The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is Good, but more of a Set Up For the Next Films

Rating: 8/10 (16 December 2012)

First of all, before I say anything, I respect Peter Jackson A LOT. The LOTR trilogy was amazing and King Kong was terrific! Jackson is the type of filmmaker who makes good judgment on where to use special effects and or CGI and where not to. He is also known for all his films being relatively "long" (LOTR: Return of the King 3 hours and 21 minutes). Taking on the Hobbit, Jackson is totally capable and qualified.
This incredible story is about a Hobbit, Bilbo Baggins, Gandalf the wizard, and twelve other dwarfs led by Thorin Oakenshield. These characters are on a quest is to take back the dwarfs stolen home Erebor from a dragon named Smaug. Once this gang of middle earthians gets on their way they encounter obstacles that surmount to intense action sequences and some repetitive humor. The scene that makes this film good takes place in Gollum's cave, where Bilbo meets Gollum and middle earth is changed forever!
There were a few problems with this movie that are worth addressing. This one could have been shorter. Not only could it have been, but also it "should" have been. Running at 2 hours and 30 minutes The Hobbit part 1 can get saggy at some parts. All around though, it ends up being a pretty action-packed and fun to watch movie. The beginning of The Hobbit is really slow. There is a lot of unnecessary back-story that was not present in the book and was a meaningless attempt at trying to link the LOTR to the Hobbit. We all know it is the prequel, you don't really need an Elija Wood cameo as Frodo to convince us. Also the characters are in the Shire for far to long. 30 minutes to be exact. The last thing that really grinds my gears about The Hobbit was the special effects. They were amazing, no doubt and may even win an academy award, but with the limited release 48 fps (films per second) that makes the movie look "super real", you can spot out where some things look "fake". Also with the special effects, all of the bad guy goblins and orc like things are CGI. What was so cool and uniqueness about LOTR was that some, not all, orcs were people in costumes and in a matter of sense "was real". LOTR was nominated and won the academy award for Best Costume Design. It just does not really make sense to me why they used so many special effects. However, the heart of this movie and by far best effects I have seen all year were the effects used to create Gollum. Gollum had never looked better. Whatever Andy Serkis does to create such a miraculous character is dumbfounding. Seriously, I thought he was an actual messed- up, tormented creature that may or may not be wandering around the earth today.
Having read the book, I was satisfied with what I saw in The Hobbit. Being "Part 1" it was more of a "start-up" film preparing audiences for an epic Part 2 and 3. For those of you who don't know, Peter Jackson has some scenes added in to this movie that were not in the book at all. They were interesting to watch, but the movie would have been just as good with or without them. The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is a good beginning to what I hope becomes another classic trilogy from Peter Jackson.