There is an early moment in The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey that captures the evocative poetry of Tolkien’s songs — something that The Lord of the Rings films, for all their achievements, never did. By the time the credits roll, that moment feels like it belonged in a very different film.
It is the Dwarves’ solemn, haunting lay about their long-forgotten gold — only three or so verses, but you can well believe that, as they sang, the love of beautiful things made by hands and by cunning and by magic moved through Bilbo Baggins (well-cast Martin Freeman, credibly evoking a young Ian Holm) and woke something Tookish in him, as Tolkien describes in the first chapter of The Hobbit. (Perhaps a future extended edition will include more of the song.)
That melody becomes a theme for the dwarves, played as they hike over mountain ridges and so forth. I think it plays during their absurd charge through a theme-park-style fight scene amid thousands of adversaries in the bowels of Goblin-town — a sequence that looks as if Peter Jackson is trying to outdo the Mines of Moria from The Fellowship of the Ring, but with all the conviction and danger of an action sequence in a Pirates of the Caribbean sequel. Jeff Overstreet has compared the Moria sequence to the best action scenes in Raiders of the Lost Ark; if so, the Goblin-town fight plays like the silliest stunts from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.
J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit is a different animal from The Lord of the Rings, more fairy tale than mythic saga, full of whimsical, simplistic touches that would never fly in the longer, more sophisticated work. (One can’t imagine Elrond’s Elves in The Fellowship of the Ring singing “tril-lil-lil-lolly, the valley is jolly, ha ha!”) It’s also, of course, much shorter, about a fifth the length of the later work.
At times An Unexpected Journey likewise seems to be aiming toward a younger audience, as in a cheerily cartoony shot of one of the Dwarves, snoring away, inhaling and exhaling a cloud of flying bugs with each breath. The raucous spirit of the dwarves’ other early song, the “Chip the glasses and crack the plates” number at poor Bilbo’s expense, is delightful, and there’s more dwarvish slapstick than poor Gimli had to suffer in the entire trilogy — fairly so.
Yet the PG-13 violence is at or near Rings levels, with intense battles, multiple decapitations, lopped-off limbs and so forth. There’s Shrek-style rude humor, including a dwarvish belching competition, trollish rear-scratching right in Bilbo’s face and a thuddingly vulgar line ostensibly about croquet. Bizarrely, there’s overt drug culture humor, notably when Gandalf, seeking to calm an agitated Radagast the Brown (a comic Sylvester McCoy), gives him a relaxing toke on his pipe (Radagast’s eyes cross blissfully). Later Saruman has a derisive line about how Radagast’s “excessive consumption of mushrooms” has “addled his mind.”
When Jackson and his collaborators, Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens, first set out to adapt Tolkien 15 years ago, the original idea was a trilogy, starting with The Hobbit and covering The Lord of the Rings in two sequels. At the time, though, film rights to The Hobbit were tied up.
We can only wonder what a Jackson Hobbit film would have looked like a decade ago. Certainly it wouldn’t have been a sprawling trilogy of three-hour films stretching The Hobbit to the epic length of the Rings films, stuffed with all sorts of extraneous subplots and additions inspired by the various appendices of The Return of the King, such as the appearance of the Necromancer (a disembodied manifestation of Sauron) and a meeting of the White Council (here comprising Galadriel, Saruman, Elrond and Gandalf) to discuss the problem. (Unexpected Journey gets us as far as the rescue by eagles from being treed by Wargs — here a wildly revisionistic set piece with a lovely denouement.)
Without a trilogy, the dragon Smaug wouldn’t be carefully under wraps for an entire film, and it wouldn’t be necessary to import an interim villain, such as Azog the Defiler, a CGI orc-chieftain with an ugly history with the dwarf-lord Thorin Oakenshield (Richard Armitage). (In Tolkien, Azog kills Thorin’s grandfather and uncle, and Azog’s offspring Bolg is killed at the Battle of Five Armies at the end of The Hobbit. Both Azog and Bolg look to be running antagonists in the trilogy.) “He died of his wounds long ago,” Thorin growls when Bilbo asks about Azog’s fate — one of a number of instances of heavy-handed foreshadowing.
The Lord of the Rings films were full of bombast, but also brilliance, and moments of quiet grace, subtlety and joy. Unexpected Journey is almost all highlights and bombast, with little if any room for subtlety or poetry. No lovely establishing vignettes in Hobbiton, like Fellowship, or evocations of hobbity respectability and the unacceptability of dashing off on adventures. No wistful moments of Bilbo contemplating his comfortable chair before the fire and the kettle singing.
