The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

[The Chev]

The score is really nice as usual with these movies. I love the way the OST came out myself.

I do too, and my above comments may sound like I'm knocking the Score but I'm not.


Also, has anyone seen the Regular 3d version? I was going to make someone to see the HFR 3d but the theatre has already stopped showing it, after a week.

Why equip your theatre to show HFR and then only show it for a week?

 

[The Josh]

I do too, and my above comments may sound like I'm knocking the Score but I'm not.

It's all good.

 

[joblain]

So I went to see this again today. I was thinking that I would enjoy it a bit more without my kids there to make me worry about length and them getting bored.

I hate to say it but I liked it even less. It is By far the weakest of all the films IMO.

Here is what I did like......

Smaug and how he was rendered and voiced. Some of the action. The talking Spiders... And that is about it.

What I find that I really did not care for.

1. Nothing happens. They get to Lonely Mt. and that is about it. Sure we meet a few new characters but none of them add anything to the story. The Two Towers suffered a little bit from this but nothing like this film. At least TTT benefited from introducing us to some great characters which leads me to

2. There is no character growth. Hell there is hardly any character moments at all. Does Bilbo have more then 20 lines of dialogue?? Do any of the characters. There are no real memorable new characters either. Some of this has to do with the source material being spread over three films I am sure. LOTR got to introduce us to great new characters in almost each film but each was basically it's own book. The Hobbit is one small book so it's just not filled with enough great characters to fill three films.... Though they could have at least tried a little harder with the characters they already introduced.
*** I do make an exception for Smaug.... He was a great new Character and perhaps I like Bard in the next film more.

3. The made up stuff.... I don't mind the female Elf... But all of that love story with the dwarf stuff really slows down the film and fails at making me care at all. It feels forced and I have to assume it's because it's made up. I like Legolas as much as the next guy but he has a few two many "Oh Legolas is so cool" moments.... Does it bother me because I know he was not in the actual book and this was all done for the fan boys?? I don't know but again I have trouble getting invested in the character or the action. Also as cool as Smaug is the ending just drags on way too long. The whole Forging of the Gold Dwarf looks pretty but ultimately serves absolutely no purpose.

4. This could be my biggest complaint and perhaps it does not effect many on this board but this had FAR and AWAY the worst film score of the series... Not one memorable theme appears. Lake Town has a little theme but it's nothing like The Fellowship, Rohan, Gondor, or the Lonely Mt song... But not just that LOTR was filled with many other great themes. The Mines of Moria, the bridge of khazad dum, the love themes, Into the West, and so much more.... This film was basically just background music that could have been composed by anyone.

5. I know I got into with Josh about this... But I still say that having Gandalf fight Sauron ruins some of the tone and feel of the original films... Tolkien was smart to leave all of this in the appendices. I liked the extra stuff in AUJ.... Not so much in this film. I know I can research the books and find out a lot of this history but the films should stand on their own. And I still say that because of all of this (running into Sauron) Gandalf should have been suspicious of the Ring Bilbo has whenever Bilbo finally tells him. Leave out Sauron and I have no trouble with any of this. But like I have said before this could all change for me after I see the third film.

6. No sense of Danger..... What is it with Jackson and Lucas in their prequel films... People seem like they can fall for ever and ever and never get hurt. FOTR always felt grounded in reality... It's like Jackson made KING KONG and fell in love with the Dino stampede and wanted to repeat it.... This is a lesser complaint I have but I do miss the feeling of "as outlandish as this all is it still feels real"



I will always continue to watch this film because of Smaug... But if you took him out of the film this movie would have nothing to offer.


I would rate the films like this

FOTR EX- 10 out of 10
ROTK EX- 8.5 out of 10
AUJ EX - 7 out of 10
TTT EX - 6.5 out of 10
TDOS - 5 out of 10

Of course all of this is just my opinion and I realize that I am in the minority. Perhaps an EX version of this movie will greatly help the film for me.

I have the same perception for this movie, your review is so complete and true, I don't have to write one. It was like I was reading my mind.

Thanks.

 

[The Ween]

See, I can't rate them along side of the LotR trilogy. To me, it's a whole other story.

 

[Irvy]

I gotta agree about the score for this one, easily the weakest. I've been playing it in the car and there are zero stand out tracks, nothing hummable.

 

[BagginsOfBagEnd]

So I went to see this again today. I was thinking that I would enjoy it a bit more without my kids there to make me worry about length and them getting bored.

I hate to say it but I liked it even less. It is By far the weakest of all the films IMO.

Here is what I did like......

Smaug and how he was rendered and voiced. Some of the action. The talking Spiders... And that is about it.

What I find that I really did not care for.

3. The made up stuff.... I don't mind the female Elf... But all of that love story with the dwarf stuff really slows down the film and fails at making me care at all. It feels forced and I have to assume it's because it's made up. I like Legolas as much as the next guy but he has a few two many "Oh Legolas is so cool" moments.... Does it bother me because I know he was not in the actual book and this was all done for the fan boys?? I don't know but again I have trouble getting invested in the character or the action. Also as cool as Smaug is the ending just drags on way too long. The whole Forging of the Gold Dwarf looks pretty but ultimately serves absolutely no purpose.

Of course all of this is just my opinion and I realize that I am in the minority. Perhaps an EX version of this movie will greatly help the film for me.

Saw this film a week ago, really enjoyed it, so going again after Christmas. Smaug was brilliant - way better than I imagined from what I'd seen in the trailer and Bard was a great new character as well. Didn't mind the Legolas additions too much...it was good to see him again on the big screen in Middle Earth!

