Well it was a cold December morning and me, Emma and Simo had tickets to go see the 10.30AM showing of The Hobbit, we had toyed with the idea of going IMAX 3D MASSIVE but this time of year funds are tight so we opted for the £5 2D showing, Now it was at Cineworld in Nottingham and i have to say the attention to detail of showing the film is terrible, the trailer before hand started only on half the screen and no sound, at least 40 minutes of adverts selling you everything and advising you as always "YOU STILL HAVE TIME TO GO AND GET FOOD!!" Now as i said it was 10.30 in the morning so i declined that offer although people around us did have MASSIVE bags of popcorn in the most noisiest bags and some people even had Nachos covered in melted cheese and chili sauce at that time of the morning, yuk!
So the film starts and i had noticed that the lights down either side of the cinema were still on this had a great effect on each side of the screen as though someone was shining a huge torch which made it blurry on either side, i was looking to see what difference the film being shot in 48 frames per second would make but with the light blur i couldn't tell, luckily someone at the cinema must have noticed so 40 minutes in they were turned off and the full effect was seen, super rich colours, looked amazing also they turned the sound up as it was also very quiet amongst the Nacho/popcorn munching and soft drink slurpers!!
Anyway enough of my ranting, on to The Hobbit...........
The film opens up with the tale of the Dwarf king(forgive me if I don’t mention specific names and there is way too many to remember, even Gandalf struggles!) so we see the dwarf king over the next few years living in his happy kingdom surround by all his people but over the years it appears his infatuation with gold takes over and he collects so much that a huge dragon obviously knows this and wants his gold as apparently dragons also love gold, Along with this whilst mining one day one of the dwarfs comes across the heart of the mountain which is mined out and placed above the dwarf kings throne, The Dragon then arrives to get his gold, this leads to massive destruction of the dwarf kingdom by the dragon in a breath-taking opening with some incredible visuals, all is lost within the kingdom and the heart of the mountain slips from its place and disappears amongst the masses of gold coins, The dwarfs are left to roam aimlessly for eternity until one day the dragon may die and they can reclaim their kingdom, During an epic battle of Dwarfs VS Orc's the king gets beheaded by a real tough looking and gruesome battled scarred white Orc and his head his thrown at his son so the son takes revenge on the Orc by severing his arm off and leaving him for dead on the battlefield, it appears that the dwarfs and orc’s really don’t like each other as is apparent throughout the whole film, but is the white Orc really dead?
We then see Bilbo starting to write his memoires to Frodo to let him know his tale and what really went off, we then go back 60 years where a happy Bilbo is just minding his own business sitting in his garden smoking a pipe when Gandalf walks past and Bilbo wishes him Good Morning which leads to an hilarious conversation and inevitably leads to the fact that like it or not Bilbo will be going on a quest, Gandalf wanders off and poor little Bilbo is left perplexed, He settles down that night to a lovely meal and a glass of wine when there is a knock on the door so it answers it and it is a Dwarf come to his house to start the quest, Martin Freedman was a great choice by Jackson and plays Bilbo brilliantly with that real “Confused” and very British politeness, but the dwarf that has arrived is by no means the only one that will arrive that night, loads more turn up all awaiting Gandalf and one more last mysterious dwarf who will be…..No spoilers! Bilbo is wanted as a burglar as Hobbits are small and move very swiftly thus avoiding the eyes of many, he declines, so he awakes the next morning and they have all left, but of course he has a rethink then rushes off to catch up with the group.
So we have the setup, Bilbo, Gandalf and the gang of rowdy dwarfs are on a mission to reach their old kingdom as the dragon hasn’t been seen for years and hopefully reclaim the kingdom and restore power to the race of dwarfs, Now it seems that it has opened to quite negative reviews saying that the 1st hour is boring, the 48 frames per second made it blurry etc. but my own personal opinion is that none of this is true, I loved it! It basically is everything you would come to expect from Peter Jackson and a Lord of the rings franchise movie, there are some truly breath-taking scenes and as I said the FX are incredible, OK so there are some bits of the CGI that do look a little ropey but overall the scenery and the colours are outstanding, the great thing as well you may know is that we get to see Gollum back and the scene with him and Bilbo is brilliant, one minute funny the next minute scary as hell, you feel the empathy with Gollum then you hate him, one of the best cinematic characters ever,Also some more stand out scenes are The Goblin king encounter, The 3 Trolls and the stunning rock giants, so although the running time is 170 minutes there is plenty of action set pieces to keep you much more than interested, So on summing up I would say if you are a Lord of the rings fan this is a MUST see at the cinema and if you aren’t so keen you really don’t have to have seen the other films before seeing this and this is more than a great introduction, so much so that after we came out Emma made an exciting “whoopee” noise, she and Simo also loved it and we have even said we will dig deep in our pockets and go back on our word and will venture to experience middle earth on the big IMAX 3D screen,I can probably see why some people say that you have “seen it all before” but as I said with this being the 4th film it is still no less technically stunning than any of the others, in my opinion I would say it is even more detailed and stunning,The film ends much like the 1st 2 of The Lord Of The Rings trilogy with no real conclusion but definately leaving you with the feeling of you need to see the next one right away! Great stuff and a cinematic treat of the highest order, these are the kind of films that modern cinema is made for.
9/10
Jonny T.
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