To my great surprise considering I absolutely hated the first, I actually highly enjoyed this. It's so superior in just about every way. It's actually exciting and involving, the action sequences are well-done (loved the barrel sequence as well as the spider scene in the first hour) and I enjoyed the new characters, especially Evangeline Lilly who gets more to do in this movie alone than the 'female lead' of the original film series Liv Tyler did in three movies. The final act with Smaug does run a little long and becomes repetitive by the end, but the film ends in a way where I was actually excited to see what happened in the next installment. B+

The screening I saw was also in 2D so I didn't have to deal with that horrid HFR bullshit that I had to with the first film

AWESOME!

smauggy

I liked it quite a bit. For a big chunk of its running time the film is basically THE LORD OF THE RINGS meets INDIANA JONES.

The editing in the final act hurts it. Jackson goes for the RETURN OF THE JEDI multiple-fronts-at-once thing, but he never figures out how to cut into them, so that every time you're into one of the stories, you're yanked out of it into something else. Smaug is really something, though.

And Tauriel, for as much heat as she's going to take from Tolkien fanboys, is my favorite thing in the movie.

Agreed. She was my favorite character.

<<<<<BREAKING NEWS>>>>>

Hell has frozen over! I received a comp ticket for the Thursday night screening of The Hobbit: The Desolation Of Smaug, and I'm actually planning on attending!

As some of you may remember, I refused to waste my time on the first six hour instalment last year, settling for a short sampler to experience the HFR film technology.

However, this year, I am going ahead and choosing to waste my time - - review to follow in this space...



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Edit: Review



Putrid.

The Hobbit: The Desolation Of Smaug is a sickeningly literal insult to the storyteller's art.


-273.15° C out of 5.

Do you save all of your posts in a spreadsheet? For quick reference?

Yeah right, more like: you bought your ticket a month ago.

Will you rate it 1 out of 5 or something like 0.00001 out of 5?

I really enjoyed this. Better than the first, and I liked the first quite a bit. Action scenes are great, Tauriel is a GREAT addition, the dragon is AWESOME. It has some flaws. Too little Beorn, editing in the final third (too many cuts between stories). And why was there no steam rising from the molten metal?

I like the approach taken in the Interstellar teaser. There's not much too it, but it shows that it could be very mainstream. Very disappointed I didn't get the Godzilla trailer.

B+ (for now. Will revise if needed after watching it in HFR 3D next week)

Too much senseless action, and although it has some magic, it lacks magic.

6/10.

I think Jackson owes us some kind of explanation for those ridiculous GoPro shots.

I hope Smaug lays waste to Lake-town and its generic inhabitants.

The second Hobbit movie was much better than the first, which dragged quite a bit.

We saw it with the faster frame rate and I was impressed; panning shots were very smooth instead of jerky like in regular films.

I agree with one critic that the advantages of adding a strong female character was outweighed by the fact that she had to have a love interest subplot.

Luke Evans (Bard) looks so much like Orlando Bloom that at first my wife thought Bloom was playing two parts.

I also looked for Stephen Colbert but didn't see him.

Where was Billy Connolly? Which character was he?

Colbert's the spy in Laketown who drops his eyepatch.

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug is a modest improvement upon the critic and fan dividing first film, which I intend as a compliment because I am an enthusiastic fan of An Unexpected Journey. This second leg of the dwarves' three-part adventure to slay the mighty dragon Smaug and regain their kingdom under a mountain benefits from depicting action already in motion, resulting in a leaner and more swiftly paced follow-up with more inspired chase and combat sequences, including a vertiginous ride down a wild river and an extended underground conflict with Smaug. Voiced by Benedict Cumberbatch, he is a very frightening and completely momentous computer-generated creation, perhaps the most convincing dragon ever featured in a live-action fantasy film. It is also pleasant to see Orlando Bloom return in agile and gorgeous form as elf archer Legolas. And the most memorable virtues of the prior film, including Martin Freeman's charming lead performance as Bilbo Baggins and the game changing spectacle of high-frame-rate 3-D, are just as potent here.

A-

Based on online responses I have read, it sounds as if people are seriously struggling with the abrupt cliffhanger ending here, even though it is obviously part two of a trilogy.

I think I liked the first better? This one was (again) way too long and forgettable. Some of it was fun though but eh.

It doesn't feel like a natural stopping point at all, though. It won't make as much of a difference after next year, by which point all of the movies will be available. But now, it feels like a cop-out to have to wait another year to see the second half of a set piece.

It functions well as an old-school cliffhanger, and I believe it is a wise decision to feature Smaug in all three Hobbit films rather than end the second film with his death.

Thanks!

I really enjoyed it, a bit more than the first one which I also really liked. (A-)

Smaug was amazing. It's been awhile since a character has exceeding my expectations, and I want to see the film again just for his (much longer than I expected) screen time. Thranduil was a better character than I was expecting him to be as well. And the Galdalf/Sauron confrontation was pretty cool, and I can't wait to see the White Council arrive at Dol Guldur in the next film.

But I do have some complaints and issues: 1) How often the storylines were changing during the final 20-30 minutes of the film. 2) Tauriel and Kili's romance felt too tacked-on for the sake of having some kind of romance in the film. The amount of time spent on them during the end of the film got annoying, too. I really liked Tauriel, however. 3) And finally, no Galadriel, Gollum, Elrond scenes was disappointing. I know they'll have scenes in the final film, but I still missed them here.

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

A great movie. It's blockbuster film production on another level, with superb visual effects and tremendous pacing, but overall I couldn't shake the feeling that Desolation of Smaug was ultimately filler until a supposed brilliant finale (which I'm looking forward to very much as this one left me on the edge of my seat). So overall, it's not as good as An Unexpected Journey, but still awesome.

The talking dragon, Smaug, is great, and voiced by Benedict Cumberbatch. The effects here are top drawer, especially when the liquid gold is poured over him, but also the fire breathing and the scaley skin of the dragon are precise and visually spectacular. Orlando Bloom returns as Legolas, and the ending is left open for a big duel in the third film, but I much more enjoyed his friend, Tauriel (played by the gorgeous Evangeline Lily), she can kick some serious ass! All the dwarves are kind of useless. They pretty much get captured by everyone and are defenceless until they make a "deal" or someone takes pity on them. And the leader of the dwarves is a moron that I never liked from the first one -- his selfish true colours are slightly shown here.

Great credits song sang by Ed Sheeran, and the music throughout was generally good too. I think what these Hobbit films might be missing is a battle, which I'm pretty sure might happen in the third one. It was nice to see the inclusion/conception of Sauron, which then ties it into the Lord of the Rings films, and the way that the 'ring' is referred to as "Precious!", that got me smirking. Finally, glad to see Peter Jackson making a cameo right at the beginning of the movie. That was neat, and I love it when I notice stuff like that. The film is entertaining in a way that we've expected from these films. Peter Jackson is a craftsman. The film is filler, but it's the best filler I've ever seen. The Hobbit: There and Back Again just shot to #2 on my list of 2014 most anticipated movies.

A-

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The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring A-
The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers A
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King A+
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey A
The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug A-