Overrated.

Rating: 6/10 (28 April 2013)

This is not a bad film. But it is not the film people are describing. The Hobbit is a children's book of approximately 300 pages. Each of the three LOTR books are a good deal longer than the Hobbit, but they only got a single film apiece...while The Hobbit gets three. You can already tell what the film's primary issue will be, and it is: pacing. And that is the film's major issue. Some scenes are dragged out to ridiculous extents. And, while LOTR films were very long, there was NEVER any filler in them. Every single thing that occurred in those films was important for the continuation of the plot (at least in the theatrical versions). But there is soooo much filler in The Hobbit that it is ridiculous! The film's primary antagonist was not even in the book! And that is just one of the many, many filler scenes in the film, that I have no time explaining here.
The film also suffers from a lack of a consistent tone. One scene can be as dark as LOTR, and the very next will have a wizard riding a sled of bunnies. A scene as ridiculous as this does not belong in a film like The Hobbit. First off, because it was NEVER IN THE BOOK, and second because it disengages you from the film, because it completely breaks from the tone of the previous scenes, and because the wizard with the bunnies does absolutely nothing to advance the story, and looks like it belongs in another film.
And don't say that The Hobbit is a children's book, and this is why there are some childish moments in the film. I would buy that, except the film goes out of its way to connect itself to the LOTR trilogy, and when it tries to do so, one can not help but to compare it to the LOTR films. If this was made as a standalone film, I would be able to look past it inconsistencies. However, I simply can not do that. And keep in mind, I only gave you a few examples of what I am talking about as far as the filler and random, unimportant scenes in the movie. Literally about half of the movie did not need to exist, and is simply there so that three movies can be made, so the studios can make more money.
The Hobbit should have been two films. I believe that they could have simply made one, but I think two films would have been fine as well. I will not discuss the visuals here, but I will say that they are decent, but I honestly prefer LOTR visuals to Hobbit's. Including Gollum.
Overall, The Hobbit was a decent film, but suffered a good bit from inconsistencies and filler that is clearly there for filler. I love LOTR, but i simply found the Hobbit okay. I will give it a 6 because there were certain things that did work, and everything that did came from the original novel.