AinurOlorin
Half-elven
Jan 23 2013, 10:58pm
Views: 587
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Thank you for the careful and thoughtful response. There remain matters on which
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we will simply disagree, but I appreciate your points, even when I do not draw the same conclusion from them.
My first viewing was my worst viewing (not at all bad, I greatly enjoyed much of it, but worse than subsequent viewings) because of the final realization of alterations which I disliked.
Yet the overall feeling of the movie, the look, many of the lines, the acting and the overall atmosphere, were excellent more often than not to my mind.
I still think the stories do weave together into one greater story. That said, as someone who has watched Game of Thrones and a few other television dramas and comedies, I don't require all threads to be instantly interwoven, as long as the general, larger connections can be observed, and I feel that is the case here. Thorin and the Dwarves are on there Erebor business. . . whilst Gandalf is about the larger business of The World, of which Erebor, its dwarves and its dragon, are currenly a factor of potentially great importance. His is, of course, the larger business that will serve as the connective tissue for the two trilogies (err mag Gawd! I cannot believe I am defending this Hobbit Trilogy business, which I was never entirely keen on to begin with. . . stop bashing this movie Captain, so I can go back to grousing about the parts I actually DIDN'T like! lol). And, again, I didn't find any greater symmetry in the tales of The Two Towers than are seen here. Putting in the signs and portents worked for me rather well actually, aiding rather than detracting from Gandalf involvement, as the time being right "as foretold" gives some added reasoning for him delaying getting to Thorin for nearly a hundred years. The time wasn't right. That can also factor into Balin later. The time isn't right for Moria, but he goes anyway, and it ends the only way it could. . . terribly.
I actually didn't take that from press info. I DO have the Visual Companion, admittedly, but that isn't where those inferrences were drawn from, else I would have commented more on Nori and Bifur.. . and I do hope to get MUCH more of Nori. I would love to see him try to pocket something at Beorn's, and have a very annoyed and concerned Gandalf see it and "magic" it back out of his pocket. Saruman used his telekenitic abilities to wonderful effect, shutting his chamber doors with a glance. Gandalf is only seen to use them while fighting Saruman. I would love to see it put to simpler and yet equally appreciable effect. Yet, the other things I drew merely from watching. I'll give you, I have seen it about 7 times. . . but most of this I drew from first watch, and I DID not Bofur's interest in the gold, though Gloin seemed more practically concerned over what to do with it. lol. Gloin's direct and sometimes surly attituded I got entirely from watching. As to Balin, when I say he is the Barbarian. . . I do not mean his fighting solely, though is certainly can fight. There is much that is conveyed from his gauntlets and fur, to his bearing and demeanor. Even aside from glimpses of him at Moria and in battle, he comes to Bag End with all the manners of a barbarian, a bruiser from a more savage and less prim/posy time and place. He eats, speaks, and engages like some Feudal Lord of yore. He is also a willing, if grousy defender. I note how he positions himself to protect Bilbo and one of the other dwarves when the Stone Giant attack commences. Oin as a dwarven "wiseman" I got entirely from the movie. The companion speaks of him as an apothecary, but not as a reader of signs and a star gazer, from what I recall. Dori, Ori, Fili and Kili, Bofur and the wonderful Balin, all gave adequate in movie engagment for me to draw the conclusions I made in the earlier post about them.
Agreed on some of those middle points, as well as on the bigatures.
Balin and Bofur were great emotional anchors for me. Thorin as well, in his way. And McKellen was continuously authentic and believable. As was Radagast, surprisingly, when he wasn't damn walling his eyes around. The overall emotion conveyed to me, however, was a joyous wonder, and the entire first half of the movie exuded that for me and conveyed it to me.
As to timeflow. . . we don't know how long it would have taken to get out of the goblin mines. It is daylight again when they reach the exit, almost sunset in fact. That isn't entirely plausible. It was a four day journey through Moria, but the film can hardly stop to detail it hour by hour. I took it that weaving through the mazes of Goblin town, in the time between the Indiana Jones sequence and the actual escape from the hillside, could easily have taken a number of hours.
