Highs and lows, Great and yet not so great, all in all a GOOD ENOUGH film, but not a fantastic one

Rating: 6/10 (25 December 2012)

I'm a little surprised to find that most people are giving either very high or very low scores to this film. I'm surprised because the movie felt a little 'middle of the road' to me. It had GREAT parts, and it had not so great parts. It doesn't triumph; it doesn't fall flat on its face.
Despite claims that the movie is 'extremely accurate' to the book, I found myself struggling to recall where some scenes came from(such as the 'Radagast the Brown' side story, or the Pale Orc as a villain). On the other hand, quotes from the book were sprinkled throughout, and the memorable milestones were remembered. It wasn't a film that left anything out. If anything, it INSERTED, which felt a little unnecessary given that the film was so long. But you have to go into movies like this opened minded, because what works in text and what works on film are sometimes two different things. Breaking it into three films allows them to show everything BUT possibly created the need for an antagonist, and motivating force which the strict narrative might not have provided. Maybe they needed conflict and resolution by the end of part one, to feel like a complete film. I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt.
Visually, the film looked good. The CGI fit seamlessly into the environment, and the actors fit their roles well. One of my most positive reactions to the movie was the choice for Bilbo! I felt like Thorin Oakenshield was little too un-dwarfy, which leads me to a point I'd like to make. That while the film looked GOOD, I didn't get that 'Ooh! Thats EXACTLY how I imagined it!" thing like I did with the other LOTR films. (With the exception of the EXCELLENT 'Bilbo meets Gollum' segment, of course.) Nothing looked bad, and there was some nice creativity, but it felt a little out of character.
The Hobbit (book) was lighter than the LOTR, which is what I loved about it. However, I felt that the film traded charm for cheap laughs at times. People defend the film's humor by saying they were going for a lighter tone, but if you failed at making a charming heart warming film and had to douse it in jokes to make it 'light'... well you should possibly rethink you strategy moving forward. You can't create tone with surface level gags and gimmicks.
As I mentioned with the 'Bilbo, Gollum' scene, there were some fantastic highs to this film. Among them, are the eagles swooping in to save the day, the Dwarfs low rumbly singing, and getting to see Rivendell up close and for longer periods of time. There were also some lows: sometimes the scenery, though creative, felt like it didn't quite 'fit' into the LOTR universe. I understand this can't be LOTR 4, BUT it DOES take place in the same place right? Shouldn't it look/feel somewhat similar? Characters and scenes were expanded in not always so great ways. There was some O.K. humor, and some that was downright corny.
If you take all as one lump, I have to give it a 'so-so'. It succeeds and fails. Hopefully, with the production hullabaloo (switching directors etc.) over and done, it will pull itself together more and more before the end of the trilogy.
(I also want to end by saying that I do NOT classify myself as a Tolkein fan/follower. The Hobbit is a charming, lovely little read that I've loved for a long time, but I'm not one of "those" people. Any bias/snobbery you may seem to find in this review comes not from my undying devotion to a specific book, but from a lifelong love and prolific reading/watching of fairy tale/children's works. I've compared this film, not to a book, but to other films that capture the imagination, in order to choose a score.)