Bilbo is less interesting a character in this entire movie than Holm made him in just the prologue of The Fellowship of the Ring. He’s certainly not as textured as the character Tolkien created when he wrote The Hobbit. That character was utterly flummoxed by the dwarvish invasion of his home and their mad scheme, but he was also proud — and Tookish — enough to push back when slighted by the dwarves:
“I don’t pretend to understand what you are talking about, or your reference to burglars, but I think I am right in believing” (this is what he called being on his dignity) “that you think I am no good. I will show you. … I am quite sure you have come to the wrong house. … But treat it as the right one. Tell me what you want done, and I will try it, if I have to walk from here to the East of East and fight the wild Were-worms in the Last Desert.”
The movie’s Bilbo, by contrast, is quite happy to be thought no good if it will get rid of the dwarves, and only impetuously decides to join the party the next day. Much later, concluding that the dwarves’ skepticism was warranted, Bilbo decides to abandon the adventure and go home. The problem is, the movie makes a point from the outset that Bilbo signs a contract with the dwarves. There’s no signed contract in Tolkien, but if there were, it would definitely matter at a moment like this. Here it’s irrelevant.
Following the template of the Rings films, The Hobbit opens with a dark, action-filled prologue (a pledge to impatient viewers) establishing the back story of the dwarvish kingdom under the mountain, the Arkenstone and the coming of Smaug. This is narrated by Holm’s elderly Bilbo, who is expanding his memoirs for Elijah Wood’s Frodo.
Then Bilbo shifts gears and — still ostensibly writing for Frodo — begins writing the story of The Hobbit, starting with a gloss on the famous opening lines: “In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. Not a dirty, nasty hole … It was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort.” Didn’t anyone point out that these lines imply a non-hobbit reader? To make matters worse, Frodo has grown up in that very hobbit-hole.
The film is chock-a-block with fan service. Jackson once said that if he made the Rings films for anyone but himself, he’d like to think he made them for Tolkien. I can’t speak to his intent, but Unexpected Journey plays for me like it was made primarily for kids who’ve grown up watching The Lord of the Rings — and it winks at them every chance it gets, referencing the trilogy whenever possible.
Gandalf can’t distract the trolls with ventriloquism, not only because Bilbo is given an increased role here, but because the filmmakers want to echo Gandalf’s iconic “You shall not pass!” moment at the bridge of Khazad-Dûm. Even Bilbo’s “Riddles in the Dark” scene with Gollum, though among the more faithful and better bits, is marred with echoes of one of Gollum’s most fan-pleasing scenes, the schizophrenic Sméagol/Gollum debate from The Two Towers.
Oddly, the film doesn’t echo the one moment from the trilogy it should have: When Bilbo picks up the ring, it’s nothing like the flashback of that moment in Fellowship. Freeman doesn’t even murmur “A ring?” like Holm did. It’s a bizarre mismatch in a film otherwise constantly preoccupied with its predecessors.
What about the realization of Middle-earth? The production design seamlessly merges with the trilogy, and the returning actors generally step right back into character. (I hate to say it, but I’m a bit disappointed with McKellen’s Gandalf. It’s very close to his Rings performance, but duller. There’s no winking mischief in his opening “Good morning” exchange with Bilbo, for instance.)
The character design for the dwarves is a mixed bag. I can give the filmmakers the benefit of the doubt on some of the more whimsical bits, such as Bombur’s horseshoe beard and Nori’s tripartite hairstyle, but there is just no excuse for some of the dwarves, including Thorin, having less beard than I do. It’s like hobbits wearing shoes. It doesn’t fly.
There has been a lot of discussion, much of it critical, about Jackson’s decision to shoot at double the normal frame rate, 48 frames per second rather than 24. Some viewers find that the heightened clarity actually detracts from the illusion: One is too obviously watching actors in costumes with props on a set, rather than characters inhabiting a world. I have to say I found this to be true, at least for stretches. The 3-D, too, did nothing for me. If I were seeing it again in theaters, I would search out a 24 fps screening in 2-D.
Unexpected Journey does get some things right. Most crucially, there is the moment of grace when Bilbo, wearing the ring, has Gollum at his mercy but makes another choice. Perhaps this is one instance where having made the Rings films first impressed on the filmmakers the importance of this moment, and it pays off beautifully.
Sometimes even something added by the filmmakers works. Gandalf has a nicely Tolkienesque speech that’s not in the book but feels like something Gandalf might have said:
“Saruman believes that it is only great power that can hold evil in check. That is not what I’ve found. I found it is the small things, everyday deeds of ordinary folk, that keep the darkness at bay. Simple acts of kindness and love.”
