Square peg meets round hole

Rating: 7/10 (22 April 2013)

Let me start by saying that I was pleasantly surprised when I finally watched The Hobbit on DVD last week. Having read a ton of reviews and rants online and shaking my head in disbelief at the weird decision to turn a 320-page children's-book into three 180-minute movies, I really wanted to hate this flick.
Turns out it's not that bad after all, but that may have something to do with the fact that I'm a huge sucker for everything Tolkien. Consequently, I didn't mind the slow start of the film. In fact, the prologue (narrated by the wonderful Ian Holm) does a good job of getting you re-acquainted with the world of Middle Earth and giving you the necessary background on the history of Durin's Folk (Dwarfs). I also didn't mind the extended party sequence at Bag End.. those scene are pretty much straight out of the book.
But let me get straight to my two main criticisms: Tone and unnecessary changes.
The filmmakers are pretty obviously trying to make The Hobbit fit in with LOTR, and that's like trying to fit the proverbial square peg into a round hole. One is a lighthearted fairytale written for kids, the other is a hugely complex and much darker epic. But instead of settling for one tone (lighthearted or serious/epic) and sticking with it, the filmmakers try to have it both ways. And they actually make things worse by not just incorporating the more childish stuff from the novel, but by adding in *more* childish stuff that wasn't even in the book. Belching Dwarfs, a Troll-snot-covered Bilbo or a guano-loving wizard driving a bunny-sleigh are nowhere to be found in Tolkien writings. Perhaps most importantly, the film can't seem to hold its tone for more than ten minutes.
There would be nothing wrong with a lighthearted tone in the first half hour and a subsequent shift towards darker material. Which is what the book does: Opening with a comedic sequence in Bag End and moving to scarier scenes like the spider-sequence, Smaug destroying Lake-town or the Battle of the Five Armies. Instead we're constantly shifting between serious and silly. Like in the Radagst scene which starts out like a piece from a Disney-movie and then turns into a pretty intense affair depicting the terrors of Dol Guldur.
At the same time, the writers are desperately looking for conflict where there was none in the source material. Thorin's attitude towards the Elves wasn't exactly friendly in the book, but here he is borderline hostile towards them. And I don't think I'm misreading a single scene here, since he fiercely objects to going to Rivendell, he doesn't want Elrond to view the map (for some reason) and he has to sneak off during the completely superfluous White Council meeting. None of which happened in the book. The Dwarfs didn't get along well with the Elves, but they weren't openly hostile. And neither did the Elves nor anyone else at this point try to stop the company from continuing the quest. It's a bit like the changes done to Faramir in the LOTR-films: Just like him, Rivendell/Elrond become an obstacle for the heroes instead of just an episode in the story.
The funny thing is that the whole hostility-deal does come in later in the narrative of the book as well, but for a much better reason than the one presented in the film. Basically, the writers took this whole element from a later point in the story (the company's imprisonment by Thranduil) and shifted it to an earlier point to give their film a bit more conflict. The problem is that it just doesn't ring true and it makes the Dwarfs look like aggressive imbeciles.
Then there's the White Council: While it is great to see these characters together on screen, the whole sequence was rather pointless. Here are four people talking about stuff foreshadowing the events in LOTR, but none of it has anything to do with Bilbo's/Thorin's story. You could easily leave the whole thing out (and put it into an extended cut) and the movie wouldn't suffer at all. Plus: Let's not forget that the information we get about the Witch King contradicts what Tolkien wrote. Check out the LOTR-wiki for more info on this breach of canon.
Don't get me wrong: I do understand why the writers made these changes. They're obviously trying to give the first 100 pages of the book (because that's what this film covers) the structure of a stand-alone film. But the result isn't exactly successful: We get some stapled on character-development like Thorin's "boy, was I wrong about you"-scene, we get some exaggerated Elves vs. Dwarfs-conflict and we get a main antagonist in the form of Azog where there was none in the book. We also get scenes fleshing out the world of Middle Earth more - which Tolkien-fans will probably love. But if we're honest these are nothing more than glorified filler and stuff meant to link this trilogy to the original one.
All that said, it is rather surprising that I liked the movie as much as I did. It's no "Fellowship" (my personal favourite of the LOTR-films), but it certainly isn't "Phantom Menace"-material, either. Yes, there is a ton of CGI in here which sometimes doesn't *really* work, but overall the world of Middle Earth (according to Jackson) looks as breathtaking as ever. The acting is mostly very good. I especially liked Martin Freeman as Bilbo, who did a much, much better job than Elijah Wood in the original trilogy. He was so good in fact, that I couldn't help but wonder how LOTR would've turned out had he played Frodo.
Bottom line: A must-see if you're a (tolerant) Tolkien-fan who can live with all the changes. But if you're not into Tolkien or even fantasy in general, this probably won't be your cup of tea.
7/10