Maybe not in PJ's re-imagined Middle-earth...but in Tolkien's story it fits perfectly.

The magic purse fits in with the setting and type of world Tolkien set. "Pull my finger" and "you never know what's down my pants" doesn't.

Alfrid in drag, Alfrid's death ... pretty much everything with Alfrid after the Master's death was over-the-top and annoying IMO. Like I said, wasn't even in the top 3 of my issues with the movies but since you brought the subject up, I found the scenes annoying and distracting.

But a TALKING TROLL PURSE does fit, right?

...and highly intelligent men, particularly of that generation, have often shared a simple, childlike sense of humour, including slapstick and the unfortunate things all our bodies do at times. I think there's every chance that Tolkien laughed at those things too.Just to name a few examples, the trolls, Bombur and much of Farmer Giles of Ham suggests to me that he wasn't quite as prim as some posters here would make him.

It's a given that we all laugh at different things, but I'm another who doesn't have a problem with Peter Jackson's humour. It baffles me that some of the people who disdain the humour in The Hobbit films seem quite happy to accept it in the Lord of the Rings films. PJ hasn't changed - he likes to laugh, and for all his skill at crafting a film he seems to be a very simple, down-to-earth sort of person.

It also makes me smile when I read comments that it isn't a very British kind of humour. I'm assuming that those who think that have never seen a classic British seaside postcard or a Gillray cartoon. The humour in them is much, much broader than anything in PJ's films - and it's essentially British.

I don't consider the inclusion of a magically enchanted purse in a magical world to be on the same level as someone making a comment about the contents of their trousers, in an obvious sexual manner. Think of it this way, just to get this thread back on topic...which of these two things do you feel appropriate to the "spirit" of a children's story?

And "Pull My Finger" comedy, is how I would best describe the types of things PJ finds humorous. Obviously there wasn't a scene where this gag was used...though I'm sure PJ would have thrown one in there if he thought he could get away with it. He probably had to try with all his might to resist turning the dwarve's meeting at Bilbos into the Klump's dinner table scene.

Such things as talking purses, magic rings, enchanted doors, anthropomorphic animal servants, were-beasts and symbolic creatures (Beorn, Wargs, the white stag, Smaug, etc.), and legendary swords are all well-known motifs to anyone even faintly acquainted with Northern European folklore and fairy tales. And Tolkien was no casual observer. His research in the field was extensive.

The Hobbit is grounded in Northern European folklore, right down to the naming conventions of Gandalf and the Dwarves being culled direclty from the Völuspá, to the dragon and magic ring from the Nibelungenlied, to Beorn's house matching Heorot from Beowulf, and Beorn himself comparable to Beowulf and Bödvar Bjarki.

So yes, a magic purse has a place in The Hobbit, whereas bad jokes about what's in the wee Dwarf's pants is not.

In Reply To

As a fairy-tale element of a children's bedtime story? Yes, absolutely. On film? Not necessarily.

Obviously, you can argue whatever you wish but Tolkien created a world where inanimate objects could be and were sometimes imbued with their own spirits or wills and even occasionally the ability to talk. These items ranged from doors that would open when addressed properly to a semi-conscious ring that knew who its master was to a sword that had its own will and replied (once) when addressed (remember, Gurthang told Turin it would slay him quickly). A purse that would alert its owner when being filched fits right in with this world in a way that a dwarf inviting an Elf maiden to inspect his pants just doesn't and I don't think it detracts at all from the realism or seriousness of the story precisely because of the aforementioned examples.

IMO, the talking purse was fantastic in a fairy tale sort of way but was fully consistent with a magic world that was clearly filled with magical artifacts and it was nowhere near as puerile as Kili's banter with Tauriel. Kili's banter with Tauriel took away from the uniqueness of Gimli's reaction to Galadriel and made it worse as there was nothing of eros in Gimli's devotion to Galadriel.

It's not like there isn't references to sex in Tolkien's work... Túrin and Niënor anyone? And didn't Túrin throw a glass at Saeros in the Silmarillion for insulting the women of Hithlum for ''having only their hairs as clothes''?

I agree completely that it fits in a children's book, but I was replying to those who thought that this does fit, but other ''childish'' elements in the movies don't.

I would suggest your example is not sexual in nature at all, and not a low joke but an insult from a haughty elf regarding the primitive nature of the Edain, who Saeros perceived to be no more than animals. And Turin caused his death for giving such an outrageous insult to his kin.