Alas, the movie has no time to actually celebrate such “small things,” “everyday deeds” or "simple acts.” (For instance, if you're going to go beyond the book to include characters whom you can extrapolate into the story, why not include a friendly exchange between Bilbo and his gardener, Sam's Gaffer?)
Even when it diverges from the source as wildly as, say, the Narnia sequels, Unexpected Journey isn’t bad moviemaking. It’s rollicking, better-than-average action fantasy. That’s still a big step down from the Rings trilogy. The journey will continue, but the magic is greatly diminished.
Steven D. Greydanus is the Register’s film critic.
Content Advisory: Intense fantasy-action violence and battle sequences; scary images and creature menace; some rude humor; a couple of comic drug-culture references. Teens and up.
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Thanks for the review. I always thought Jackson’s LotR Trilogy went off the rails about halfway through (although hints of the problems can be found in the otherwise sterling FotR). I was expecting another ‘good movie, iffy Tolkien’ out of The Hobbit. Part of this is because it features Elrond again, who may be the most ill-served character in the entire LotR Trilogy. The Hobbit is the very book where Elrond is described as “kind as summer”; is there any hint of that in the film?
One question: Tolkien wrote The Hobbit as a children’s book. It was intentionally whimsical fantasy. The more seriously toned Fellowship series didn’t come about until a more mature Tolkien gave into demands for a “sequel” to the beloved fairy tale. So, shouldn’t we expect The Hobbit to be much lighter than the Fellowship of the Rings?
Great review, agreed with all major points made. :-)
C. Teague: My review addresses that point.
Matthew L. Martin: No. Elrond is no different, though of course there’s no “Arwen is dying” subplot here.
St. Benedict Press has a new book out about the Christian themes in The Hobbit from a professor from Thomas More College, Joseph Pearce,
Bilbo’s Journey: Discovering the Hidden Meaning in The Hobbit. Have you read it yet? https://tanbooks.benedictpress.com/index.php/Bilbos-Journey-Discovering-Hidden-Meaning-in-Hobbit
Do the goblins sing at all? Are the added bits inspired by the appendices and the Quest for Erebor true to the spirit of Tolkien?
“Bizarely, there’s overt drug culture humor, notably when Gandalf, seeking to calm an agitated Radagast the Brown (a comic Sylvester McCoy), gives him a relaxing toke on his pipe (Radagast’s eyes cross blissfully). Later Saruman has a derisive line about how Radagast’s “excessive consumption of mushrooms” has “addled his mind.””
It sounds to me like the drug culture references need not be read into those scenes. Longbottom leaf can be relaxing without being recreational, and mushrooms comment doesn’t seem much different from Saruman’s admonition to Gandalf in FotR that “Your love of the halfling’s leaf has clearly clouded your mind,” and given the dark ages/medieval milieu of Tolkien’s stories, it sounds to me that Saruman thinks the mushrooms poisonous rather than psychedelic.
Marcy W:
I’ve not read Pearce’s new book, but I’ve read a couple of his earlier ones on Tolkien, and found him useful.
Pierce Oka:
No singing goblins, alas.
Longbottom leaf does not make your eyes cross, and its relaxing properties would be far more subtle than what we see here (Radagast’s crossed eyes are clearly a drug-culture reference).
The earlier line about Gandalf’s “love of the halflings’ leaf” having “clouded your mind” is much more ambiguous. Note that it is not the leaf, but Gandalf’s love, that Saruman says “clouds his mind,” i.e., his judgment. Saruman in both the books and, I think, the film believes that Gandalf is overly attachedto the Shire and the Hobbits in themselves. In principle, the line would still make sense if it were “Your love of the halflings…” (or “the halflings’ country” or “the halflings’ songs,” etc.) having “clouded his mind.” The “mushroom” line strikes me as much more clearly a drug-culture reference.
Although the Lord of the Rings are fine films, I’ve never been able to trust Peter Jackson as a director after seeing something he made called “Meet the Feebles.” Hoc viso, I can believe Mr. Jackson is capable of all manner of scatalogical references.
I’m also annoyed that the story has been turned into a trilogy. Is there any possible justification for this apart from dragon’s gold having that effect on people?
I think it is really sad that they had to do the Hobbit movie like this. The book is pretty much an innocent, childlike fairy tale-why couldn’t the movie be similar? I really don’t appreciate that they added totally unnecessary rude humor either. and violence really wasn’t the point of the Hobbit.
The book is way too short for the movie to be a trilogy! One “The Hobbit” movie is enough!
