The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is the first of three prequels to the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. After spending years in development hell, losing a director due to constant delays, paving the way for a new 3D format, and then deciding to release three films instead of two the first ‘chapter’ of J.R.R. Tolkien’s long awaited novel is hitting theater screens across the world.
Bilbo Baggins joins Gandalf the Grey and thirteen displaced dwarves on a dangerous mission to reclaim their home and treasure inside The Lonely Mountain. Along their long journey they encounter hungry trolls, Necromancers, vengeful Orcs, and other friends and including a ring toting psychotic.
Watching The Hobbit is a lot like putting on an old pair of comfortable shoes and taking a long journey. It’s great to come back to The Shire and head off on an adventure across Middle Earth with an assortment of characters from a great Wizard all the way down to a tiny Hobbit and every manner of creature in between. The problem with that old pair of comfortable shoes is there’s a pebble lodged in the sole that occasionally makes your journey rather uncomfortable to the point of wanting to cut your trip short.
Unlike The Lord of the Rings series which consisted of three films that were based on three novels, The Hobbit is one (rather short) book that is split into three (rather long) films with the runtime being padded out with material from The Hobbit’s appendix. That is The Hobbit’s biggest downfall; it’s bloated, meandering, and repetitive. When the story isn’t going in circles it veers far off course and then just as quickly heads back down an already beaten path.
Anyone that has experienced The Lord of the Rings Trilogy (either the theatrical or extended cuts) knows that each of those films is long. Even with runtimes reaching or exceeding three hours sequences had to be cut or outright removed for the sake of pacing. The Hobbit has a distinctively different feel; instead of paring The Hobbit down even more material is added to it. While watching The Hobbit, a quote from the film Wonder Boys jumped to mind, “…it sort of reads in places like you didn’t make any choices. At all.”
Other than my qualms with An Unexpected Journey’s runtime and pacing I otherwise enjoyed the film. I found myself surprisingly thrilled to see Ian McKellen once again don his Wizard’s hat, the beauty of Middle Earth is staggering, and adventurous aspects of the film work just as well here as they did in The Lord of the Rings. Aside from Gandalf and to a lesser extent Bilbo Baggins (expertly played by Martin Freeman) I didn’t feel a strong emotional connection to many of the other characters, primarily the Dwarves, including their leader Thorin. Affection for many of the other characters may grow as the series progresses, but initially a lot of the Dwarves look the same and have complicated names that are hard to remember.
The Hobbit is the first major motion picture to be shot and released in High Frame Rate 3D (HFR 3D). Instead of the being filmed in the industry norm of 24 frames per second, The Hobbit was shot using 48 frames of film per second. The aim of shooting 48fps (frames per second) is to create greater realism of movement than 24fps can provide. Director Peter Jackson premiered ten minutes of 48fps footage earlier this year to negative to mixed reviews. Jackson responded that ten minutes of footage was not enough to allow the viewer to get used to the effect and that the response to HFR 3D would be more favorable when audiences were able to get accustomed to the higher frame rate. After first seeing The Hobbit in conventional 3D I was very impressed and was optimistic that Jackson would be right. There was of course a certain logic to his argument; Americans are accustomed to 24fps, it’s been the industry norm since the late 1920s and ten minutes probably wasn’t enough time to get used to a higher frame rate. Unfortunately Jackson was wrong, HFR 3D simply looks terrible.
I’m sure many of you have HDTVs that advertise 120/240hz refresh rate or a ‘de-juddering’ mode. That is what watching The Hobbit in HFR 3D looks like. It doesn’t look more real or natural; in fact it looks unnatural and surprisingly cheap. The Hobbit went from being one of the most stunning 3D films to emerge since the 3D boom began to looking like something produced for the SyFy Channel (with better CGI of course). Much of The Hobbit looks as though you’re watching it at an accelerated speed; imagine fast forwarding through an entire film at 1.5x speed, but with the dialogue playing back at normal speed. It’s very distracting and created one of the worst viewing experiences I’ve ever encountered theatrically. There may be benefits to shooting at 48fps, because I can’t argue with how The Hobbit looked when presented in standard 24fps playback but beyond that I consider the ‘experiment’ a failure.
Fans of The Lord of Rings Trilogy should have no issue falling back into J.R.R. Tolkien’s world. The Hobbit is far from perfect and on its own doesn’t work as well as any of The Lord of Rings films did individually. Strong visuals and performances keep The Hobbit afloat as the story often feels superfluous and repetitive. Much has been made of the HFR 3D which failed to deliver and begs the question was too much time spent on a new 3D format that could have been better spent reworking the story?
Columbus Underground Review Exclusive:
If you’re interested in experiencing The Hobbit in HFR 3D, Columbus does offer you a few viewing options. Three Columbus theaters are HFR 3D capable; AMC Lennox 24, AMC Easton Town Center 30, and Marcus Cinemas in Pickerington. High Frame Rate showtimes are labeled by “HFR 3D” or by “High Frame Rate”. Having experienced The Hobbit both ways I highly recommend conventional 3D over HFR 3D and keep in mind 2D and IMAX 3D showing are also available.
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