First of all, I want to say that as someone who has always
struggled with his weight, I think it's great that Peter Jackson has been able
to successfully shed much of his excess body mass and find ways to remain
healthy and lean. I only wish that he could apply the same kind of discipline to
his filmmaking. 3D, wicked-high frame-rates and motion capture have become his new
indulgences and these technologies have apparently now taken precedent over
coherent storytelling and character development.
As a
fan—and sometimes defender—of Jackson’s ambitious Lord of the Rings trilogy,
I’m at a loss at how the same man behind that behemoth of a juggling act, who,
for three films, was able to keep all of his balls in the air at the same time,
now can’t manage to competently tell a simple point-A to point-B plot. I left last year’s “The Hobbit: An Unexpected
Journey” with the bare-minimum level of satisfaction and a heap of
better-luck-next-time reservations. Within “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug”,
despite spending its entire running time throwing CGI things at the camera,
whatever story was set up in the first film has now been shoved aside for a two
hour and forty minute, fantasy, tech-demo.
The
plot of this second installment—as it barely exists—continues to follow Bilbo
(Martin Freeman) and his merry gang of dwarves, led by the brave but stubborn
Thorin (Richard Armitage), as they make their way through the dangerous pockets
of Middle Earth on the way to the Lonely Mountain to reclaim their home and
treasure from a massive dragon named Smaug (voiced by Benedict
Cumberbatch). On the way, they run into
an army of Orks, racist wood elves, and a downtrodden fishing community, ruled
by a corrupt master (Stephen Fry).
Seems modest
enough, right? Well, added in, we also follow the wizard Gandolf (Sir Ian
McKellan) as he is sneaking around caves and forests in search of a non-related
prophecy, as well as a wooden will-they-or won’t-they, romantic strand dealing
with Legolas (Orlando Bloom) and an arrow-wielding elf named Taurial
(Evangeline Lilly). All of these story
bits, along with the main journey, struggle for air between a number of bloated,
video-game action set-pieces.
Despite
Jackson stretching this relatively short novel into three separate films by
including side-mythology from Tolkien’s other writings, this movie couldn’t be
less interested in the story. Through
most of the it the characters are bounced from one set-piece to another with
hardly any narrative tissue holding them together. There are far too many goofy names and magic
scrolls and foretold something-or-others to keep up with, and the film’s
complete inability to slow down and let the plot breath prevents any of these elements
from progressing. We don’t even have a
particular interest in Bilbo’s involvement in the story anymore since the movie
continually shifts the center of consciousness, digressing into uninteresting
and irrelevant subplots and over designed and aggressively choreographed
green-screen action sequences.
What
will inevitably trick audiences into thinking they got what they paid for is
the fantastic, well-paced conclusion of the film, involving the dragon Smaug; a
completely believable and awe-inspiring CGI creation that steals the entire show.
Cumberbatch’s voice is used to good effect here and the scene, unlike the rest
of the movie, is based in its characters and their interactions.
Back in
2005 I would have never called “The Lord of the Rings” series subtle, but
compared to these exponentially disappointing Hobbit prequels they now feel
like Ken Burns documentaries. Whereas
those films knew how to use their long running-times to build brooding
atmosphere and explore the different character dynamics, this movie just feels
like being led on a track through a spook house, passing one visual thing after
another, in way that seems arbitrary and inconsequential.
Originally published in The Idaho State Journal/Dec-2013
I have to say that I agree - I felt that the film was uneven in pacing, development, and technical quality. The entire 'barrel chase down the river' scene seemed thrown together and really felt like it was a last minute addition to stuff another action scene into the film. The CGI was poor at best, and the reason for diverging from the book's plotline was zero. At least some of the things that Jackson added made sense in light of trying to explain and tie in to LOTR, but that whole scene was just crap. I also thought that for as long as the movie was, it really didn't get very far. They should have cut a bunch of the filler crap and included the battle with smaug at laketown. Then the third movie could be the battle of 5 armies.
ReplyDeleteI agree with D+. A telling point for us was during the dwarves running from smaug / legolas fighing orcs in laketown scene, the sound went out in the theatre for a bit and not only did it not detract, it actually an improvement.