The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoilers)

[Mr Light]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

I have no problem with Gandalf learning of Sauron's return firsthand because that's what's described in the Appendixes. In the FOTR movie, Gandalf already knows that Sauron has returned, he just doesn't know that Bilbo/Frodo has the Ring he only suspects it.

I can't wait to see Saruman, Radagast, Elrond, and Galadriel storming Dol Guldor to rescue Gandalf. That's going to be the highlight of the third movie for me

 

[BillJ]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

Went and saw it with the wife. She loved it, I fell asleep. But then I'm probably not the best gauge of quality since I've never been much interested in Tolkien.

 

[Rhaven]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

I thought it was awsome. And yes, there were parts where the plot was drawn out and almost boring. But Smaug's appearance and adventures were well worth it.

 

[The Old Mixer]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

Jackson has stated that while they initially placed the scene at the end of the second movie, they decided that it didn't work with the flow of that film and they moved to the opening of the third film. But when the time came to edit the third film, they realized that they were taking too much time resolving the movie two villain rather than focusing on the third movie's plot.

Then put it at the end of the second movie because viewers deserve a proper conclusion to the SECOND MOVIE'S VILLAIN and because that's where it belongs in the first place and not on a money-grab DVD edition?

I swear, Jackson is worse than Tarantino and Judd Apatow combined when it comes to cutting his movies and making pacing decisions.

Mr Light...behold the chaos you have wrought!

 

[ROBE]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

Smaaaaaauuuug better be in the next movie.

 

[JD]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

Jackson has stated that while they initially placed the scene at the end of the second movie, they decided that it didn't work with the flow of that film and they moved to the opening of the third film. But when the time came to edit the third film, they realized that they were taking too much time resolving the movie two villain rather than focusing on the third movie's plot.

Then put it at the end of the second movie because viewers deserve a proper conclusion to the SECOND MOVIE'S VILLAIN and because that's where it belongs in the first place and not on a money-grab DVD edition?

I swear, Jackson is worse than Tarantino and Judd Apatow combined when it comes to cutting his movies and making pacing decisions.

Trust me, you really should read the link. I did and now things make a lot more sense.

 

[Mr Light]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

I always click the links to articles. I want the real story!

 

[Allyn Gibson]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

The lack of a defined arc in DoS is a legitimate criticism. But ending it with Smaug's attack on Lake Town wouldn't, IMO, solve the problem.

I disagree. It's because of character arcs that I thought Bilbo leaving Erebor with the Arkenstone, after Smaug's death and the burning of Lake-Town, would have been the right ending. That's the point where Bilbo realizes that Thorin has lost it, and since Thorin is unwilling to make Lake-Town right on his own he'll force him to do it. Bilbo becomes proactive at that point. (Which is an issue with The Hobbit; the plot is largely a reactive one.) Plus, it matches the ending of the film version of The Two Towers; one group of heroes feels like they've won a great victory, while another hero leaves on a desperate quest, and overall things are looking very gloomy indeed.

 

[JD]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

I saw this this morning and I loved it. After seeing the reaction to this one, I was pretty sure I was going to enjoy this one, and I was not wrong. I thought this one had a lot of great action scenes, from the spiders, to the barrel escape to the fight in Lake Town. I know the barrel scene wasn't really a big action scene in the book, but I thought what we got was a pretty cool exciting sequence.
The one thing I was most nervous about going into this one was the inclusion of Tauriel and Legolas, but I thought they worked really well. The thing I was the most nervous about was the Kili/Tauriel, but I thought they managed to work it into the movie without it becoming a distraction. I thought it gave us a few nice quieter character scenes without really detracting from the big action scenes. I also thought it made sense to work Legolas in since it was a nice connection to LOTR, and it wasn't too hard to do since he was already established as being the Elven King's son.
By far the best part of the movie was Smaug, he was simply amazing. I thought Benedict Comberbatch did a magnificent job with the voice/mocap, and the animation for him was gorgeous.
I saw it in HFR3D, which I still loved. I thought it looked great, and really helped to make the movie feel even more immersive.

 

[Davros]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

Smaaaaaauuuug better be in the next movie.

Why wouldn't he be?

 

[Set Harth]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

He's the new Saruman, you see. He won't be in the third film at all. That's how the story goes, anyway, even though it doesn't make any damn sense. In other news, computers will think it's 1900!

 

[DarthPipes]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

3. Ten, maybe fifteen, minutes of Smaug before he is killed by Bard. Sadly Smaug's character will not be developed any further, but hopefully PJ will stick to the plot and keep Smaug's role in the third movie to be strictly confined to destroying Laketown... Before being slain by Bard.

It's Peter Jackson. It'll be 40 minutes because he's an ego-maniac in love with his own overrated directing ability.

 

[Captaindemotion]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

Oh dear, I really did not expect this film to surpass Man of Steel as my biggest disappointment of the year.

I loved all of Jackson's previous trips to Middle Earth, even if I felt that An Unexpected Adventure was overlong. I will even defend King Kong. But this was just a bit of a mess.

Now, admittedly, I was tired and have had the cold all week. But I saw AUE after walking for nearly 1/2 an hour in the rain and cold and still enjoyed it. DOS was a different kettle (or barrel) of fish. It just seemed thrown together. Chase sequence, dwarves & Bilbo captured, dwarves & Bilbo escape. Repeat. Gandalf stands around and looks constipated and shouts portentously. Bring in a noticeably older-looking Legolas and give him and Kate from Lost some cool action stuff to do, repeat. Add pointless new characters from that silly town and a silly love triangle about a poisoned dwarf.

