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On December 22 2013 10:10 Grumbels wrote:Show nested quote +On December 22 2013 10:07 hootsushi wrote:On December 20 2013 16:14 itkovian wrote:On December 17 2013 04:28 ImDrizzt wrote:
But I think very young people will love this movie, but not anyone over 18. While I normally can't stand cheesy action intense movies, I actually feel like these hobbit movies are doing it right. They're fun and funny with a dose of dramatic. But what really makes them work is i get the feeling they don't take themselves too seriously. The amount of retarded no-sense action that happens is just stupid. So stupid that you can tell they're just doing it for fun, like a nod to the viewer saying isn't this just ridiculous?The action is just absurd. Just so fucking absurd that you know its intentional and I think that makes it pretty hilarious. And the CGI is neat and the landscape is earth porn. At first when I saw the trailer and I saw how much legolas was featured in it, I found myself shaking my head with my hopes down. Then I thought fuck it I'm just going to buy into it and enjoy it. And ultimately, I didn't mind him being featured. My major gripe is the length. Its like being on a roller coaster you really enjoy, but it just doesn't stop. 2 hours would be a better length Overall, this was good fun, just like the first one. Personally, I liked the first a little better. On December 20 2013 12:13 Jerubaal wrote:
Can someone suggest times to go to the bathroom. :p Just don't miss the barrel scene. I agree with you, the reason I found the first one a little bit better is because the second part seems to be the big setup for the third movie, which I have high hopes for. Maybe they can even trump the epicness the battle of the pelenor fields delivered. How can you possibly have high hopes for the third movie? It will feature the fight with the dragon, the fight with the orcs and possibly the fight with sauron. There will be no actual story, just a rehash of LotR fight scenes.
Return of the king was also about 50% fighting of the time, yet it was the best in the trilogy. I don't see your point.
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Great movie, there will always be nitpickers and I feel so sorry for them
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Smaug was badass. The "themepark" fight scenes were pretty ridiculous but enjoyable. Agreed that the weird pseudo-romance between Kili and Tauriel was unnecessary though. Other than that, I liked the movie as a whole.
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United States42653 Posts
I feel a plot summary should take more words than this one took.
Attacked by orcs, saved by bear.
Attacked by spiders, saved by elves.
Imprisoned by elves, saved by Bilbo.
Attacked by orcs, saved by barrels.
Stuck by lake, saved by boat.
Poisoned by orcs, saved by elves.
DRAGON
Not much happened this film.
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On December 23 2013 04:09 KwarK wrote:
I feel a plot summary should take more words than this one took.
Attacked by orcs, saved by bear.
Attacked by spiders, saved by elves.
Imprisoned by elves, saved by Bilbo.
Attacked by orcs, saved by barrels.
Stuck by lake, saved by boat.
Poisoned by orcs, saved by elves.
DRAGON
Not much happened this film.
You can do that for most movies, Lord of the rings trilogy:
Anything that happens orcs attack/ ringwraiths etc, saved by someone else
Rinse and repeat
Ring is destroyed
Hell the entire fight outside minas tirith is just one side about to lose, new ally shows up and saves them. Then the other side is about to lose and new ally shows up and saves them. Happens 3 times and actually 4 times but the 3rd time was a just a fake by the other side to make them thing they were saved.
But yeah your right not much happened in the LoTR trilogy either...
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afaik the entire story in the movie is true to the lore, save for adding some characters like the orc leader. I think that it's important to realise that the hobbit book itself was more of light hearted adventure story that only briefly mentioned gandalf having some other stuff to do regarding a necromancer. I think that by including a lot of the lore found from other sources (the silmarillion?) there is enough to tell to fill like 7 hours of movie, it just doesn't have the clear independent story arcs the three books of LoTR provided.
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On December 23 2013 08:28 Dunmer wrote:Show nested quote +On December 23 2013 04:09 KwarK wrote:
I feel a plot summary should take more words than this one took.
Attacked by orcs, saved by bear.
Attacked by spiders, saved by elves.
Imprisoned by elves, saved by Bilbo.
Attacked by orcs, saved by barrels.
Stuck by lake, saved by boat.
Poisoned by orcs, saved by elves.
