The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

[The Ween]

Let's all just sit by the fire and puff some old tobey

View attachment 154661

Ewwww.

I'd say pass, but you're suppose to puff first and I ain't doing that!

 

[Khev]

Heres Thranduil's page by the way. Doesn't mention anything about what they call Aragorn.

Good links Josh, but I wouldn't feed the trolls any longer. A pretty ridiculous amount of hyperbole being thrown around in an attempt to criticize this film. Saw it for the third time, this time with the kids yesterday. Such an amazing movie. That opening Smaug sequence just keeps getting better and better.

On another note I've been going through the DOS filmmaker commentary. Really interesting stuff (as always.) Jackson mentioned that he did want to have the Mirkwood elf parties in the movie but didn't film them just because of how long the Mirkwood scenes already were. He had Kili overhear the partying and comment to them to Tauriel so that at least lip service could be paid to them to acknowledge that they were happening.

So many great locations and sets in these films. People have no idea (or, as I suspect are just being deliberately obtuse in not recognizing that New Zealand's landscape and real sets are just as much a part of The Hobbit films as they were the LOTR.)

 

[DiFabio]

In the future, I hope there's a "build your own Hobbit movie" where you can pick and choose from a menu to make the perfect movie/movies.

Hell, for as much as I love and prefer LOTR and think they're as close to being perfect as possible, that'd be a cool feature for those too. It'd give users a sense of personalization. I'm surprised Disney and Lucasfilm haven't thought this up yet for Star Wars.

 

[Khev]

Hell, for as much as I love and prefer LOTR and think they're close to being perfect, that'd be a cool feature for those too.

Yes, we've talked about that. Pretty much every LOTR film has a "best" version somewhere between the TE and EE's.

The two Hobbit films were originally supposed to break when you see Bard's shadowy silhouette appear by the riverside and then the second film would start again when the dwarves were in the boat with him. You'd find out about the deal they made with him to cross the lake in passing. All the scenes of him chatting with the dwarves, loading the barrels, etc., were added to give extra scenes to the middle movie.

You wanted more Bard DiFabio, they really fleshed out his character leaps and bounds beyond who he was in the novel.

 

[DiFabio]

Some day, some day.

 

[Khev]

Some day, some day.

I think if he were doing the LOTR EE's today he would have added scenes more sparingly. For the first trilogy he just seemed to add "everything" back in. But for The Hobbit he's only adding good stuff in and even makes mention of extra scenes that he withheld even from the EE's. For instance there is completed footage of Bilbo stepping outside his home and looking around at the Shire after the dwarves leave in AUJ. PJ thought it was redundant to show him surveying the inside of his home AND the outside before racing after them so he cut the second portion even for the EE.

Why didn't you have that mentality when you had the ROTK EE show Aragorn charging with ghosts twice?

 

[TURINS~BANE]

I was waiting and ...waiting for Beorn to show up at the battle just like in the book, a awesome moment and it was completely wasted here, Dont understand why he did that.

 

[DiFabio]

I haven't seen any of the Extended Hobbits and probably never will. I saw a few clips that advertised the first like kiddy Bilbo, the shards of Narsil, Bilbo in Rivendell and naked dwarves bathing and wasn't impressed.

LOTR has a lot of things that were cut and never made it into even the Extended Edition. Ironically, a lot of that stuff I'd like to see (especially the Moria orc attack on the fellowship by Lothlorien) whereas Hobbit, the less I see the better. I still think the Hobbit would have been better if it were told entirely from Bilbo's perspective. It's his book, story and adventure after all. Gandalf/Tolkein even says, "all great stories deserve embellishment". Then a lot of my gripes with the movies would disappear because it would just be Bilbo being hyperbolic about what happened. Bilbo should have never become a side character in the middle of his own adventure. Eliminate everything he wasn't involved in (White Council, Dol Guldur, love triangle, elf/dwarf love, Alfrid, etc.) and I think the movies would have been as good as LOTR. It's not like Martin Freeman couldn't hold his own. There's a reason why some of the best parts of these movies involve Bilbo and/or Thorin.

 

[Khev]

The book wasn't told entirely from Bilbo's perspective though. Every so often Tolkien would break and give us details about events that he wasn't a part of (like Bard bringing down Smaug.) Not that I would have been against more Freeman, I absolutely think he's the best hobbit we've seen in all six films (including Holm.)

 

[DiFabio]

Well you gotta have Bard because he takes down Smaug. That's a given. I'm sure that account would be in Bilbo's "There and Back Again" story. Those other events? Not so much. One of the things I love about the book was how Gandalf was always leaving the company to Bilbo's dismay, it always made it more exciting when he returned. You get a sense of that in DOS . . . until Gandalf shows up doing his own thing another scene later.

