The first Hobbit movie

[steuard]

I saw The Hobbit a few days ago, and I enjoyed it. I started to write up some brief comments on the movie to post here, but they got a bit out of hand, so I've posted them on my Tolkien website instead. For those who are interested, have a look at my full review; comments are welcome!

Comments

[madmanatw]

I'm willing to accept Galadriel's "teleport" by assuming she bespelled Gandalf and put him to sleep briefly, much like Luthien does Morgoth. :) Just 'cause it's a known ability of sufficiently powerful elves.

[robbbbbb]

I took the "Thranduil marches his whole army to the Lonely Mountain" scene to be metaphorical, at best. No, Thranduil isn't going to bring a bunch of elves out to The Mountain like that. It's a visual representation of something that would otherwise be very difficult to do in a montage like that.

I'm trying to figure out why Peter Jackson felt the need to add the Necromancer's story to this tale. It seems out-of-place, unless it's way that Jackson's justifying Gandalf's disappearance in the second half of the tale.

Also: I'm not sure there's enough material here for three movies, unless there's a huge expansion of the Necromancer half of the tale in the middle of the next movie. Which decision would leave me uneasy.

And Radagast is a mess.

[steuard]

In fact, it's been made quite explicit that the whole "White Council drives the Necromancer out of Dol Guldur" storyline will be shown live on screen. (Making time to show "the Battle of Dol Guldur" was even one explicit reason that Jackson gave for making three movies instead of two.) I'm actually okay with the idea of embedding the Dwarves' quest story in its larger context for these movies (à la "The Quest of Erebor"). But using it as an excuse to focus on a bunch of additional big battle scenes bugs me.

And yeah, I guess it's reasonable to treat that scene with Thranduil as symbolic. But somehow that's harder for me to accept on screen, when you actually see it happen.

[akiko]

Peter Jackson sure does love him some Epic Battle Scenes and Comic Mischief. Bleh.

[prock]

Thanks for the review, it was a great read. As a comic book reader, I find the whole "canon vs. mythos" debate to be curious. Stories are stories, and they always change in the retelling. The value in a retelling almost always trumps the loss of fidelity with the original. Modern pedanticism in the regard reaches almost comical proportions with religious evangelical literalism with respect to a "false" retelling of a thousand year old mythos.

As a parent of a three year old girl, my frustration with the male dominated narrative of Tolkien has once again reached a new peak. I only wish that Jackson had taken even more liberties in that regard.

[steuard]

Responding in reverse order, I very much sympathize with your frustration about Tolkien's neglect of female presence in his stories. (And not just because I'm the parent of an 18 month old girl! Boys need to learn that girls can be heroes, too.) I recommend hooking your daughter up with The Blue Sword and probably a bunch of other McKinley books as soon as she's ready for them, if not before. :) But maybe she'll find a way to make Tolkien work for her anyway: I went through my entire first read of The Lord of the Rings thinking that Merry was a girl.

As for the whole concept of "canon", it's an interesting question. I perpetually feel torn about it, in various ways. For example, I've gotten the impression that most Tolkien scholars who are more respected than I am don't share my fondness for the idea of (and search for) a "canonical" Middle-earth in Tolkien's writings. (I sometimes wonder if I am in fact the most respected Tolkien person who still appreciates the concept.) But the question of adherence to canon in other peoples'

[prock]

Thanks for the pointers to McKinley's books.

[ericakeithley]

I'm curious; why does Tolkien need to have more females in his stories? Is there something inherently wrong with having mostly male characters? The vibe I'm getting is that it would be nicer if Tolkien was giving women a heroine role model. Is that your main complaint? I'm a woman, and I have both sons and daughters; I don't have a problem with the lack of heroines in Tolkien, but I am interested in hearing why other people do.