Among other things, in the places where it didn't stray into altering the appendices, it was often more true to the novel than the Rings films were. And the atmosphere was excellently reproduced in many places, and you still have yet to tell me, yay or nay, whether you thought things like the Erebor sequence or the Lonely Mountain anthem singing were superflous or tedious. If you are going to site the majority of the critics complaints to support your own, you should at least be complaining about the same things. To the point of coagulation of stories. . .I disagree. There is the larger matter of the dwarf quest, which is prompted by and feeds into the larger matter of Gandalf and the Council. Now, I will go so far as to agree to this: they need to make it clearer that Gandalf already had at least some cause for concern, and has been harbouring suspiscions concerning Sauron for some time, otherwise the question of exactly why he set this journey into motion to begin with remains to be asked and answered. Otherwise, they mesh about as well as Aragorn considering reclaiming a lost throne, while Gandalf rides to Rohan to deal with Saruman and Rohirrim and the troubles of Ents, whilst Frodo plods on in the main quest. So, if they ever get back to Gandalf's initial concerns, he deems that it is important for this quest to move forward; during the quest he discovers more evidence that all is not well, which merits conferrence with the Council (yes, the way the council was called together could have been better handled, but it still essentially works). Thorin's old enmity with Azog (and, bear in mind, I already told ya I rather disliked the changes that were made to accomodate Azog) helps to establish him as a character (and he is a central figure to the story) and also potentially provides context for other matters yet to be explore. Upon leaving the more secure and better manned/dwarfed sanctuary of The Blue Mountains, Thorin, in the wild and with few followers (as Thrain was in the actual narrative, though unfortunately for Thrain he didn't have a Wizard, and certainly not two, watching over him), and thus becomes far more vulnerable pursuit by his foe Azog (as Thrain became vulnerable to pursuit by Sauron). Are their flaws to the execution? In some places yes. But it is not poorly done, over all, and the imperfections are certainly not enough to make it a bad or mediocre movie. The thing is, one shouldn't have to spend this much time and energy justifying how the three stories intersect; certainly one didn't for the various plotlines in LotR, such as Gandy's being captured by Saruman in FotR, the three story lines in TTT or the over-lapping narratives in Rotk. All of these also were united by revolving around the fate of the Ring-bearer and those fighting the war instigated by the Dark Lord who was seeking him/it. Meanwhile, why is Azog hunting the Dwarves now after so much time? It feels arbitrary and contrived? If he were a pawn of the Necromancer, it should have been dealt with in the first film; as a result, the film feels more episodic than the book. Raddy shows up then disappears; there's the Azog episode, and so on. The signs and portents, as opposed to Gandy simply finding the map and key on Thrain, bringing them to the Blue Mountains, and starting the quest...again, it feels clumsy and contrived, IMO. At the second point. . . well, there are thirteen of them. And they are, if anything, less well developed in the book. Thorin and especially Balin are wonderfully developed. I disagree about Bofur. I think his character shows through very well. He is a bon vivant, generally easy going and good humoured, with a penchant for wicked humour and the ribbing of others, but ultimately good hearted and compassionate, with a sympathetic disposition beneath his sporatic, teasing and jabs. Fili and Kili. . . I do wish that the movie had managed to point out that they are Thorin's nephews. This could have been done as easily as the revalation of Balin and Dwalin as brothers. That said, I did get from just watching that they were bold but not particularly experienced with life, and are very respectful of Thorin. Teenaged to early adult in their mentality and behaviuor: irresponsible, a tad reckless, inclined to take things with less seriousness than they might merit, but capable and competent nevertheless. Dwalin is a hardass borderline barbarian, with a general disregard for penny pinching and the sweating of what might be deemed small stuff. Gloin is surly and otherwise business minded (and clearly has a mind for treasure. . . "Nori, get a shovel"). Oin is, aside from being hard of hearing and amusingly less than fond of Elven music, the star gazer of the community: the reader of portents and speculator of signs. Bombur's a fatty  . Ori is very youthful, very inexperienced, bookish and wonderlusting, polite and very impressionable. And Dori is all ettiquette and culturing, a tad fussy and a tad prim, and almost sycophantic attention to the powerful. Of the others, more is likely in the coming films. I never expected an additional five minutes for each of them to display themselves more completely. That would tack another hour plus onto the film. And, really, how well did you know Eomer? Haldir?Even Legolas and Gimli are not Exceptionally well defined in Fellowship alone. I will give you that Lindir had a few lines to many, and shouldn't have had ANY if Glorfindel wasn't going to get a nod. But I digress. lol