I don't know why this one didn't work for me. It's not that it's the difficult middle movie - I think TTT is better than FOTR. But DOS just reeked of being padded, of having material stuck in and on to justify a 3 hour running time because it's what audiences expect of a Jackson Tolkien movie.

On the plus side, Smaug was fantastically realised, animated and voiced and the whole cat and mouse routine with Bilbo was brilliant. The spiders were also fantastic and that was a very memorable scene too. Some of the other action sequences were also amazing. Unfortunately, I do think that the 48FPS 3D, while marginally better than in the previous film, still cheapens the look of the movie and detracts from it. I got my times mixed up with the showings and ended up seeing this version, as oppose to the 2D. Trying to be positive, it means that these films do look unique, but I'm not surprised that no other movie makers have copied this technology.

Sorry PJ, I wanted to enjoy this. Maybe you should have just made 2 Hobbit movies after all.

 

[AvBaur]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

I just came out of the theater. The second installment of the Hobbit trilogy still didn't do much to convince me that this story needed to be told in three lengthy parts, but I did have a ton of fun with it despite the bagginess of the narrative. I will admit, though, that these movies are mainly a visual experience for me, and as such, this one impressed me once again. To a rather large degree, this may be thanks to the HFR 3D, which continues to amaze me. Not only is the level of detail and the tangibility of the sets and characters, which the higher framerate allows, quite breathtaking, but it also enables Peter Jackson to go crazy with his energetic camerawork without sacrificing clarity and cohesiveness. Whether these movies hold up as well when I rewatch them on my non-HFR projector at home will have to be seen, though.


Of course, the visuals alone would not have been enough for me to rate the movie this highly. I also very much enjoyed Martin Freeman's Bilbo and the scenes he shares with Smaug, brilliantly brought to life by Benedict Cumberbatch and an army of animators. I liked the action scenes much more than some of the ones in part one. While they're still pretty extravagant and physics-defying, and probably too long, I had an easier time just going along for the ride this time, and they fit better into the story. And I even liked the introduction of Evangeline Lily's Tauriel and the love story between her and one of the dwarves. (But would it have killed them to make at least some of the other elves female, too?)


My rating: 8/10

 

[Set Harth]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

I just saw a 47 Ronin tv ad with the line: "Your world will burn."

Sounds familiar.

 

[JarodRussell]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

I just saw a 47 Ronin tv ad with the line: "Your world will burn."

Sounds familiar.

The fire rises.

 

[Mr Light]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

I just saw Hobbit 2 a second time in theater, and I was right about the golden statue. They start the furnaces, melt the gold, it pours through the floor trenches, then they go down to a lower level where the statue hall is. So while we do not see where the gold is pour to in the film, we see it flowing towards a lower level where the statue is, so presumably it gets poured into the top of the empty mold (though I didn't see the mechanism for this). Then it sat in the mold long enough to partially congeal, so that when they blew apart the molding it would retain its shape for a few moments before the liquid inside burst through.

Another thing I noticed in the movie is that every time Smaug breathes fire he clearly is caught up in the blasts and is uninjured.... and since dragon fire is the only thing that can melt a magic ring... why did they think that molten gold would kill him? I guess they were just hoping he would drown in it as it solidified before he could break free.

And yes, the cliffhanger is still abnormally abrupt and unsatisfying

 

[Stone_Cold_Sisko]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

I enjoyed it. But man did peter Jackson pad this out. These would have been two really awesome movies instead of 3 entertaining movies (of course who knows how movie 3 turns out).

I wish this wasn't trying to be LOTR. I wish they'd embraced the hobbit-ness of it more. Embraced the different tone. Smaug doesn't even feel like the big bad here with all the great war is coming.

In movie 1 the Bilbo-Gollum showdown was great. In this one Bilbo-Smaug is great. This is all better to me than the Sauron stuff.

 

[Mr Light]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

The three movie restructuring is really bringing out the LOTR parallels...

Billbo = Frodo. Thorin = Aragorn. Gandalf = Gandalf. the Dwarves = Merry and Pippin (the comic relief)
Beorn = Eomer. Legolas = Legolas. Tauriel = Eowyn. Bard = Faramir. Master = Theoden. Master's Slimy Aide = Wormtongue.
Smaug = Saruman (no wonder his scenes got cut from the third film! )
Necromancer = Sauron (!). Azog = Gothmog. Bolg = Lurtz (right down to using a bow on a downed hero)

 

[Unicron]

Re: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug - Grading & Discussion (Spoile

I just saw Hobbit 2 a second time in theater, and I was right about the golden statue. They start the furnaces, melt the gold, it pours through the floor trenches, then they go down to a lower level where the statue hall is. So while we do not see where the gold is pour to in the film, we see it flowing towards a lower level where the statue is, so presumably it gets poured into the top of the empty mold (though I didn't see the mechanism for this). Then it sat in the mold long enough to partially congeal, so that when they blew apart the molding it would retain its shape for a few moments before the liquid inside burst through.

Interesting. Too bad it's so easy to miss unless you know what you're looking for, and the end result is just to make Smaug the Blingy.