I’ve never seen “Meet the Feebles” . . . but I’ve heard the stories, and I have a friend who did. This friend, a die-hard fan of the Aliens series, was deeply shaken by it.
On other notes of Jackson’s filmography, Stephen’s comments about the events in Goblin-town remind me of my impressions of the Skull Island bits in Jackson’s King Kong.
I have to acknowledge that this is a good review, although a bit picky from my perspective.
I absolutely loved the movie.
And why no one mentions how damn amazing is the prologue??
I wonder is Jackson and his co-writers, in writing the new speech for Gandalf, were aware of similar words from Wm Wordsworth, Lines Written Above Tintern Abbey:
Tintern Abbey, Stanza II
(excerpt)
In hours of weariness, sensations sweet,
Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart;
And passing even into my purer mind,
With tranquil restoration: -feelings too
Of unremembered pleasure: such, perhaps,
As have no slight or trivial influence
On that best portion of a good man’s life,
His little, nameless, unremembered acts
Of kindness and of love.
I beg to differ about singing goblins; Down, Down to Goblin Town is one of my favorites.
Guess what everyone? All of you who are complaining…. Don’t have to see the movie! YAAAAAAY! Its like you have freedom of choice or something.
You will anyway though.
Great review.
Howard:
Who exactly are you disagreeing with on the goblin songs?
Stepping back a bit: “It sounds to me like the drug culture references need not be read into those scenes. Longbottom leaf can be relaxing without being recreational, and mushrooms comment doesn’t seem much different from Saruman’s admonition to Gandalf in FotR that “Your love of the halfling’s leaf has clearly clouded your mind,” and given the dark ages/medieval milieu of Tolkien’s stories, it sounds to me that Saruman thinks the mushrooms poisonous rather than psychedelic.”
Having just seen the movie (it’s 4 a.m., why the heck aren’t I in bed?) I can safely say that the volume of laughter at this scene clearly indicated that the audience knew it was a drug reference…I agree with you on how bizarre it is SDG!
@Jared: True.
So it looks like LOTR get its own “Stars Wars” type prequels.
Thanks Mr. Greydanus. I have to say that I now rely on you solely for film reviews. You appear to be the only critic who understands that movies should be like literature, and not like soma. Don’t let this go to your head, though. Nay, it means you now have the brotherly responsibility to lead me aright!
My favorite scene from the book was when they are traveling up the mountain on their ponies and it is pouring rain and lightning and thunder and the company can hardly see where they are going and finally they find a warm, snug cave to rest in and dry out in and they fall asleep all cozy and such and then the side of the mountain opens up and steals the ponies and then…goblins! Oh I want to go read the book right now. I will be looking for that part in the film! (P.S. My high school teachers always warned me about run-on sentences!).
Thanks for the review Steven!
SPOILERS SPOILERS
It was certainly patchy. I was seriously ticked off at the destruction of Bilbo’s slow growth from being anxious and nervous into a quietly courageous hobbit that dares to walk within the mountain and speak with Smaug. The scene where he jumps out of the tree to defend Thorin is so out of character at that point in the story. I noticed that throughout the movie, the filmmakers tried to make him seem braver and cleverer than he was in the corresponding parts of the book—i. e. guessing “Time” rather than stumbling upon the answer by accident, having him delay the trolls rather than Gandalf, etc. In the end, the Smaug scene, in some ways the climax of the book, will be greatly diminished.
On the other hand, there were many lovely and delightful moments. The Dwarvish halls in Erebor were astonishing, and although we only saw them for a moment, I loved the bright colors and the glimpse of unusual toys in the brief townspeople scene. Moreover, they kept one of my favorite lines about “squashing them into jelly”.
I didn’t care for their interpretation of Riddles in the Dark. I grew up with the animated version, which, to my memory, had little lighting. It was far too bright and easy to see what was going on—it would have been more effective in almost total darkness, as one saw Gollum’s terrible eyes gleaming in the shadows. I closed my eyes during the darkness riddle (or was it time?) and was pleased with the results.
The PG-13 violence bothered me almost as much as the padding. My dad read me “The Hobbit” when I was eight, but I don’t think I’d let an eight-year-old see this movie (of course, even if it were less violent, a child that young probably couldn’t sit still for nearly three hours). It’s a really baffling tonal smorgasbord—if Jackson wanted it to be a more kid-friendly movie, then why have all the violence, and if not, then why have the slapstick? It almost reminds me of the Disney “Hunchback of Notre Dame,” which was far too dark and frightening for children but had those stupid gargoyles to ensure it was too dumb for adults. It wasn’t nearly as bad as “Hunchback”—I really enjoyed “The Hobbit” overall, despite its serious flaws—but the similarity is there.
