Review of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012) by Stefan G — 30 Jun 2015

It's pretty hard to dislike this movie, primarily because it's technically well-made. However, in many ways, it seems very much like a rehash of the older Lord of the Rings movies, which were made by the same director.

For me, the film's biggest problem is the same problem that plagues the Lord of the Rings trilogy - the film is nearly three hours long. However, this film in particular seems to have a deliberately slow pace, as if the producers have a major psychological condition that prevents them from realizing that it might come across as boring.

For me, the film has a particular problem getting started. Right at the beginning, the film spends five minutes on a lavish prologue, and after that, we get ten more minutes of pointless, inane dialogue before the film actually starts.

Once we get past that, we get a very long and drawn out adventure with a lot of overacting. That's basically this film in a nutshell, but that's not to say that it lacks merit. It certainly has grand visuals, though I think I have come to expect that.

Most of the film is special effects, and in this film's case, it's hard to be really dazzled by what you've seen in so many other films. It may be enough to please fans, but I think it could have been so much better, especially in terms of its unbearably sluggish pacing.