DRAGON
Not much happened this film. You can do that for most movies, Lord of the rings trilogy: Anything that happens orcs attack/ ringwraiths etc, saved by someone else Rinse and repeat Ring is destroyed Hell the entire fight outside minas tirith is just one side about to lose, new ally shows up and saves them. Then the other side is about to lose and new ally shows up and saves them. Happens 3 times and actually 4 times but the 3rd time was a just a fake by the other side to make them thing they were saved. But yeah your right not much happened in the LoTR trilogy either...
I skip over the helm's deep fight while rewatching though.
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On December 23 2013 09:47 Grumbels wrote:Show nested quote +On December 23 2013 08:28 Dunmer wrote:On December 23 2013 04:09 KwarK wrote:
I feel a plot summary should take more words than this one took.
Attacked by orcs, saved by bear.
Attacked by spiders, saved by elves.
Imprisoned by elves, saved by Bilbo.
Attacked by orcs, saved by barrels.
Stuck by lake, saved by boat.
Poisoned by orcs, saved by elves.
DRAGON
Not much happened this film. You can do that for most movies, Lord of the rings trilogy: Anything that happens orcs attack/ ringwraiths etc, saved by someone else Rinse and repeat Ring is destroyed Hell the entire fight outside minas tirith is just one side about to lose, new ally shows up and saves them. Then the other side is about to lose and new ally shows up and saves them. Happens 3 times and actually 4 times but the 3rd time was a just a fake by the other side to make them thing they were saved. But yeah your right not much happened in the LoTR trilogy either... I skip over the helm's deep fight while rewatching though.
Okay, I did talk about minas tirith in that one but I could do it for helms deep too and any alot of movies.
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So they make a big deal when first entering Lake Town that there is a big iron gate guarding the lakeside entrance, seems smart since they live in a pretty dangerous part of Middle-Earth. Can't be too careful.
But apparently on the other side of Lake Town there is just a huge open bridge that leads right to the town with no gate, no guards, not even any people nearby. The Dwarves were smuggled in and the whole town knew they were there within minutes, but there are orcs and elves riding in to the city on warg/horse back and then running around on the rooftops and nobody seems to notice or care.
Overall it was a good movie I guess but it was about 60% fan fiction.
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On December 18 2013 12:34 rkshox wrote:I feel like I should have read the book to really make a comment about the film being stretched into three films, but without reading the book and knowing how long it is, I can say one book stretched into three 2 hour + films is pretty Hollywood-esque. I watched the film on Saturday going in with no expectations, just looking for an entertaining movie. All in all, aside from Legolas' vampiristic bright shiny blue eyes, I enjoyed the movie. It was a little too predictable how + Show Spoiler +moonlight, not sunlight showed the secret keyhole , aside from that I enjoyed the movie. Sucks we have to wait a year for the final installment. Which will probably be a Return of the King kind of battle.
Oh there shall be an epic battle in 3. The battle of the 5 armies, can't wait for it :D
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Peter Jackson is like George Lucas 2.0, he took a complete and utter shit on his legendary trilogy by making a trilogy of horridly crappy preludes. I've lost all hope for the 3rd movie. I very much respect how many directors have to change up some stuff in order to bring the pages of a book onto the big screen and it was done near perfectly in the LOTR trilogy, but this is just an insult to any Tolkien fans and even to any fans of the previous movies.
There are some mind-blowingly stupid scenes in this movie that literally left me speechless. An intelligent dragon easily fooled by a "nanana you can't catch me hehehe", Legolas is somehow on a godlike power level way above what he could do in the 3rd movie/book, a shit ton of cringeworthy comedy attempts with decapitations and strange fatalities and the dwarf-elf romance-y dialogues were simply too much to take in, the lines were written so terribly I saw a lot of people around me in the cinema facepalm and shake their heads. The 5% of the movie that is taken from the book is pretty tolerable, but much of what they made up by themselves is very painful to watch. Oh, and all the senseless action scenes have long lost any kind of tension since all good characters (including the dwarves) are gods and can easily cut through a legion of orcs, goblins and other creatures. Gandalf was cool though and the barrel scene was okay (could've been much better without the stupid POV editing). There was a very memorable moment when the dragon Smaug peered at me in 3d and it was almost scary (of course they took a laughing piss on this potentially cool character a few minutes later) and seeing the dwarves enter Erebor for the first time was somewhat moving but by then my mind had been numbed by the shittiness of the movie.
