'Unexpected Journey' is enjoyable, but seems slightly unnecessary

Rating: 8/10 (8 June 2015)

There was once, a novel, written in 1937. The book became a success, as a children's novel, and the author wrote and released, 16 years later, a darker sequel to the story, split into three parts. From this sequel, a whole world spawned that would continue to be created until his death in 1973. What book am I talking about? The Hobbit, of course! What author am I talking about? J.R.R. Tolkien, duh! Let us begin our review of the first film in this trilogy...
...The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. An Unexpected Journey follows a Hobbit by the name of Bilbo Baggins as he is swept up in an adventure with 13 dwarfs and a wizard to reclaim the dwarfs's homeland of Erebor from the terrible dragon, Smaug.
I first watched this film about five or six months ago, mainly because I had finally watched the Lord of the Rings Trilogy (which I will be reviewing as well), and I wanted to see the upcoming (at the time) Battle of the Five Armies (which I will be reviewing too). So, I finally watched it, and here is what I think of the film.
Positives, first. The acting in this film is really great. Martin Freeman as Bilbo is easily one of the standouts, as he captures the young Hobbit's uncertainty in going on the adventure, while also managing to turn in a great performance. Ian McKellen always does a great job, no need to mention how great he was again. (Even though I just did.) Richard Armitage does a great job as Thorin, portraying a dwarf who loves the fun and adventure, while also struggling with his wish to return to Erebor. All of the dwarfs do a good job, especially the ones we actually start to know, including Kili (Aidan Turner), Fili (Dean O'Gorman), Balin (Ken Stott), and several others. Several characters from LOTR return as well, including Galadriel (Cate Blanchett), Elrond (Hugo Weaving) and Saruman (Christopher Lee).
The special effects (for the most part) worked really well. I'm still in awe of how they managed to make Hobbits and Dwarfs smaller than their on-screen counterparts. It's a amazing technical feat. I really enjoyed the music as well, even though half of it was a retread from LOTR, Howard Shore always manages to create music that will stick with you. Misty Mountains is one of my favorite songs from a movie, ever. The cinematography was beautiful as well, the sweeping shots of the landscape as the dwarfs made their quest were amazing.
I'm sure most of you want to hear about the scene that is probably going to be the most remembered from this part: Riddles in the Dark, or otherwise known as, Gollum's 20-minute return to Middle-Earth. Probably the best scene in the film, in my opinion. I enjoyed it immensely, all the little cat-and-mouse games they played with each other worked out beautifully. This is one of the things that saved the movie from getting a lower grade.
Let's get to the negative stuff, unfortunately. I disliked the pacing of the movie. It's not really a spoiler, so I'm going to tell you that it takes 45 minutes for them to get out of Bag End and into the main plot. This wouldn't be a bad thing if it couldn't have been cut down. At some points in the film, you can really tell that they were stretching this into three movies, because certain scenes and plot points that were not in the book or were barely mentioned were given a lot of screen time (Where the hell did Radagast the Brown come from?).
Another thing I disliked was the fact that Azog was a part of the film. Why give someone to chase the dwarfs when they had enough adventures on their own? For example, the troll scene, and other scenes that were either not in the book or barely mentioned? The whole thing felt way too drawn out, and I honestly believe they should have kept it to two movies. Shorten this one, cut DOS in half, shorten DOS entirely, and then tack on BOTFA at the end. Bam, two movies.
Overall, this is a welcome addition to the Middle-Earth saga. The acting, characters, special effects and music were all well done, however the plot had pacing issues and that really affected my enjoyment of the movie. Still, it's a great movie and one I will return to.
8/10. Grade: B