3.5 stars

(released 2012)

It’s wonderful to see another beloved Tolkien novel brought to life on the screen under the thoughtful direction of Peter Jackson.  This film is visually, aurally, and tonally continuous with the Lord of the Rings series, although the material tends to be lighter than LOTR (which is consistent with the source material).

Martin Freeman is spot-on as Bilbo Baggins – in fact it’s hard to imagine a better casting choice.  Andy Serkis’ Gollum is simply perfection and the rendering of the “Riddle game” sequence is just like the book come to life (and I mean that in the best way, not that it was just a word-for-word re-creation of the novel).

The concerns about Jackson’s decision to stretch the series out to make a trilogy appear to be unfounded, based on the pacing of this first episode.  Material added in to flesh out the dwarves’ history and to dramatize some of Gandalf’s manoeuvring are entirely appropriate.  Jackson and his writing team have consistently made good choices about adapting the books to the screen, both in terms of what to edit out and what to add in for better movie-story-telling.

A couple of relatively minor complaints:  I saw this film in 3D and 48 frames per second (the way Jackson wants it to be seen) and it definitely was a detriment to the movie-going experience, especially during the indoor scenes.  The lighting seemed artificial and I was acutely aware of camera movements.  The 3D effect made the characters who were in close-up look like they were standing in front of a flat background.  I definitely recommend seeing this in 2D and traditional 24 frames per second.

Also, I was a little disappointed that they did not introduce more new theme songs – I think they only added one new Lonely Mountain theme (which basically replaces the Fellowship theme) and recycled the Shire theme and the Rivendell theme.  I know they wanted to establish continuity with the LOTR films, but I thought hearing so much of the same music was off-putting.