All in all, to anyone over 13 it's just a mandatory disapointment - a LOTR movie after all. Maybe an okayish adventure movie on its own but mostly a long romp in the safe and fun-for-all middle-earth theme park for teenagers.
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Watched the movie yesterday (HFR 3D, sadly in German, not English).
The barrel escape scene was done great, Bombur gave me a few greath laughs.
To sum things up, I liked it much more than the first part and can't wait for the 3rd.
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Canada11349 Posts
@kwark. I find the reductive plot summaries are most reduced and therefore the most dismissive when people don't like the story. But the reductive plot summary can be turned on any story if one feels like dismissing the story. If I understand it correctly, a certain branch of structuralists could reduce entire stories to one line of symbols that stood for the different archetypes. Personally, if anything something like the Bolg on the roof, cluttered the plot too much (similar to the Azog chase scene in the first.) Basically, the issue is disliking the story (fair enough) and not that you can sum up the plot simply.
- She abandons Legolas to help somebody she's known for 5 minutes. This is wrong for 2 reasons: 1 she's abandoning the crown prince of the kingdom and 2. the movie states she's known Legolas' family for SIX HUNDRED FUCKING YEARS. You're telling me she rejects 600 years of bonding, friendship and duty to save some fucking dwarf she's known for FIVE FUCKING MINUTES? What is this bullshit? She isn't doing female leads any favors by playing this cheesy shit. Legolas almost dies because she stays behind to heal a nobody.
- I'll say it again.... she shits in the face of 600 years of history and duty to jeopardize the kingdom and her prince b/c she had a superficial crush on a tall dwarf.
After watching the film a couple times, I don't think this is a fair or accurate understanding of the situation. They established there were already some divergent paths and thought processes. While Legolas fancies Tauriel, we don't have much indication that she returns the interest. At the very least, she knows she has no hope of it after 600 years as Thranduil made clear. Furthermore, from her talks with Kili, it would seem she has a longing to be outside of Mirkwood- that the years of isolationism could not stop, but rather probably increased. In her talk with Kili, she seemed as interested about the outside world as she was specifically about him.
This seems to be confirmed with her disagreement with Legolas at river's edge over the role of elves in the world. Then you combine it with Legolas being surprised by the bloody nose and that the King has half his face melted off, you have an overprotective king that retreated into the fastness of the forest for safety, but not all elves felt the same way. And maybe some might be so bold to do something about it.
As a sidenote, I like that silvan elf-guards thought of their king as "ill-tempered." One thing they were trying to do is draw the distinction between the silvan Mirkwood elves and Thranduil and Legolas. This was a distinction that Tolkien later made with the idea that the Grey and High Elves had gone out, uniting the lesser Silvan elves. (Which I think even Galadirial did- I can't remember if her people were primarily Noldor or not.) A minor nit-pick, but I am almost positive Orcrist was not made by Legolas' kin. I do not think he was Noldor and certainly not from Gondolin or of Fingolfin's line.
In addition, being a Silvan elf, she is supposed to be less wise and more rash, which is what I think they were going for when she was going to kill the prisoner orc. And considering what her king did, she wasn't altogether out of line, just jumping the gun a bit.
But you are right with the time issue. Really in most movies and Jackson's movies specifically there is a significant time compression. I mean, after Frodo gets the Ring in the Fellowship, Gandalf takes off for 17 years, hunting Gollum with Aragorn and researching here and there. In the movie it feels like a couple days. Simillarily, the book prison sequence lasted a couple weeks rather than a day. Plus I'm pretty sure Azog was somehow whisked from Beorn's house to the south end of Mirkwood in half a night to get to that Dol Guldor scene before morning comes and Beorn changes back to human.
I watched the last time in HFR and I honestly can not tell the difference whether good or bad. It just looks like a 3D film to me.
On December 23 2013 09:47 Grumbels wrote:Show nested quote +On December 23 2013 08:28 Dunmer wrote:On December 23 2013 04:09 KwarK wrote:
I feel a plot summary should take more words than this one took.
Attacked by orcs, saved by bear.
Attacked by spiders, saved by elves.
Imprisoned by elves, saved by Bilbo.
Attacked by orcs, saved by barrels.
Stuck by lake, saved by boat.
