{"id":5608,"date":"2013-12-23T20:41:39","date_gmt":"2013-12-24T01:41:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=5608"},"modified":"2021-06-05T22:34:22","modified_gmt":"2021-06-06T02:34:22","slug":"film-review-the-hobbit-the-desolation-of-smaug","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=5608","title":{"rendered":"Film review: “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

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The main takeaway that I take away <\/strong>from watching The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug<\/i>, second in Peter Jackson\u2019s very fat movie adaptation of a fairly thin book, is that I have no interest in buying the DVDs. I want to see the movies in theaters, don\u2019t get me wrong, but I can\u2019t find in my heart any desire to buy them and watch them again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The main reason, I think, is that there\u2019s too much Peter Jackson here. The mix works out to about 50% Tolkien\u2019s story, 50% Jackson\u2019s special effects indulgences. He promised us a Hobbit <\/i>fleshed out with material from the Silmarillion <\/i>and other Tolkienian sources. But in fact most of the added stuff is just fluff \u2013 improbable chases, a Rube Goldberg strategem for fighting the dragon (voiced by Benedict Cumberbatch, and wonderful to see in itself), and an entirely implausible romantic subplot. Also a fighting female elf, unknown in the original material.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As with the first film, it\u2019s visually wonderful. Glorious, beautiful, dazzling. But I kept getting pulled out of the story by Jackson\u2019s self-indulgences. I don\u2019t think he trusts the material. In the classic moviemakers\u2019 tradition, he wants to do the story the immense favor of improving it in his own image.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I kept wanting to tell him to sit down, shut up, and let Tolkien talk.
My movie companion thought it was better than the first one. He may be right. But I continue to feel that great opportunities were lost here.
Cautions for frightening scenes and fantasy violence. OK for kids above, oh, eight, I\u2019d say.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oh yes, I wanted to mention that the wise old dwarf Balin is played by Ken Stott, who played Inspector Rebus in the second Rebus <\/i>TV series, reviewed here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The main takeaway that I take away from watching The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, second in Peter Jackson\u2019s very fat movie adaptation of a fairly thin book, is that I have no interest in buying the DVDs. I want to see the movies in theaters, don\u2019t get me wrong, but I can\u2019t find in … Continue reading Film review: “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug”<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[15],"tags":[1309,1345,1934,2898],"class_list":["post-5608","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews","tag-inspector-rebus","tag-j-r-r-tolkien","tag-movies","tag-the-hobbit"],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5608"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5608\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15446,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5608\/revisions\/15446"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}