Product: The Hobbit [VHS] (1977)
Rating: 1.0
Poor Audio and Worse Video
Like many here I wanted to purchase this video to have a DVD copy of the movie. I enjoyed watching this as a child and wanted my children to experience it as well. I will say they enjoyed it thoroughly.My low rating of this product is not related to the movie itself or the interpretation of The Hobbit. The low score is in reference to the quality of this product. Other reviewers on here have mentioned how poor the audio and video are. I agree with all of them. In many portions of the movie I can barely see anything on the screen. For example, in the scene of Gollum's cave the eyes of Bilbo and Gollum are visible while the rest of the screen is so dim I can't see anything. Another problem that appears every once in a while is an artifact will appear on screen completely blurring out a portion of the screen or the entire scene itself. These problems with the video are not normal. I have the VHS copy and watched it after viewing the DVD. None of the video errors I mentioned were present.I also agree about the audio. The soundtrack isn't exactly the same (though I didn't find this to be a major problem). However, in some scenes the audio sounds muffled and not clear. Even using my AV receiver to clean some of the noise the audio had issues. Only so much can be done when the source isn't perfect.