PG-13, 169 minutes
Starring- Martin Freeman, Ian McKellen, Richard Armitage
3/ 5 Stars
DO NOT SEE THIS MOVIE IN THE 48HFR RESOLUTION! This makes the movie, especially the battle sequences; feel as if they were in a video game. Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, let’s begin. The Hobbit centers on Bilbo Baggins (Freeman) a hobbit from The Shire who is recruited by Gandalf the Grey (McKellen) to assist him and a group of thirteen dwarves to reclaim their homeland from the dragon Smaug, all while being pursued by nasty creatures like orcs, wargs (giant wolves) and goblins.
I am a huge Lord of the Rings fan and for years, I had been anxiously waiting to see this film. Unfortunately, it was a great disappointment. First off, the good. The acting is terrific in this and Bilbo Baggins is already a much more interesting and dynamic character than Frodo Baggins from the LOTR films. The makeup is excellent, the cinema photography is enjoyable, and Peter Jackson was perfectly able to capture the best scene from the book (riddles in the dark with Gollum.)
Sadly, the negatives just barely out weight the positives. I saw this film in both the latest 48HFR resolution and the more conventional 28HFR. For those who don’t know, a normal movie reel shows 28 frames for every second, but with some screenings of The Hobbit, one can view 48 frames for every second. It’s supposed to better engage the viewer and make them really feel as if they were in the land of Middle Earth. This format really needs some adjustments. All of the visuals looked cheesy and poorly done. However when I saw this film in the conventional 2D 28HFR resolution, the visuals looked amazing. So, if you are going to see The Hobbit, save your money and go the traditional route. The Hobbit, unlike LOTR, has unemotional characters, poor dialogue, and has unbelievable pacing problems. At nearly three hours long, this could have easily been reduced to two hours. Plus, the introducing of a wizard named Radagast is somewhat like Jar-Jar Binks from The Phantom Menace; unnecessary, annoying, and plays no vital importance to the story. An Unexpected Journey was indeed unexpected, just not in a good way.
