Monday, January 07, 2013

"This shooow goes ever on and on..."

I went to see "The Hobbit". And I nearly fell out of my seat.

From boredom.

And irritation.

THE GOOD:

  • THE DWARVES. I liked everything about them. Good casting, good dialogue, good costumes, good jokes. And that "to find our old forgotten gold" song was a great fireside moment. 
  • BILBO. The perfect mix of deference and humour, reluctance and courage. Well acted and well-cast...but then I love Martin Freeman in anything. (Dent Arthur Dent) And... 
  • RICHARD ARMITAGE. I could watch him get a filling done, that's how interesting he is to me. Although it's a little disconcerting finding myself physically attracted to Thorin Oakenshield, who I've always loathed. 
  • THE KNITTING. Oh, the knitting. The dwarves are covered in the stuff, and it's all dreamy and so very, very copyable. 

THE BAD: Where to begin? Where, oh where, oh where to begin. All right, let's begin with:

  • GALADRIEL. I love Cate Blanchet, but Galadriel's stupid faux-sonorous voice, with that ridiculous habit of unnecessary telepathy, has got to stop. In that one scene, where she paces around Elrond's council chamber like a restless spirit, she is WEARING LIFTS. Seriously. They have jacked up her shoes by a good two inches, presumably to give her a more ethereal, Elven look. It's the stupidest thing I've ever seen, except for that laughable, noodley hair of hers. 
  • THE PLOT PACE. Seriously? 9 hours (total) for a 260 page book? I was checking my watch. During The Hobbit, a movie I've been looking forward to seeing since 2009. WHILE WATCHING RICHARD ARMITAGE WEARING FURS LIKE A SHORTER, SEXIER CONAN, I was checking my watch. That's how much this stupid movie drags.
  • All the EXTRA CRAP they stuck in from the Appendices, just to give it more run-time so they could release three, three-hour movies instead of one three-hour movie OR, okay, if you insist, two two-hour movies. It's a CASH GRAB and I hate cash grabs.

So are you getting that I hated The Hobbit: An Unexpectedly Boring Ordeal?

6 comments:

Dave Hingsburger said...

My biggest problem with Peter Jackson is that he doesn't know when to end a movie. The LOTR series seriously upset my bladder. Yes, I'm 60 I can talk about my bladder. I kept thinking, "OK, that's it, I can go and pee now" only to find that each movie had like 7 endings ... it kept ending and ending and ending. Sheesh. If my bladder has stretch marks, I'm suing Peter Jackson.

Susie Hewer said...

I'm deliberately not going to see the film at the cinema because I know it will make me angry. I loved the book and would have been happy if they'd made it into 1 film. There are not 3 films in that book.

Happy New Year by the way!

Shan said...

Yes!! YES to both of you!!

(Happy New Year Susie!)

Jeannette said...

Yep, I agree with what Susie said.
Ever since I heard about it, my thought has been, "What? How dare they..."
My time is worth too much, and I do not want to rot my brain, nor ruin my memory of the book.

clumsy ox said...

Well, I didn't go to see The Hobbit. I'm not really boycotting, I'm just not into spending $$$ for the cinema. I figure it might be a better picture than my Blu-Ray can show, and it's sure get better sound, but I just don't think the "betterness" of the cinema offsets the "worseness" of the ticket price.

Of course I'll probably see it when it comes out on Blu-Ray. Not the first release, I'll wait for the inevitable "extended edition". I'll rent the first release and buy the "extended".

I still haven't forgiven PJ for omitting Tom Bombadil and Glorfindel from LotR. Sorry, that's a bridge too far. And while people have argued to me that he had to exclude something, because the movie would be "just too long"... That's nonsense. Time constraints didn't keep him from fabricating dialogue between Arwen and Aragorn from whole cloth. If he were to omit the stupid, vacuous "longing" of Liv Tyler's eyes and put the story back in that belongs there, the story would be much better.

As it is, we're to believe somehow that Merry can jam any-old-sword into the leg of the Witch King and he'll crumple. Huh? It's because of the story of Tom Bombadil that Eowyn can kill the Nazgul.

Anyhow, I'm in no rush to go see The Hobbit. On the other hand, I'm reading the book to my kids...

Shan said...

Yep, absolutely, Mark. I don't care about the Tom Bombadil thing in and of itself, but it's nonsense to suppose it was because of length concerns. If PJ has a splendid disregard for anything, it's length.

I'll freely admit, I hate all the elf parts in all the movies. The one exception is Haldir.

Frankly, if you're getting the 'extended' edition, you might die of old age before the end credits.