Incidentally, did anyone have a watch during the beginning? Does it really take them an hour to leave the Shire, or did it just feel that way? My husband hasn’t seen it yet, and I was trying to figure out how to smuggle in a book for a good chunk of the beginning because I can’t sit through that again.
SPOILERS! SPOILERS!
I actually liked the Smeagol/Gollum schizophrenia in “Riddles in the Dark.” I didn’t see it as a callback so much as a choice consistent with the way Jackson has characterized Gollum for the entire series; IIRC, there wasn’t nearly as much Smeagol/Gollum interplay in the books as in the movies, so it seemed like Jackson was intentionally making that a bigger part of his personality. Since he played up the schizophrenia so much in the original trilogy, it makes sense for him to incorporate it into the prequel as well. I also really liked the idea that, while Gollum wants the game to be over as quickly as possible so he can eat Bilbo, Smeagol is actually enjoying the chance to talk to someone and play a game for once. I found that to be a poignant moment—Smeagol’s a lonely fellow.
I am a huge fan of Tolkien’s “The Hobbit”, and have been looking forward to this movie for a long time. Though fans like me would love nothing more than a word-for-word translation of the book onto the screen, I do not think it is wise to go into a movie hoping to see that. Going in and being open-minded to Jackson’s interpretation helped me to appreciate the good things, and not let the bad things get too much in the way. That being said, here were my highs and lows (SPOILERS):
LOVED: The Riddles in the Dark scene (agree with Rachel K above- with the multi-personality comments), Balin the Dwarf, the song about going to the mountain (gave me the chills!), Martin Freeman as Bilbo (he was PERFECT),the opening scene with Frodo (very endearing), the incredible glimpse of Smaug’s eye at the end (it looked like I could reach out and touch it), and Elrond (who I couldn’t stand in the LOTR, I thought he was amazing in this film).
DIDN’T LIKE: Thorin’s attitude, the rudeness of the dwarves when they first entered the house, Bilbo’s leaving on his own (Gandalf didn’t come back for him), Radagast the Brown (too goofy, I always pictured a more St. Francis-like character), the way the scene at the end-with Gandalf and the dwarves up in the trees, was totally ruined, and the loss of Bilbo’s progression as a character (did he really kill several creatures all ready? I agree with Maggie D’s comment above).
Overall, I enjoyed it. I am really looking forward to the coming films, because I feel like- now that they’ve got the story set up, there will be more room for real development, since the pressure will be off. And, considering the HUGE expectations that this movie was handling, I’d say it did pretty well.
Mr. Greydanus, I agree with some of your points, but also think that some of them were a little over-the-top. Thank you, though, for the review. I always like reading your perspective! God bless!
I just saw it today. I think you’ll find it enjoyable if you keep your expectations at the right level. No, it’s not going to be LOTR. If you read the LOTR book first, followed by the Hobbit book, the latter would probably be pretty disappointing if you expected it to be something along the same lines.
At the same time, you can’t expect the Hobbit film to be just like the book. Having come after Jackson’s LOTR, the story had to be told in a different way. All of the grave and important things happening, only hinted at just off the edges of the page, are already known, so the film needs to acknowledge them and fill us in on the backstory.
Jackson’s attempt at doing this is not entirely successful: Some things work and others don’t. I thought the White Council scene was a bit disappointing after the initial joy at seeing Elrond, Galadriel and Saruman. It was underwritten and uneven. It’s clear that Jackson, Walsh and Boyens had to write the scene from scratch, without a template from Tolkien to adapt (compare the “Council of Elrond” scene in LOTR, long but interesting and critical to advancing the plot; Tolkien devoted a whole chapter to the scene in the book).
Some of the Radagast stuff was a bit silly, but overall I enjoyed that; yes, he’s pretty dotty, but he’s not a bumbling incompetent. The film makes clear that he is surprisingly powerful despite his initial appearance; I look forward to seeing more of him, hopefully not as comic relief.
I was somewhat disappointed in the use of CGI. Not as many “bigatures” this time, with more sets and backgrounds being computer generated. It’s well done as it goes, but as the camera sweeps about, it has more of a video-game feel than the majestic, soaring shots around, over, under and through the wonderfully detailed scale models in LOTR.
Also, regrettably all the baddies are computer generated, and I didn’t like the cartoonish design of the main villains (Azog and the Great Goblin). Hard to feel suspense in the battles with them.
