Sunday 5 January 2014

We have been to the Desolation...

Well that's the four of us back from the film.Verdict? We all enjoyed it but  with a few reservations.It was a tad too long,not sure about goblins and elves fighting in Laketown and not entirely sure of Tauriel having been added.Although she was better than I had imagined as a character.I must go back to the book and compare and contrast...
What did you think ?

8 comments:

  1. Nothing like the book, but I can see why they have made the film like that having re-read the book recently- straight from the page would have made a rather dull film most of the time .

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  2. Much the same, I liked it even better than the 1st one which I liked alot but I could done without most or all of the dragon chasing dwarves scenes. I need to reread the appendices from LofTR as thats apparently what inspired some of the extra bits. I did rather like the she elf to be honest.

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  3. I must e the only person to truly enjoyed it. I thought the film moved at a good pace the additions added to the film.

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  4. In my view it didn't work. The problem for me is that the book is too long for one movie, and too short for three. But structurally you can't really subdivide it into two. The book is also self-referential in several areas, e.g. Gandalf pulling the same trick on Beorn that he pulled on Bilbo himself at the beginning of the story, the extensive use of tunnels that link the major parts of the story's structure, Smaug and Bilbo, in their live of subterranean creature comforts, being rather similar types...

    If you can't retell the story in a movie, don't retell it.

    So Peter Jackson, broadly speaking, doesn't. It's a whole different gig, with only the merest nod in the direction of the original structure. The journey through Mirkwood, which was supposed to take weeks becomes a stroll through the forest, give or take some rather importunate spiders; Esgaroth looked great, but what happened to the phlegmatic Bard of the book?

    From a spectacle point of view, the movie comes up trumps - the settings are great. Esgaroth of the long lake knocks Kevin Costner's Waterworld into a cocked hat; Mirkwood at least looked as though it could match the gloomy evil character of the original; and Smaug looks as mighty as the treasure he hoards. No trivial lizard he, squatting upon a few sparklies!

    It was OK: 6/10 for mine (an improvement over Hobbit 1, 4/10). But I reckon a more apt title would probably have been 'Raiders of the Lost Desolation of Smaug.' At least they pronounce 'Smaug' correctly.
    Cheers,
    Ion

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  5. Yep, I would go along with 6/10. I enjoyed the film, but it was too long and I feel that Bilbo is being sidelined into a minor role. When I heard about a love triangle between 2 elves and a dwarf I was horrified, but to be honest it didn't bother me much in the film. I liked Legolas' insults about the portraits of Gloin's wife and "wee bairns". My oldest boy liked it, and we are planning to do The Battle of 5 armies on a budget using 1/72 Dark/Light alliance figures in the main.

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  6. I really enjoyed it, much better than the first film. I have a big advantage in that I have not read the book in forty years so I don't remember a thing about it. I am looking at the film as an entity in itself and comparing it to something else, except the first film. No baggage, no preconceptions. For me, 9/10.

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  7. Sorry - that should be " and not comparing it to something else,.."

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  8. It was not bad. Not the book though.The Hobbit is pretty much a sausage-fest, LOTR only slightly less so. The hot red-head warrior chick seems to be a bit of a meme right now so the addition of Tauriel wasn't surprising.

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