And I agree, I think Freeman Bilbo is one of the best of all the Hobbits (though, LOTR Ian Holm and Billy Boyd as Pippin are fantastic).

 

[Khev]

I haven't seen any of the Extended Hobbits and probably never will.

You're missing out then, particularly with regard to DOS. It adds lots more Beorn and Bard and no additional elf scenes, which I believe would cater directly to your preferences. Not that I expect you to give it a chance or anything given your comments on the TE's.

 

[DiFabio]

Beorn and Bard I could get into probably. I felt those two were severely lacking in the last one. I wanted more, especially towards the end.

Being a fan of the Hobbit book and loving LOTR, I really tried to enjoy each theatrical Hobbit movie, but just couldn't. Other than a few set pieces, Bilbo, Thorin, Gollum and the Riddles in the Dark, Smaug/Bilbo, and the burning of Lake town, (all of which I loved, even dug the songs and inbred hillbilly trolls) I just couldn't get into it this time. Trust me, I feel bad. I'm not looking to troll or be a cynical ****, I just couldn't buy into what Jackson was giving this time.

 

[Khev]

Yeah the EE replaces the Beorn intro with outdoor two-by-two introductions much like it happened in the book. It was great. There are also additional scenes showing how connected he is to goings on outside his valley (again emulating the book and his far reaching reconnaissance.)

 

[DiFabio]

Are the commentaries as good as the LOTR ones? I may not like the direction they took with the Hobbit movies, but it'd be nice to get some insight on what they were trying to do and what possessed them to do what they did from an artistic/writing/editing stand point. As much as I don't like these last three, I don't think I can accuse them of phoning it in.

 

[Darth Waller]

Also, TDKR > Hobbit movies

 

[Khev]

Are the commentaries as good as the LOTR ones?

Absolutely. For instance Jackson does detail why they went CG for Azog. They made the "Yazneg Azog" as kind of a crafty elderly orc who had survived The War of Dwarves and Orcs and would be a constant thorn in Thorin's side. As we know they put the actor in a suit and makeup and had him interacting with Richard Armitage. Then when they did their first edit of AUJ they looked at the finished footage and just didn't think the version of Azog he had envisioned translated on screen. He came across as a shriveled up wuss. So they were faced with doing new makeup on a bigger guy and digitally inserting a "real" person into all those scenes (which still could have looked "off" since there'd be no guarantee that sight lines, lighting, etc., would match) or just digitally insert a digital Azog into the movie which would allow them to add those extra details that would have been difficult or impossible to pull off with a mask. Obviously PJ chose the latter and continued that through the second two films.

I think Manu Bennett did a fantastic job. They really went all out with the mo-cap. You mentioned how Miranda Otto was fatigued after filming her duel with the Witch King. So was Bennett. His mo-cap mace had a huge bag of sand on the end to give it the necessary weight relative to him and his shoulder would be sore for days after swinging it around for shot after shot. He even improvised little nuances for Azog, like directing his "Can you smell it? Fear surrounds them" lines to his warg (instead of the other orcs) to imply that he has a special bond with his beast and is getting it excited for its next meal.

He also said he was constantly trying to channel a combination of Darth Vader and the shark from Jaws. He knew Azog had sharp teeth but he rarely bared them, saving them for "Jaws" type moments when he'd open his mouth at the last second when he'd go in for a kill. Bennett was the man.

And then Bolg was mo-capped by the actor who played Lurtz which made for a particularly evil henchman for his father.

 

[The Ween]

In the future, I hope there's a "build your own Hobbit movie" where you can pick and choose from a menu to make the perfect movie/movies.

Hell, for as much as I love and prefer LOTR and think they're as close to being perfect as possible, that'd be a cool feature for those too. It'd give users a sense of personalization. I'm surprised Disney and Lucasfilm haven't thought this up yet for Star Wars.

You don't really need it for Star Wars. Just throw away the prequels and only watch the original TEs. Fixed!

 

[Khev]

#1 at the Box Office again.

$41,420,000 weekend (US)

12 day total (US) $168,522,000
Last year's 12 day total for DOS $140,639,480

Worldwide BOTFA: $573,622,000

 

[Irvy]

I don't really mind the look of Azog, just wish they had more time to render him better

 

[rushmore223]

I don't really mind the look of Azog, just wish they had more time to render him better

I agree, he's actually a pretty cool design. If they could have made him look as believable as Gollum, I'd have no complaints.

Well, no complaints other than hating Alfrid.