There are also too many cartoonish CGI-constructed action scenes that go beyond the limits of plausibility (in Goblin Town, the whole company surfing/riding a roller coaster ride of collapsing wooden scaffolding and bridges hundreds of feet to the ground completely unscathed is one; another is the over-the-top stone giant fight in the mountains.)
One great triumph of CGI is the familiar-but-improved Gollum 3.0. He’s terrific, and his scene with Bilbo is the best in the film.
Okay, I know most of these comments are criticisms, but I DID enjoy it and look forward to the next two installments. It’s a long, leisurely, rollicking, spectacular adventure story, but without the truckloads of pathos and thematic and philosophical depth of LOTR.
The only times I got misty-eyed were when characters from the earlier films showed up (Ian Holm’s Bilbo, Frodo, Gandalf, Elrond, Galadriel, Rivendell and the Shire themselves). Of course, 1/3 of the way through the book, there weren’t any weepy moments either. I look forward to seeing what Jackson and co. do with Bilbo and Thorin’s relationship in the 3rd film.
If the film as released is nearly three hours, I’ll have to wait for the DVD version - I can’t sit in a theater seat that long.
TeaPot562
General note:
While commenters are welcome to make any observations they find worth making, I wish to be clear that comments about not hoping for a “word-for-word translation of the book onto the screen,” or how one “can’t expect the Hobbit film to be just like the book,” while they may be helpful to some readers, don’t engage my criticisms of this film, at least. I’ve been reviewing movies for over a dozen years (and critiquing them for longer than that), and I have never, ever asked any movie to be anything like a “word-for-word translation of the book onto the screen,” etc.
On the contrary, I consistently and explicitly give filmmakers ample room to depart from their source material — even to critique or subvert it, if that’s appropriate. For more discussion, interested parties are directed to my reviews of, e.g., Pride & Prejudice, Prince Caspian, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader and The Last Temptation of Christ, among many others.
Jackson was accused early on of not really ‘getting’ Tolkien. And it has been repeatedly noted that he made action films of the trilogy. So this film is not surprisingly about what you might expect. I tried to go with no expectations, but was disappointed at some of the rather buffoonish handling of certain scenes,where clever dialogue from the book is replaced with crude humor. I totally agree, some of the action scenes were too dependent on previous movies, I thought of ‘Raiders’ during the cave fight. The great Goblin, who seems fearful in the book, seems little more than Jabba the Hut gone to seed. And the episode with the stone giants was so overdone I expected Shia Lebeouf and Megan Fox show up in a new Camaro. I’m not really sorry I saw the film, and hope against hope the next ones are better, though I doubt it.
John Mark,
It is not the case, though, that An Unexpected Journey is simply more of the same, or that the Lord of the Rings films were not a more honorable, compelling and often inspired response to Tolkien’s work than is this film. The Lord of the Rings films gave many Tolkien lovers (such as myself) reason for much joy, as well as some moments of frustration. An Unexpected Journey offers a lot more frustration and very little real joy. At least, that’s my take.
Heh. I found myself put in mind of an evil version of Boss Nass (with a similarly showy vocal performance).
TolkienLover:
Ooo. I like that. Major missed opportunity there.
re “GENERAL NOTE”—put another way, when the movie comes first, then the book, no one expects the book to track the movie line for line, scene for scene. A “book” that would, the written screen play, would not flow like a book
Just saw it today in 2D (since LotR was 2D) and I have to say I was very pleased with the film. I agree, I felt the almost zany difference with the goblin city being a more wacky rendition of the Moria scene, but to me that felt appropriate. The Hobbit is a more whimsical story than Lord of the Rings, so I felt things like that felt right.
The other thing I like to think of is that we’re getting Bilbo’s rendition of the tale, he’s telling the story (or writing it down anyway). There are two different versions of The Hobbit. A pre-LotR printing and a post-LotR printing where Tolkien made changes to the finding of the One Ring to fit more with LotR and the change was justified as “Bilbo didn’t exactly tell the whole truth” in the pre-LotR editions.
For that alone I’m okay with his discovery of the ring being different in LotR and Hobbit and what’s more I’m okay with some of the scenes of The Hobbit being a little more theatrical and even silly. As Gandalf said, every good story needs a little embellishment. ;)
I would have preferred Gandalf to have tricked the trolls, but I’m okay with Bilbo finding some courage to save Thorin, especially when it still almost led to his death. He killed one warg (more the worg killed itself) and one orc in that scene, so I don’t feel it completely detracts from the book’s pacing.
Definitely a worthwhile prequel all in all in my mind. I look forward to the Extended Edition, though. As someone here compared, no, this is most definitely not the same as Star Wars suffered from its prequel trilogy.
