Spirit of the book well captured

Rating: 8/10 (4 January 2013)

Films like this have usually enthusiastic fans and gloomy skeptics - but they are not uninviting. The first do - after enjoying the book - appreciate state-of-the-art realisation, the latter are of the opinion that technology effects and tricks would decrease the importance of acting and spirit. Well, it is true that heavy make-up + digital distortions make much more difficult to evaluate real skills of an actor (most of dwarfs, trolls, orcs) and in fight/battle scenes, huge creatures would steal the show. However, those elements would enlarge the audience...
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is good and quite book-like, with several great main (Ian McKellan, Martin Freeman) and supporting (Andy Serkis, Kate Blanchett, Christopher Lee - almost 90 years old during filming!) performances. Technical solutions are also well elaborated, with the exception of perhaps the orcs chasing Radagast.
The most visible minus is the length - over 2,5 hours - as this film is the 1st of the trilogy only and, therefore, without a proper ending. Thus, a certain challenge for younger and older viewers, above all, but definitely better than e.g. Thor or similar comic-based films.