Fun adventure with some good laughs.

Rating: 8/10 (22 December 2012)

First of all, I saw this is 2d, which slightly dampened the experience because I could tell that some sequences were shot for 3d. I also saw it at 24 fps, and it looked beautiful so no complaints there.
As a huge fan of the Lord of the Rings trilogy, this movie is very light and fanciful, especially in the beginning. Some parts are very similar to Fellowship, with some familiar locations fans will enjoy. The beginning when the dwarfs all arrive at Bag End had me laughing quite a bit. However, it is quite a while before Bilbo actually leaves the Shire on his adventure, and this attributes to he movies length of 170 mins.
Martin Freeman and Ian McKellen are both great as Bilbo and Gandalf. Ian seems like he never left Gandalf and slipped right back into his wizard boots. The dwarfs are all given their own personalities, although some more than others, and they all help Bilbo out a lot. They give some great comedy relief too.
Visually the movie looks great. The Shire is as beautiful as ever, as is Rivendell. Everyone's heard that Gollum is in here, and he has one extended scene that is probably my favorite in the whole movie. There is also a fantastic escape sequence near the end.
My only real complaints are the movie's length and a couple of sevens that seemed unnecessary. At 170 mins. you will need to set aside an entire afternoon to go see it. But I still had a lot of fun with it. It might be a little to violent for young kids, but any other age should enjoy it.