Jeff Fincher:
I’ll grant that An Unexpected Journey isn’t Phantom Menace bad — with two caveats.
a) For many viewers, including me, the full impact of the badness of The Phantom Menace was not immediately felt. Its visual wonder and novelty overwhelmed us, and we had to live with it for awhile, experiencing it over multiple viewings, before we fully appreciated its badness. Likewise, An Unexpected Journey does strike me as a movie with the potential to become insufferable over time. It’s easy to be generous to a movie like this now, when it’s new and your excitement is high. But give it five years or so and then see how you feel.
b) While I wouldn’t put them on a par, my friend Peter Chattaway recently blogged on some striking parallels between An Unexpected Journey and The Phantom Menace — and I’ve added one of my own in the comments.
I saw the 48 fps version. I saw the unrealistic scenes too, but I don’t know that it was caused by the high frame rate. The lighting was simply too bright, and colored like they just had the big florescent work lights still left on. Golum’s cave and the Goblin’s city were as bright as day.
Is the lighting as bad in other formats?
For other viewers, The Phantom Menace is actually not one of the most incredibly bad movies in the history of incredibly bad movies, and the hate that gets piled on it is bizarrely over the top.
Pachyderminator:
FWIW, I am not a Phantom Menace hater, and I don’t regard it as “one of the most incredibly bad movies in the history of incredibly bad movies.” While I eventually knocked off one star from my initial 3½-star rating to 2½ stars, my review is a blend of appreciation and disparagement. Its “badness” is not the total reality of the film; it’s a movie in which visionary and wondrous creations coexist with incredibly poor choices.
Your comments about drug references reminded me of an old Harvard Lampoon LOTR parody titled “Bored of the Rings.”
Saw it and enjoyed it, but definitely have to agree that’s it’s very uneven in places, and tonally all over the place. I’m sorry, but adorable CGI hedgehogs that make baby noises and gruesome decapitation and dismemberment don’t really belong in the same film. I’m thinking Radagast in general will probably grow increasingly annoying for me in repeat viewings.
Also I’m still somewhat disappointed that they’re stretching the smallest book in the series into a trilogy of it’s own, I don’t see how that can be interpreted as anything but a blatant cash grab.
This makes me sad; I was looking forward to taking my kids to a Hobbit movie more in line with the tone of the original children’s story, my favorite book when I was a kid (and sometimes still). Guess I’ll need to wait until they are a bit older. And three movies?????
Also, I could be wrong as it has been several years since my last reading, but didn’t Bilbo sign a contract in the book?
Bobby:
In the book, Thorin signs a letter to Bilbo with certain promises and commitments, but Bilbo isn’t asked to sign anything as far as I recall. Why add that to the film if you aren’t going to do anything with it?
Note: Raymond Arroyo and I discussed An Unexpected Journey on EWTN’s “The World Over Live” last Thursday; you can watch the full show on YouTube (I’m on at the very end), but I’d recommend the 10-minute after show Raymond and I taped, available in my latest blog post. (We also discuss Lincoln, Skyfall and Les Misérables.) At that link you can also see 60-second reviews of An Unexpected Journey from me and my “Reel Faith” co-host David DiCerto.
Enjoyed the film, as I valued completeness over skipping scenes (I still mourn for Tom Bombadil, Old Man Willow, and the Cairns). Who cares about length when the majority of my viewings will have a “jump-to-desired-scene” function? If they announced a 7th film covering say, the Lay of Luthien, I’d be ecstatic - we’re spoiled to have these at all.
I loved the panoramas, was able to suspend disbelief about underground lighting (unlike some commentators above), and was impressed by the textual between-the-lines additions. These included the Ereborn details, the Oakenshield etiology, the goblin mine, the White Council and Necromancer story, Radagast, and the willingness to put on the thunderstorm titans (which easily could have been skipped, but they probably did go over-the-top there). Bilbo was good but not great, Gandalf did lose a little edge, Elrond gained some, Saruman was made into a buffoon unnecessarily, and the dwarves, always difficult, were depicted miles better than anything else I’ve seen.
Thanks for the review, SDG, and it reminds me to note that I reread your Middle Earth vs. Harry Potter review every couple of years or so, and admire your criticism and wisdom there and elsewhere.
I didn’t think it was bad, but I wouldn’t call it good. What makes me most excited about it is that the next generation of kids will watch this first, and then LOTR.
My other thought was that this film seemed to be a lot of set-up, like Harry Potter part 1. A bad choice by the filmmakers, but I don’t think this movie will really be able to stand by itself… I’m going to come back to it once part 2 and 3 are out.