Poisoned by orcs, saved by elves.
DRAGON
Not much happened this film. You can do that for most movies, Lord of the rings trilogy: Anything that happens orcs attack/ ringwraiths etc, saved by someone else Rinse and repeat Ring is destroyed Hell the entire fight outside minas tirith is just one side about to lose, new ally shows up and saves them. Then the other side is about to lose and new ally shows up and saves them. Happens 3 times and actually 4 times but the 3rd time was a just a fake by the other side to make them thing they were saved. But yeah your right not much happened in the LoTR trilogy either... I skip over the helm's deep fight while rewatching though.
Why? Do you skip the big set-piece Bravehart battle? Or the final battle in Mo Gung? (ok that might be a little more obscure...)
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On December 24 2013 03:11 Falling wrote:Show nested quote +On December 23 2013 09:47 Grumbels wrote:On December 23 2013 08:28 Dunmer wrote:On December 23 2013 04:09 KwarK wrote:
I feel a plot summary should take more words than this one took.
Attacked by orcs, saved by bear.
Attacked by spiders, saved by elves.
Imprisoned by elves, saved by Bilbo.
Attacked by orcs, saved by barrels.
Stuck by lake, saved by boat.
Poisoned by orcs, saved by elves.
DRAGON
Not much happened this film. You can do that for most movies, Lord of the rings trilogy: Anything that happens orcs attack/ ringwraiths etc, saved by someone else Rinse and repeat Ring is destroyed Hell the entire fight outside minas tirith is just one side about to lose, new ally shows up and saves them. Then the other side is about to lose and new ally shows up and saves them. Happens 3 times and actually 4 times but the 3rd time was a just a fake by the other side to make them thing they were saved. But yeah your right not much happened in the LoTR trilogy either... I skip over the helm's deep fight while rewatching though. Why? Do you skip the big set-piece Bravehart battle? Or the final battle in Mo Gung? (ok that might be a little more obscure...)
I don't know those references, but I skip over the battle scenes because they last forever and because the "allies show up just in time" gimmick gets old and because I don't like to watch people being slaughtered.
By the way, I really don't envy your position where you are such a middle-earth fan that you feel compelled to always assume the best of the series or the adaptations. I'm still very fond of Tolkien's works, but basically only in the capacity of enjoying reading through them twice and watching the movies ~3 times. I don't have that much emotional investment, so given that I don't like Peter Jackson as a director I don't expect much and I don't feel hurt if the movies aren't as good as I might have wished them to be. Coming from this perspective reading all your posts defending the movie is a bit weird to be honest.
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After watching the movie today I am surprised it was rated so much higher than the first. Man it was really way too long. I dont want to nitpick and talk about single things I dint like. It is just that I was not really entertained but bored.
I actually fell asleep during the fighting with Smaug, while you would expect this to be one of the exciting highlights of the film. Like he chases them and chases them and chases them, and it seems to never end. It is just boring because you know for sure that noone will ever be harmed. LotR trilogy in contrast was able to create some moments of actual suspense.
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On December 24 2013 03:11 Falling wrote:
After watching the film a couple times, I don't think this is a fair or accurate understanding of the situation. They established there were already some divergent paths and thought processes. While Legolas fancies Tauriel, we don't have much indication that she returns the interest. At the very least, she knows she has no hope of it after 600 years as Thranduil made clear. Furthermore, from her talks with Kili, it would seem she has a longing to be outside of Mirkwood- that the years of isolationism could not stop, but rather probably increased. In her talk with Kili, she seemed as interested about the outside world as she was specifically about him.
This seems to be confirmed with her disagreement with Legolas at river's edge over the role of elves in the world. Then you combine it with Legolas being surprised by the bloody nose and that the King has half his face melted off, you have an overprotective king that retreated into the fastness of the forest for safety, but not all elves felt the same way. And maybe some might be so bold to do something about it.
As a sidenote, I like that silvan elf-guards thought of their king as "ill-tempered." One thing they were trying to do is draw the distinction between the silvan Mirkwood elves and Thranduil and Legolas. This was a distinction that Tolkien later made with the idea that the Grey and High Elves had gone out, uniting the lesser Silvan elves. (Which I think even Galadirial did- I can't remember if her people were primarily Noldor or not.) A minor nit-pick, but I am almost positive Orcrist was not made by Legolas' kin. I do not think he was Noldor and certainly not from Gondolin or of Fingolfin's line.
