Review of The Hobbit (1977) by Jordan P — 03 Apr 2008

Forget about Peter Jackson for a moment. Now imagine that youâ??re some sort of hippie/proto-D&D Nerd with a penchant for watercolors and drinking songs living in the mid to late 70s, and you can see the appeal of this movie. What I find interesting is not the animation (ludicrous by todayâ??s standards), or the musical numbers (uninspired lyrics, though catchy), or even the voice work (with surprisingly appropriate appearances by Orson Bean and John Huston). Rather, I look at it as an interesting artifact of the 1970s post LOTR culture. I find it interesting that the scene between Gollum and Bilbo, which in the book isnâ??t all that long or significant (as Tolkien had never intended to write a sequel), takes up a very large portion of the 70-some minute movie. Presumably this was done at least somewhat in deference to the LOTR trilogy. I wonder, if The Hobbit had been made into a movie before the Trilogy had come outâ?¦.

That being said, I should have left this alone and just kept my highly romanticized memories of it from childhood intact.