding out The Hobbit and not resort to continuing much beyond it. This is a very lame silver lining, but that’s the optimistic spin on it.
Judging from what I’ve read, I think all of us were fairly wrong about how it’d end. So yeah that would make the second movie even less than it should have been.
— Alan
Nesrie
1615
I didn’t like or dislike Tauriel’s addition.
Lady Elves
I do think if you never read the books, you might walk away thinking only the lady elves have any kind of magical power though
As for the hair thing, meh. I am fine with it. I think it serves a weak purpose. There are different groups of elves that are never explained in the movies but you can kind of see a visual difference. Glorfindel was described as blonde and was Noldor. It’s one of those debates that goes around every time there is a new adaption or a new addition of the lore.
Glorfindel is probably another Noldor/Vanyar hybrid, like Galadriel. There’s nothing definitive proving it in Tolkien’s writing, but it’s considered the likeliest possibility.
rei
1617
I loved this outing more than the first. I didn’t notice the time passing and was pissed off it ended where it did.
peacedog
1618
Beorn has a lot more to do in the Hobbit than Bombadil did in LotR. Granted, it’s mostly “kill 25000 goblins in the Battle of Five Armies”.
Yeah, there was never any doubt Beorn would make the Hobbit trilogy. How could any director resist a giant werebear rampaging through a horde of enemies? Bombadil, on the other hand, is completely dispensible. The entire Old Forest-Bombadil-Barrow Downs trip is perhaps the first and best literary example of a side quest.
HAHA. I cannot wait for you to see Beorn in this movie.