This seems to be relying just as much on the information from the press and marketing around TH than the film itself. If you hadn't read what the Dwarves were supposed to be in various materials, would Gloin still seem money-minded (why could he have not noticed the Troll treasure rather than Bofur)? The Dwarves as a group seem easy going, show concern for Bilbo, and good humored, so it didn't seem to me Bofur showed a real concrete persona apart from the others. Again, Fili and Kili seemed to me to be missed opportunities; Dwalin doesn't come across as warriorish save one small moment in Goblin-town (however, he announces "we have to get out of here/we can't fight them!" at other points in the film. As for the others, the little bits we got were hardly telling unless we expound on what wasn't in the film. Agreed Legolas and Gimli didn't get much development either, but they didn't need to be defined from hoards of other Elves or Dwarves; Eomer and Haldir were more minor characters, and Eomer's relationships to Eowen and Wormtounge, and his homeland were much more telling about him than most of the Dwarves, who we never saw interacting aside from Thorin and Balin. I did not get the video game feel. The wrap around rope and pendulum swing of the goblins, and a few of the other swing and ladder gags there were a bit too much in the vein of Indiana Jones, but. . . eh  . I was so pleased that Gandalf actually displayed a feat of powerful magic like he was supposed to for the opening of that rescue scene that I couldn't be bothered to complain about anything else. lol. I didn't have a problem with the look of the goblins. Yes, I could have done without the excrement in Radagast's hair. Yes the falls could have been less dramatic, and the mace to the face was a bit much. Though none of it was any more over the top than Dark Knight or Avengers, so. . . And, I did not say the film was free of flaws. I said that the flaws were not sufficient to negate the many things I deeply enjoyed about this movie. So here we're agreed on some things; however, wouldn't it have been nicer had PJ had relying more on prosthetics and bigatures (never got why those couldn't have been utilized with the RED 3D cameras)? The missing of the handkerchief is a nod to the book. It was a big deal to him, and it also underlines his sensibliities of what is important at the time of his departure, and just how unprepared for The World he is at that stage. I entirely agree about the excess of snot and bathroom humour. It is an aspect of Peter's humour that I neither like nor particularlry appreciate, and I do think it detracted from the fil. But not enough to make the movie less than good. I largely agree about the music, the overuse of old scores and the underutilization of the new. I cannot agree at all about the emotion. I appreciated the fact that Freeman did not overact his face, though he used it quite effectively. The younger, prettier Wood could get away with going al wide eyed at every single thing to cross his line of vision. Freeman, thankfully, did not assume he could get away with the same. Thorin was very good, and his look and bearing were magnificent. Balin. . . I am more fond of him already than I ever will be of half the LOTR characters. I find Bofur both more amusing and less annoying than either Pippin or Merry, both of whom I too often wanted to slap the piss out of, despite generally liking them. I fundementally disagree with you on virtually all of your points in 6. And NOTHING in this movie was half as bad as Shadowfax killing Denethor, thank you. Nor even of Gandalf beating the piss out of Denethor. That could have been handled so much more tactfully. A locking of eyes and a subtle touch from Gandalf could have incapacitated Denethor in the same way that touching the Palantir caused Aragorn to pass out. It was just apalling excess played for laughs to have him beat the steward that way, in plain sight of the guards. I don't think the angered Gandalf moment was superflous HOWEVER, I do think it could have been better handled: primarily, I think if the dwarves had been shown to be more contemptous, dismissive of Bilbo and even, in some cases, mildly hostile, then his powerful interuption would have seemed better merited. Granted, Frodo had two facial expressions, but IMO Freeman felt too self-conscious in the part. I wanted to really feel for the Dwarves need to reclaim Erebor (we never saw their lives in the Lonely Mountain, just the finding of treasure as supervised by Thror which to be honest came off a but as a sweatshop). I wanted to feel for Bilbo's leaving his home behind to help the Dwarves return to there's, for Gandalf's struggles to avert the return of the Dark Lord...to be honest, the film came across as hollow and soulless. It swerved from flippant smugness to faux-drama, but again, it seemed like PJ wasn't really invested in the story he was telling, so why should we? However, I agree about the Denethor issue; he and his demise are one of my major complaints about LotR. The flow of time is not always seemless in the LOTR movies either. This borders on nit picking. I do think it should have been further into evening when Azog crested the cliff top. To have him chasing the dwarves in daylight makes Saruman's special breeding of Uruk-Hai seem more redundant. But that is a consistancy error. I dislike the way the Nazgul and Witch-King are handled, in terms of what befell them in the Angmar versus Arnor wars, but I have been complaining about that from the beginning. Glorfindel and the true tale of The Witch-King's overthrow should have been mentioned. If they had altered it so that Glorfindel and the forces of Lindon, Arnor, Rivendell and Gondor had managed to capture and entomb him (through Elven arts etc.), and some of the other Nazgul had still escaped and not been seen again in the North etc. etc., I could have better dealt with that. As I have said, there ARE things I did not like, but they do not ruin the movie. Also, the Witch-King of LOTR is a creature of the supernatural. He is, as Eowyn puts it in the books, "Dwimmerliek, a Lord of Carrion. . . Dark Undead." What was buried was a physical corpse that can obviously be reanimated. Erebor is called the last of the Great Dwarf Kingdoms, not the last Dwarf Kingdom. The assumption can be made that the colonies in The Blue Mountains are akin to Rohan or the realms of the Dunedain after the Kings and Princes of Arnor failed in 1975-76 T.A., while Erebor would be more akin to Gondor, Thranduil's realm, etc. Moria is accursed and forsaken by the dwarves, beyond what Gandalf deems to be a reasonable hope of