The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies [Movie Review]

At long last the final chapter of The Hobbit comes to a close. It has been three long years. Somehow Peter Jackson was able to take one book and spread it across three films, a feat unparallelled in Hollywood thus far.

This action shot of the old people only lacks Radagast.

I've been down on movies being stretched to the breaking point. The Hobbit really pushes this boundary without completely destroying it.

4 out of 5 stars

This is the shortest film of The Hobbit trilogy, which sounds strange still. A trilogy of movies from one book, the prequels to the trilogy of movies made from an entire book series (LotR). This is the shortest, but it could have been shorter. If you take a break from this review and read my previous review of The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug, you will see that I mentioned it suffered from middle child syndrome. If the first 20 or so minutes of The Battle of Five Armies had been attached to The Desolation of Smaug, it would not have had that feeling.   

Hey, Heavy. Look at all the Shinies.

The whole ordeal on Gol Dulgur was somewhat less epic than I expected it to be. It too occurred very early on, but it just did not have as much impact as I was hoping. Spoiler alert: It sets up the movies that came out years ago!

Azog plays cheerleader.

The actual plot of the film, and its messages are good, but at times you feel they are being swamped by lots of battles and conflict or the threat of conflict. The best parts of the film are its themes: loyalty, family, and the danger of greed. Greed, and how corrupting it can be, is especially called out in the film.  

This is a beautiful movie as is everything that comes out of Weta these days. I did not see it in 3D, nor in the crazy increased frame rate. I prefer my movies old school... digital is fine, but stop screwing with other stuff. Practical effects rock.  

I really enjoyed the film, but I no longer walked out 'wowed' by it. Perhaps I've become to familiar with Peter Jackson's work. It was good, really good, but I've become used to it. The grand spectacle was what I expected and it was what I got. Again, I was too familiar with it. It did not have the same impact on me that the earlier films did.

Do not get me wrong, there is a very good chance I'll be seeing this once or even twice more in theaters. I enjoyed it. I really enjoyed the ending, it flowed so perfectly into LotR... when these are all on BD I'm going to sit down with my extended editions and just watch all six movies - back to back to back to back to back to back (that's six backs). Go see it. It is now tradition for one good science fiction / fantasy film each December and next year we have Star Wars VII to look fowards to.
 

I'm not knocking on, knocking on Erebor's door. Erebor's door.