I do agree with your point about the elf/dwarf love story part though - I felt it slowed things down too much and didn't really need to be there. I like Tauriel as a character (and she is a good addition) but they could have just added her in there, made her a good character and not made her part of an obligatory romantic subplot .

 

[Njits]

Yup it's probably the weakest score of all five films, the omission of the Misty Mountains theme is unforgivable in my opinion. And the omission of new themes in general was very disappointing. There are *some* in there but those weren't very good imo. I guess you could label DOS's main theme as the Smaug theme. But that theme just kinda doesn't work for me, I dunno. Overall very underwhelming. Feast of Starlight, Mirkwood, and because I just loved to hear it make a return, A Spell of Concealment (Barad Dur theme) are my favorites. I really hope all these half themes and teases come a to a smashing conclusion in the next film so we can at least get some cool thematic music back again.

 

[Adolfo]

Yup it's probably the weakest score of all five films, the omission of the Misty Mountains theme is unforgivable in my opinion. And the omission of new themes in general was very disappointing. There are *some* in there but those weren't very good imo. I guess you could label DOS's main theme as the Smaug theme. But that theme just kinda doesn't work for me, I dunno. Overall very underwhelming. Feast of Starlight, Mirkwood, and because I just loved to hear it make a return, A Spell of Concealment (Barad Dur theme) are my favorites. I really hope all these half themes and teases come a to a smashing conclusion in the next film so we can at least get some cool thematic music back again.

The music for this film was dark, very dark, and that makes it tough to be as loved as much as more adventurous/high themes

 

[jye4ever]

I just think of it this way.

The revolutionary war, cival war, world war 2 and the vietnam war all took place on earth yet all are very different from each other.

Same for LOTR and Hobbit.

Pick your era and enjoy what each has to bring to the table.

 

[The Chev]

I don't really get the criticism that the "Love story" slowed things down. It wasn't much of a love story from what I saw. One scene of them talking in the dungeons and then the events in Lake Town.

It could of been worse. It could have been Anakin and Padma all over again

If anything, we should be upset that Bombur isn't getting some action!

 

[The Chev]

I just think of it this way.

The revolutionary war, cival war, world war 2 and the vietnam war all took place on earth yet all are very different from each other.

Same for LOTR and Hobbit.

Pick your era and enjoy what each has to bring to the table.

I don't know why, but that made me think of Lt. Dan from "Forrest Gump" and how he had his ancestors die in all those wars.

 

[The Chev]

I gotta agree about the score for this one, easily the weakest. I've been playing it in the car and there are zero stand out tracks, nothing hummable.

Even though I do think it's a really good soundtrack, I did notice a lot more of these missing.

The only track that I felt was Hummable was "Girion, Lord of Dale"

 

[Njits]

The music for this film was dark, very dark, and that makes it tough to be as loved as much as more adventurous/high themes

That has nothing to with it, The Two Towers was also very dark. The score is just very underwhelming, simple as that.

 

[Adolfo]

That has nothing to with it, The Two Towers was also very dark. The score is just very underwhelming, simple as that.

I found two Towers more adventurous than dark...it had its dark moments just not like DOS had...for most people that love soundtracks it has to do much with garand scale and power...Superman Thenme, Batman theme, LOTR main Theme, even Hobbit AUJ had that feeling...the darker you go the harder it is TT had much of the LOTR grand scale feel while as DOS did not...It had moments but nothing to hold you for long...those great powerful moments lasted very short time wise ..IMHO of course..I own them all and to me DOS was certainly the most different...lots of bells etc and other rarer to use percussion instruments...lots of base sounds too

 

[Adolfo]

I don't really get the criticism that the "Love story" slowed things down. It wasn't much of a love story from what I saw. One scene of them talking in the dungeons and then the events in Lake Town.

It could of been worse. It could have been Anakin and Padma all over again

If anything, we should be upset that Bombur isn't getting some action!

agree and as for Bombur food is his sex...

 

[The Josh]

I don't really get the criticism that the "Love story" slowed things down. It wasn't much of a love story from what I saw. One scene of them talking in the dungeons and then the events in Lake Town.

As I said in my review it's more of a mutual admiration society. There's no real "love" story going on IMO. That's how I felt after my first viewing and still after my third on Friday.

--------------

As far as the OST I just totally disagree that it's underwhelming. It's a solid score and sounds great IMO. I've listened to it a lot since I downloaded it and I'm loving it. The credit song is probably my favorite since Into the West.

 

[jye4ever]

Is Lothlorien near Mirkwood?

Are Elron/Galadriel chief Elves?

Does Thandruil (is that his name, Legolas father) have the same level authority as them?

My wife asked me to ask Josh.

 

[Articulation Junkie]

Mirkwood is far north of Lothlorien.

As far as authority goes. I believe Elrond and Galadriel are held in higher regard because they are both Ring bearers. Thranduil is lower on the totem pole, but he is still a King nonetheless.

 

[The Josh]

No basically same distance as Erebor to Moria.

They are the two of the big wig elves of Middle-earth. Celeborn was the other.

You're close. It's Thranduil and he's not quite on their level.

 

[The Chev]

agree and as for Bombur food is his sex...

lol

I'm starting to wonder if there's a good reason Bombur doesn't have any lines. We already have the dwarf he cant' really speak so there has to be a reason or a payoff coming.