In addition, being a Silvan elf, she is supposed to be less wise and more rash, which is what I think they were going for when she was going to kill the prisoner orc. And considering what her king did, she wasn't altogether out of line, just jumping the gun a bit.
I watched the last time in HFR and I honestly can not tell the difference whether good or bad. It just looks like a 3D film to me.
Fair point but I still have a problem with her actions because of how she justifies going into Laketown. First, she justifies it by saying we shouldn't allow orcs to pass through our land freely and that they have the task to seek out evil, not let it just take over. Second, Legolas says she can't handle that many orcs alone and she says "I'm not alone."
Both of those things were ignored once she saw Kili in danger. She was content to let orcs roam freely in a human town and escape and left Legolas to fight alone (again she is the captain of the guard and he is the crown prince). Maybe it would have been more tolerable if the second she healed him she was like "Oh yea, I should probably go help Legolas now," then she went out and saved Legolas at the last second against that orc leader.
I know I'm nitpicking, but Tauriel isn't an original part of the lore and was added by Jackson to have a female lead in the movies. I don't think he's doing females any favors by having the one female lead be a walking stereotype who makes decisions based on love and emotion instead of logic.
As for HFR, I absolutely hate it. Makes it look like a PBS show and makes the CGI stand out even more than usual.
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Canada11349 Posts
@Grumbels.
To be honest, I just like talking Tolkien, stories and how films adapt and interpret stories. I don't necessarily think people all people are giving it a fair shot with, but I just enjoy discussing it.
Understand though that my defence of the movies is a shift in thinking in the last few years. I was an adamant hater of Jackson and his destruction of the Tolkien's works in the first trilogy. A worse book purist you would be hard pressed to find. So quite the opposite, I have already felt the sting of films not being as good as I wished them to be. But that changed between the behind the scenes and director commentary of the trilogy and a professor Corey Olsen (Who by the way wrote this blog for the Wall Street journal How Faithful Are "The Hobbit" Films to Tolkien's Books?)
At first glance, Peter Jackson’s trilogy of epic films based on “The Hobbit,” a slender children’s book, might appear to leave its source behind in order to make more capital out of the “Lord of the Rings” franchise. Many viewers may wonder how much J.R.R. Tolkien they are really getting in “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug,” which opens today. Just how faithful are these films to Tolkien’s “The Hobbit”?
...
But given that my defence of Tolkien used to be to see the Jackson interpretations in the worst possible light, now I am (you are right) much more forgiving of the film's excesses. But it is for that reason that I want talk about it with others and see if others might have a least a slight shift over from simply 'all the changes are cashgrab attempts.'
The Company That Keeps Us
Is about a similar sort of shift in thinking.
It's not that I think Jackson is some god of interpretating Tolkien. But I think there is room for his interpretation. And that where he fails, makes me appreciate all the more the source material. Whereas before I viewed every error or poor adaptation as somehow ruined LotR's for me (the change of Faramir, Sam-go-home, the simplification of Denethor, the missing battle prep scenes for Minas Tirith, etc) I have found that the book has stayed the same and I can enjoy the interpretation for what it is.
The Mo Gong reference was a reach, but I would have though Braveheart would be a common one. I mean do you like movies with battles in general is basically what I am getting at? The last battle sequence in Zulu, the final push in A Bridge Too Far (that's hard to pick out because the entire film is combat), etc.
But I talk because I enjoy talking stories and Tolkien most especially not exactly because I think by sheer density of of paragraphs I'll win people over (thought that would be nice.)
@Onslaught
I see your point with Tauriel. But I think that's more the problem with having only one female character. When there is only one they tend to be viewed as a stand in for the whole. But if there are a few, then those errors in judgement are more easily seen as character flaws rather than gender flaws. But that is an issue I have with mainstream films generally rather than The Hobbit specifically.
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Meh Peter Jackson improved the Lord of the Rings in most ways other than the dumb Frodo tries to give the ring to the Witch King therefor Faramir thinks he should let Frodo wander off with the ring... I definitely dreaded the thought of a 3 movie Hobbit...I thought the first movie was amazingly terrible. The Dwarves choosing to let the trolls eat them because the trolls captured Biblo? WTH? The fight scenes with the goblins were just awkward and bad.