return. Men are Humans. Homo Sapiens Sapiens, as opposed to Homo Sapiens Immortalis? That is a non issue to me. Alright, Smaug's attack should have been at night, I will give you that. lol. Gandalf should have been less answerable, and parts of that scene, should have been more carefully handled. Gandalf refused to lead the council, despite Galadriel's wishes, because he refused to be subject to any summons or answerable to a committe, and it is hardly feasible that he would pass up the leadership position merely to take on a role of being even more accountable to others. I blame Phillipa as much as Peter for that. But, again, these inconsistancies are no greater than some of those present in the Rings films. I don't remember strange time flow calling attention to itself as it constantly did in TH. The Nazgul tomb, with which I didn't have a problem until seeing the film put it in context, could have been explained away with a simple line about the Nazgul being "sleeping/beaten low until their master's power returned", or something to that effect. Nope. As said, these points are minor, and would have been forgiven had the rest of the film worked for me. As I have said, this was not a perfect movie, and none of them are. Yet it was a good movie, great in some ways, and one which I very much enjoyed. From the scenes recounting Erebor, to the Unexpected Party, through the departure of the Shire I was essentially mesmerized. It gave me the sort of wondrous experience I had as a child seeing films like Willow or The Neverending Story. It was, literally, Wonderful. And I am not, as you know, one of the zealous champions of Peter. I am not one of the Jacksonians. When people say "trust Peter," my answer is, "let us see what he does first." I understand how some of the critics might have gone into the theateres already in a less than generous vein. I was vexed when I heard what was being done in terms of further expanding the film. And I thought, "well, damn, there goes any chance of a quasi faithful Hobbit." And I went in prepared for a LOT more bloated, never before heard of, Peter/Boyens/Walsh invented bull manuer than you would dare to shake a shovel at. What I got was A LOT less contrived bloat than I had feared (granted, two films to go, which leaves room for either right or wrong things to grow lol), and a lot of general faithfulness to the story. Indeed, I understand how some critics managed to be excessively negative based on prejudice. The notion that Jackson et al were getting carried away with themselves and taking too much license became pervassive, and having adopted a measure of that view myself, I know that it had the potential to sour one's mood, and that any critic who wasn't able to put it aside to view the film would be sitting in the theatre looking for everything wrong instead of enjoying the many things that were right. It being a "good movie" and saying it's "one that I enjoyed", are two separate matters. ;) You've made it clear that this is your perspective with statements such as "I thought" throughout the discourse, but this is why it's impossible to present criticism of AUJ now that the culture of the board doesn't allow for it. And hell yes there were some things wrong. I am not one of those who will tie themselves into pretzels trying to justify everything and anything Jackson and Boyens see fit to do. BlackBreathalizer may huff and puff at me until he is blue in the face, and he still will not move me to a place where the rearranged Azog back story (and, more importantly, the root causes for that war and the driving motivation of the Dwarves) is as good as the tale given in the books, even if Thorin had to replace Dain as the rallying force and Azog slayer. The backstory given concerning The Witch King at The Council meeting, and some of the dynamics between Gandalf and the others, could also have been much better crafted and handled. But neither will anyone convince me that there was not an abundance of great storytelling at a number of points in this movie, nor that huge sections of the movie did not essentially capture the spirit and atmosphere of the book. The Erebor sequence, the bulk of The Unexpected Party, the early journey scenes with the Wizardly commentary, ". . . you were born to the rolling hills of The Shire. But home is now behind you. The World is ahead. . ." all of it was absolutely wonderful. And a solid hour of wondeful, with another hour plus of good, and maybe a combined half-hour of meh and the odd glaring inaccuracy, still adds up to a very good to rather great film in my thought. I actually have gone being an ardent defender of the film back in the days where there were petitions to remove Bofur's head ornament and for Kili to grow a beard, to get rid of Itaril/Tauriel, ETC; to doubting the film after the three-film decision and the full trailer; to being ready tor AUJ to be a disaster following many mixed to negative early reviews; to really enjoying AUJ the first time I went to it; to finding it to be a pretty dysfunctional and disappointing film. I wish I could find more in the film that worked that material that didn't, but having approached AUJ from various angles and considering it ad nauseum, this is the stance at which I've ended up. Being a former AUJ supporter, I understand what is being said, but can't agree with it. Hopefully, I'd find Films 2 and 3 more appealing.  1. Three stories that fail to congeal into a coherent whole...the Dwarves going to the Lonely Mountain & Azog's revenge & Radagast/Necromancer/White Council were totally removed from one another, resulting in total lack of forward momentum. Things just kind of happen one after another. The film drags, not because of the running time, but because we don't advance enough into the narrative for these stories to start relating to one another. Also, nothing's resolved by the end of the film; Bilbo's position in the Company has begun to ascend somewhat, but otherwise, nothing happens and nothing is achieved. Also, clumsy narrative structure, exposition, and dialogue.