I will concede the fan-service got a little old. ;P
Thanks for the thoughts, Stephen!
After seeing the movie, I couldn’t care less to see the sequels. There seems to be no deep moral message here, just an opportunity to use CGI to place the characters in less believable worlds and escapes. By the end, I never felt Bilbo’s underlying goodness building nor his string of extraordinary luck. The dwarves are supposed to be slowly gaining an appreciation for the out-of-place hobbit, but that is replaced with a sudden and heavy-handed instant act of valor. Jackson completely missed the subtleties that made The Hobbit so endearing and worth reading and replaced it with an overly long and ridiculous concept.
Thank you for this review. I enjoyed it greatly, and you drew out points I hadn’t even considered. I especially liked your treatment of various inconsistencies in Jackson’s world-building. Regarding the changes to Bilbo’s character, I was most annoyed by the war-hero aspect of all that. However, I see how it falls into place with the other changes (even something as small as having him guess “Time” instead of getting it accidentally). Myself, I thought Freeman was so awesome I didn’t mind. The other liberties bothered me a lot more. Completely agreed with you on many points there. I guess my feeling is that because I was never a HUGE fan of the _LOTR_ movies, I didn’t feel the let-down with this one that others felt. In fact, I walked away thinking it was both good and bad in a lot of the same ways. The poor world-building was, if anything, an even bigger problem in _LOTR_. “Arwen is dying.” Gimme a break.
Also, per Gollum’s schizophrenia, is everyone forgetting the extended inner debate he has in the book when he loses Bilbo in the tunnels? Tolkien even breaks up the dialogue as though it’s a conversation between two people. This scene was not even in the movie. I think Jackson’s truer to Tolkien’s thinking here than people give him credit for. Though myself, I would have rather he kept Tolkien’s original scene instead of replacing them with blunter schizophrenic lines. “Wasn’t talking to you” is kind of on-the-nose. With Tolkien, the impact is no less powerful, but it’s done more gracefully.
I’ve seen the film twice. Once in 2D and once in 3D. Personally, I think your brain shuts off the 3D after a bit, and you only really notice it in certain sequences. I quite forgot that the film was in 3D after about ten minutes, and only remembered it in the scene with Gandalf, Bilbo, and the dwarves in the tree.
I found the scene in Bag End where the dwarves sing of their gold thrilling. I think that was among the most poignant scenes in the movie. I’m not sure that I liked that Bilbo decided to join the quest seemingly on a whim. While that may play to his “Tookish” roots, it is rather out of character for a Baggins of Bag End, and goes against the grain of Tolkien’s vision for this “respectable Hobbit”. Jackson could have done a much better job of handling Bilbo’s response to the offer of the Dwarves. I agree with the poster who suggested that Bilbo’s feathers should have been ruffled by the suggestion that he was incapable of completing the quest. Bilbo’s pride and Tookish love of adventure were what propelled him into the quest along with Gandalf’s gentle prodding. That point could have been more strongly emphasized.
On the other hand, I liked Bilbo’s expanded role in the troll sequence. It seemed to reinforce Bilbo’s role as the “brains” of the operation, though I could have done without the incredibly obvious reference to the Bridge of Khazad-dum sequence from the Fellowship movie. It just seemed unnecessary. I could have done without the storm giant sequence as well(both in the book and the movie). I know Tolkien was a huge fan of Norse mythology, and I think that was more a nod to that mythology than anything else in his works. However, it did very little to advance the story, and could have been cut from the movie with no detriment.
As to the violence, the Hobbit, in spite of being a children’s book, is violent. Gandalf and the dwarves do battle their way out of Goblintown, they are attacked by the goblins and wargs, Bilbo does do battle with the spiders in Mirkwood, and the grand finale to the entire book is the Battle of the Five Armies. Children’s literature is replete with violence. Are the scenes too gory? Perhaps, but remember that Jackson is trying (perhaps too hard) to appeal to children, adults, and Tolkien fans with these movies.
I was quite disappointed that Jackson chose not to develop the character of Gwaihir the Windlord. It makes the eagles look like some sort of servants who come at Gandalf’s beck and call rather than the majestic and proud creatures who are repaying their Lord’s debt to Gandalf. Would that have taken much time? I would like to have seen (or rather heard) Patrick Stewart cast as the voice of Gwaihir. Oh well.
I liked the movie very much. My five year old son and twelve year old daughter both loved it. The five year old giggled through much of it. I found the continuity of the landscape and the actors comforting. I look forward to the sequels with great anticipation.
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