However, movie 2 was so much better that I'm looking forward to movie three being solid. I enjoyed the fight scenes much more this time around although the running around with the Dragon was a bit of a roll my eyes yawner. Still an improvement on the first chapter and actually really good for something done by Peter Jackson (who in general is pretty bad at what he does).
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@Falling,
The movies are completely different in tone. The entire point of the novels is lost in the movie, even if superficially there are similar elements. I consider that much more galling than whether Tauriel is a character from the novels or not. The Hobbit purports to tell a children story about how Bilbo Baggins, a homely hobbit, discovers unexpected courage and ingenuity and eventually ends up proving his worth to the adult world of dwarfs. The narrative is arranged similarly to a fairy tale or some oral story telling tradition in terms of having an episodic structure with a series of encounters where Bilbo's company gets in trouble which is then resolved by some clever trick by Bilbo.
The movies simply completely lose out on this approach to the story. They keep the episodic structure and the setting, but the heart of the story is gutted. It's not infused with intelligence and restraint the way the novel was written. The few scenes with dialogue directly lifted from the novel feel odd and out of place.
I still enjoyed both of the movies in terms of the "middle-earth theme park" idea, and I'm not going to claim I hate them, but it's first and foremost a Hollywood-type adaptation of the novel and it's not the one I had wished for.
And well, what message do these movies give to kids? They are not "moral entertainment" the way the source material was. The hobbit was something I would have my children (if I had them) read, because it has a great many things to teach them, foremost the importance of believing in yourself. (although it helps if you have a magic ring  ) The movies don't really teach you these lessons, so what's the point? It's okay entertainment I guess...
The Mo Gong reference was a reach, but I would have though Braveheart would be a common one. I mean do you like movies with battles in general is basically what I am getting at? The last battle sequence in Zulu, the final push in A Bridge Too Far (that's hard to pick out because the entire film is combat), etc.
I've heard of Braveheart, Zulu, ABTF, but never watched any of them, although I've been meaning to watch Zulu for ages. I don't really like war movies though.
Understand though that my defence of the movies is a shift in thinking in the last few years. I was an adamant hater of Jackson and his destruction of the Tolkien's works in the first trilogy. A worse book purist you would be hard pressed to find. So quite the opposite, I have already felt the sting of films not being as good as I wished them to be.
Movies can't possibly be as good as the books if you are watching them with the book in mind. It's not even a question of the quality of the movie, fact of the matter is that if you are screening them for conformity to the source material you are engaged in a game of "spot the difference" that can never have a satisfying outcome.
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On December 22 2013 10:07 hootsushi wrote:Show nested quote +On December 20 2013 16:14 itkovian wrote:On December 17 2013 04:28 ImDrizzt wrote:
But I think very young people will love this movie, but not anyone over 18. While I normally can't stand cheesy action intense movies, I actually feel like these hobbit movies are doing it right. They're fun and funny with a dose of dramatic. But what really makes them work is i get the feeling they don't take themselves too seriously. The amount of retarded no-sense action that happens is just stupid. So stupid that you can tell they're just doing it for fun, like a nod to the viewer saying isn't this just ridiculous?The action is just absurd. Just so fucking absurd that you know its intentional and I think that makes it pretty hilarious. And the CGI is neat and the landscape is earth porn. At first when I saw the trailer and I saw how much legolas was featured in it, I found myself shaking my head with my hopes down. Then I thought fuck it I'm just going to buy into it and enjoy it. And ultimately, I didn't mind him being featured. My major gripe is the length. Its like being on a roller coaster you really enjoy, but it just doesn't stop. 2 hours would be a better length Overall, this was good fun, just like the first one. Personally, I liked the first a little better. On December 20 2013 12:13 Jerubaal wrote:
Can someone suggest times to go to the bathroom. :p Just don't miss the barrel scene. I agree with you, the reason I found the first one a little bit better is because the second part seems to be the big setup for the third movie, which I have high hopes for. Maybe they can even trump the epicness the battle of the pelenor fields delivered.
I don't think anything except maybe Helm's Deep battle can trump the epicness of Pelenor Fields. That was pretty much every race colliding in one battle for over an hour long. EPIC
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EPT