2. General lack of character development for the Dwarves; other than Thorin and Balin, they're still cyphers at the film's end. Dwalin, Bofur, Kili, and Fili speak up pretty consistently, but speaking and actually showing us their character are two different things. Dwalin was bald; Bofur was James Nesbitt; Fili & Kili were younger and somewhat less clumpy-looking; Dori was pretentious; and Ori was geeky. Gloin & Oin were bit players with a few superfluous lines of dialogue each; Nori has one totally superflouous line; Bifur had one line in Dwarvish; and Bombur was an extra. After all the talk about how fleshed-out and sympathetic each Dwarf would be, after all the promises it just wouldn't be a pack of interchangeable Dwarves as in the book...that's what it felt like. Worrywort, Grinnah, and Lindir each had more dialogue than three of the Dwarves. And Thror had more dialouge than Bombur. And yeah, they'll have more screentime in the next two films, which will introduce a slew of new characters and more than likely feature less of the supporting Dwarves less than AUJ. A sequel that's a year away doesn't dispel with the failings of this movie.
3. Total over-use of CGI; looks like a video game. Also, production design often just bizarre, such as cartoonish Goblins or Radagast's hair tonic. Characters surviving endless enemies and enormous falls, maces to the face ETC strained creditability to the breaking point.
4. Also, too much cartoonish low-brow bathroom humor, such as Bilbo fretting over his lack of handkerchief, then being used by a stone troll as a handkerchief himself. Funny.
5. Overuse of music from LotR; it's distracting and can't be explained away as "thematic linking for a film that will come out in two years". Other than "Misty Mountains", not enough (new) strong thematic material in the score. Great themes from the soundtrack such as "A Very Respectable Hobbit", "Erebor" and The Dwarf Lords" went slightly used or totally unused.
6. A weird lack of emotion; even Bilbo seemed disconnected from the action much of the time (as opposed to the vast majority, I have no idea what Martin Freeman thought he was doing as Bilbo most of the time; we kept swinging between overly-effected to non-emotive. Also, he has one facial expression). The entire affair felt rushed, clumsy, soulless, heartless, and lacking the spirit, humanity, and artistry of LotR (yes, it's part of the series and needs to be compared to a precedent. The film doesn't exist in a vacuum so it can be held up as a success). Speaking of which, it relied too heavily on LotR iconography and nostalgia - Bilbo/Frodo bookend accomplished nothing, superfluous angered Gandalf moment in Bag-End ALA FotR, random Weathertop cameo, Azog bashing people with his mace ALA Sauron in the FotR prologue, come to mind.
7. Basic gaps in coherence and common sense & many lines which are contradicted by what's happened on-screen. Days and nights which are too quick (how do they spend an entire day in Goblin-town again? Then, it's sunset, then it's night again in 30 seconds? Shades of X-Men 3, another franchise continuation starring Ian McKellen in which things like time doesn't seem to adhere to the laws of physics/common sense). How could the Witch-King be in a tomb when he wasn't killed until RotK? How is Erebor the last Dwarf Kingdom of ME when other kingdoms are mentioned, including the Blue Mountains? Why do the Dwarves sing about dragon fire in the night when the attack happened in the day time? Why does Saruman call the Necromancer a "human sorcerer" when the term "human" doesn't exist in ME (it's the race of Men)? Why does Gandalf state he's not answerable to anyone, then spend 10 minutes answering to Saruman, Galadriel, Elrond? And so on...granted, these last criticisms are comparatively minor, and I'd have forgiven them had the rest of the film been decent.
"Hear me, hounds of Sauron, Gandalf is here! Fly if you value your foul skins, I will shrivel you from tail to snout if you step within this circle!"
"Do not be to eager to deal out death in judgement. Even the very wise cannot see all ends."
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.(head desk). 
LOL! 
There's room for everyone here
lol 
