The Lord of the Rings trilogy is an incredible piece
of film-making - not only is it close to the books in terms of story, but what it shows
on screen is subtle, almost toned down and fits very comfortably into Tolkien’s
world. What made it such a marvel though, was how ambitious it had seemed at
the time of release; no one had ever succeeded in making a film at this kind of
scale and in this particular genre, so expectations were high when Peter
Jackson announced his intent to adapt The Hobbit into two films, and then,
months later, into a Hobbit trilogy. Excitement increased as the cast list was
gradually revealed and fans began to speculate as to how Jackson would pull it
off (including me) – where would the first film end? How could it possibly be extended into
three films? Then finally, several days ago, The Hobbit: An Unexpected
Journey was released into the world, and it was (and I shudder to say it)
sort of disappointing. What follows are my very muddled opinions of the film,
in the form of a rant/review.
The main problem was
that it all looked very commercialised. Jackson, presumably drunk on power from
the success of the Rings trilogy, spent most of the film trying to make
it into this brightly-coloured, fun-for-all-the-family blockbuster, while
simultaneously attempting to shove Middle Earth into his audience’s face, just
because he can. I’m sorry, but that’s what it looked like.
Tolkien’s books are
filled with back story and extra information that, along with the main
plotlines, are fascinating to read because it gives Middle Earth an extra
dimension; we as readers are made aware of the sheer scale of the world in
which these stories take place. And that’s great. That is why his books are as
popular as they are: because of the author’s extensive imagination and dedication
to what he has created. But to try and fill the script of The Hobbit
with as many references, trivia and back story as possible in order to fill up
the running time is not going to work. The truth of the matter is that the
audience couldn’t care less about the wolves of Gundabad, the lost king of
Angmar, or even the spawn of Ungoliant, especially when they’re mentioned in
passing, and while characters like Galadriel and Saruman may have been
intrinsic to plot of The Lord of the Rings, here they just come across
as gap-fillers: unnecessary elements of the film that serve only to stretch it
to its three hour running time.
The tone of The
Hobbit is at a completely different level to that of The Lord of the
Rings. Everyone knows this. It’s a very light-hearted, largely
uncomplicated tale of treasure hunting and riddle solving written initially for
Tolkien’s children. Peter Jackson definitely knows this – he goes on
about it in interviews, so why does it seem so misjudged? Why does it
unashamedly try so hard to be The Lord of the Rings? What we’re
presented with is a mixture of grotesque comedy and exaggerated, derivative
‘dark and brooding seriousness’, making the film seem unbalanced and most of
the time unsure of itself. This might not necessarily be the filmmakers’ fault
and is probably due to the Rings trilogy being made first; the bar had
been set, and anything proceeding it was inevitably going to appear slightly
silly.
To demonstrate some
of the more ridiculous moments in The Hobbit, I shall use Radagast the
Brown as an example. Here is a character rarely mentioned in either The
Hobbit of the LOTR books, a wizard who prefers the company of
animals and lives peacefully at his home at Rhosgobel in Mirkwood. His only
role is to warn the White Council about the dark power massing in Dol Guldor,
so he’s not really got a lot to do with The Hobbit, yet here he is
riding around the forest on a rabbit-drawn sledge (not very animal friendly)
with a sick hedgehog named Sebastian and dried bird crap running down the side
of his face. Saruman even accuses Radagast of being a mushroom addict! The film
has transformed him from a wise, friendly, nature-loving wizard, into a figure
of ridicule – someone to laugh at. Characters like these are present throughout
most of film (the Goblin King is an obvious one, looking completely out of
place, as though he’d just walked out of the Ralph Bakshi cartoon version), but
the only times they really worked were with the dwarves. Their characters were
well-acted and cleverly written, Thorin especially, and theirs were the back
stories that actually helped the film move forward.
On that note, it
needs to be stressed that The Hobbit was not awful – it was far
from awful, just not very impressive, especially when compared to Jackson’s
previous ventures into Middle Earth. That being said, it definitely has its
moments. One of the film’s saving graces is its casting: Martin Freeman is a
perfect Bilbo Baggins, not just in looks, but there’s something very Ian
Holm-ish about the way he delivers his lines – I just wish he had more of them.
In fact some of the best scenes are the one-to-one moments: Gandalf’s arrival
is brilliant, as is Bilbo’s encounter with Gollum, which is handled
surprisingly well. Jackson also manages fight scenes with a good eye for detail
and camera angles, which is why many of the goblin war flashbacks worked – they
were actually kind of beautiful. Similarly, the way he shoots landscapes is, as
usual, incredible – it might have been a better film if he had filled up the
gaps in the plot with more wide-angle shots of the company walking up
mountains.
For a blockbuster or
a family film, The Hobbit is enjoyable in so far as it’s quite pleasant
to be back in Middle Earth after so many years, but for fans who worship the books
and the original trilogy as religious artefacts, it’s too epic for a story so
simple and needed less ‘things’ going on. Or am I just being pedantic here? Do
I not like it as much because it’s so different from what I imagined it would
be? Perhaps I should just accept it as what it is and stop going on about it.
It’s hard to decide…
No comments:
Post a Comment