The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey unless you read the book which was forty times shorter and for children.

Rating: 6/10 (24 April 2013)

Peter Jackson's The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is a fantastic movie, but only if you've read the Silmarillion and drew obscene pictures of elves as a kid. Otherwise this massive undertaking to bring the classic children's book to life is as convoluted as a trans gender midget in clown make-up that only washes VW buses for a living. While this level of depth worked perfectly for Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy, it's absolutely ridiculous in a movie based off a book that was created to maintain an eight year old's attention span.
I love Tolkien, and I'll go toe-to-toe with anyone regarding Middle Earth trivia but The Hobbit was a first attempt children's book by a master linguist who wrote it as he went along. Look at the first two chapters of the book and you'll see there's a natural narrator that somehow disappears as Tolkien starts to find confidence in his ability to craft the story. It's simple and fun, and that's what makes it such a great lead-in to his epic Lord of the Rings trilogy. Unfortunately for Jackson's wallet, Tolkien's The Hobbit isn't nearly as detailed as his great masterpiece, which forces Jackson to pull out every back story he could to warrant three years of merchandising all because King Kong sucked as bad as Jack Black in the Pit Fall commercial.
So going into it, you should know that 75% of the film has nothing to do with the original book and is full of abstract back story that you can only find in the comment section of the appendix section of the Silmarillion. Now if you don't know what that massively long book is about, then congratulations on having fun in college. It was a culmination of all of Tolkien's background work in creating the world of Middle Earth, and is awe-inspiring to say the least. It also helped guide him into singlehandedly creating fantasy fiction as we know it today. But The Hobbit was his first attempt, and made for children, not Harry Knowles. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is the first three hour entry to a trilogy that is based off of a 320 page book, which adds up to a nine overall hour film derived from a book that can be read by an elementary school teacher in less than four, according to yahoo answers which is never wrong.
I hate to knock The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, because as a Tolkien dork, I loved it. I felt goosebumps while watching some of my most nostalgic memories come to life, such as the troll battle and riddle game with Gollum. But in typical Jackson style, he altered these classic moments so that they were almost indistinguishable from the original version just like that prick George Lucas, post 1985. If you don't believe me, go back and read the troll scene and then compare how close to the original it stayed. Or find one single mention of Radagast riding a sled of bunnies anywhere in The Hobbit, or Lord of the Rings for that matter, and I'll forgive Jackson's insult of leaving out Beorn the shape-shifter or Bombadil (I realize he was in the LOTR, but I can still harbor resentment).
Still as I said before, I enjoyed the movie and must give credit where it's due, and there were many things that worked including the superb cast. The fantastic Martin Freeman starring as the young Bilbo Baggins was stellar as expected, as he's mainly known for respected roles in original series like The Office and Sherlock, among others. Furthermore the rest of the cast is engaging and really embraces their fantastical roles, particularly the forty five dwarfs whom I'm not going into detail about because there's too many. Also watching the early stages of Gandalf, played perfectly by Sir Ian McKellen, was refreshing and brought a greater impact when you go back to watch the LOTR trilogy. It's also impossible to fault Jackson completely as a director, simply by how he maintained the basic ties to the themes that worked from the LOTR's series, such as the beautiful cinematography and incomparable score by the great Howard Shore.
Still the film was confusing and unfocused. While the earlier trilogy was complex and could also be seen as overwhelming, LOTR centered on a small cast of heroes that we rooted for and a clear cut villain, and so was easier to follow. With The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey, we have the entire cast of the Keystone Cops to keep up with, not to mention a hodgepodge of orc leaders mixed with the mysterious darkness in Mirkwood, as well as Smaug the Dragon, whom the eleven year old that forces me to eat crème horns after midnight can't wait to see. Then you have to remember that most of the plot development has yet to happen, which makes this first installation pretty much three hours of listening to a bunch of dwarfs spinning yarns to a hobbit who gives about a much of a damn as you did before you found out your grandfather really worked as a women's shoe salesman in Albuquerque during Iwo Jima.
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey was a fun film to watch if you have any idea who the Witch-King of Angmar or Gary Gygax is. I won't lie that I personally enjoyed the movie, but my nine year old nephew, who had just read the book to get ready for opening night, walked away having a better understanding of how itemized tax deduction works than what we just sat through. So wait till all three versions have come out in three years, and watch it all at one time. Or just buy the original Rankin/Bass Production on vinyl here, or the 1977 movie version because it's awesome and doesn't involve knowing who Mithrandir is.