Dustin: 3.5 of 5 stars Nick: 3.5 of 5 stars Average: 3.5 of 5 stars (Live canary)
Dustin: The Lord of the Rings, Part 6: The Hobbit, Part 3: The Battle of the Five Armies is the last film in the Middle Earth series until Warner Bros figures out how to stretch a trilogy out of the appendices in LOTR. It rounds out the adventure of Bilbo Baggins while giving the character very little screen time.
Nick: Bilbo was rarely seen and even more rarely heard. Though it was funny whenever he was shown in battle he was just holding his sword around many enemies, but I don’t think he ever in a fight. Do you recall him swinging his sword?
Dustin: He threw some rocks and took out a bunch of orcs. It was hard to suspend disbelief whenever Bilbo was fighting. While he did become a stronger hobbit during his adventures, I don’t think him throwing rocks at monsters twice his size would accomplish anything more than pissing them off. It would be more believable if he just put on the ring and then went around slitting orcs’ throats.
Nick: Most of the film is one large battle. I never thought I’d say the fight scenes directed by Peter Jackson in a film placed in Middle Earth were not well done. I feel wrong just saying that, but so many times there would be shots of a character with some melancholic music playing as if that character had no shot while an impossible number of orcs are shown walking up, and yet 15 minutes later that character is still alive and all the orcs are dead. This happened frequently and left me very bemused.
Dustin: Yeah, the characters got out of impossible situations a little too easily. Remember in The Fellowship of the Ring how much it took to kill one troll? Here, they shoot down trolls with no difficulty. The special effects were also not quite as well done. The armies moved in a little too perfect formation, so it looked fake. I wouldn’t say it was Phantom Menace fake, but certainly not as good as The Two Towers.
Nick: Not only do the battle scenes wrap up with ease for our heroes, so do the mental battles for characters like Thorin. His turn around was out of nowhere. One minute he’s selfish, and the next he looks inside himself and is unselfish. What was his sickness? The Dragon’s ----?
Dustin: By far the most intriguing element of this movie was Thorin bogarting all the gold for himself. But I agree this psychological battle was resolved a little too easily. He does about one minute of soul searching, then does a 180 and becomes the hero again. I might have liked it better if he waited until he was finally pushed into a corner before he started fighting, and not having his turnaround until he was mortally wounded. Boromir’s character arc in FOTR was better done.
Nick: My favorite scene was the battle between Cate Blanchett, Hugo Weaving and Christopher Lee against the ghostly kings while they are protecting Ian McKellen (Gandalf--I know this name!). It’s enjoyable because you see the differences in fighting between an Elf King, a Wizard and I’m not sure what exactly Blanchett is, but I’m going with Elf Goddess? It’s up there in the best fight scenes of the year for me.
Dustin: I actually thought that scene was kind of pointless. It felt shoehorned in to give Christopher Lee and Co an excuse to be in The Hobbit. I also have trouble with the suspension of disbelief when the old wizards are fighting. Yes, I know they have magical powers, but it seems to me their strength isn’t in physical combat.
Nick: You’re completely right, but since the whole series feels shoehorned then I don’t mind one fantastically done battle within the already pointless three-film version of a 300-page book.
Dustin: He threw some rocks and took out a bunch of orcs. It was hard to suspend disbelief whenever Bilbo was fighting. While he did become a stronger hobbit during his adventures, I don’t think him throwing rocks at monsters twice his size would accomplish anything more than pissing them off. It would be more believable if he just put on the ring and then went around slitting orcs’ throats.
Nick: Most of the film is one large battle. I never thought I’d say the fight scenes directed by Peter Jackson in a film placed in Middle Earth were not well done. I feel wrong just saying that, but so many times there would be shots of a character with some melancholic music playing as if that character had no shot while an impossible number of orcs are shown walking up, and yet 15 minutes later that character is still alive and all the orcs are dead. This happened frequently and left me very bemused.
Dustin: Yeah, the characters got out of impossible situations a little too easily. Remember in The Fellowship of the Ring how much it took to kill one troll? Here, they shoot down trolls with no difficulty. The special effects were also not quite as well done. The armies moved in a little too perfect formation, so it looked fake. I wouldn’t say it was Phantom Menace fake, but certainly not as good as The Two Towers.
Nick: Not only do the battle scenes wrap up with ease for our heroes, so do the mental battles for characters like Thorin. His turn around was out of nowhere. One minute he’s selfish, and the next he looks inside himself and is unselfish. What was his sickness? The Dragon’s ----?
Dustin: By far the most intriguing element of this movie was Thorin bogarting all the gold for himself. But I agree this psychological battle was resolved a little too easily. He does about one minute of soul searching, then does a 180 and becomes the hero again. I might have liked it better if he waited until he was finally pushed into a corner before he started fighting, and not having his turnaround until he was mortally wounded. Boromir’s character arc in FOTR was better done.
Nick: My favorite scene was the battle between Cate Blanchett, Hugo Weaving and Christopher Lee against the ghostly kings while they are protecting Ian McKellen (Gandalf--I know this name!). It’s enjoyable because you see the differences in fighting between an Elf King, a Wizard and I’m not sure what exactly Blanchett is, but I’m going with Elf Goddess? It’s up there in the best fight scenes of the year for me.
Dustin: I actually thought that scene was kind of pointless. It felt shoehorned in to give Christopher Lee and Co an excuse to be in The Hobbit. I also have trouble with the suspension of disbelief when the old wizards are fighting. Yes, I know they have magical powers, but it seems to me their strength isn’t in physical combat.
Nick: You’re completely right, but since the whole series feels shoehorned then I don’t mind one fantastically done battle within the already pointless three-film version of a 300-page book.
Dustin: The special effects in the scene were amazing, as they were throughout most of the movie. My complaints about the effects are really just nitpicky. All the films are spectacularly done from a technical standpoint. It’s just that they tried to take a simple story and make it as epic, if not more so, than LOTR. After I saw the first installment, I wasn’t very satisfied with the elements from outside the book, but I kept an open mind. I was willing to forgive the bloated nature of the scenes if they rounded them out well in the final installment. But I stand by my original criticism. This really should have been one movie directed by Guillermo del Toro.
Nick: Del Toro still stayed on as a writer/producer. But you’re correct. The first film is my least favorite, while the second one is slightly better than this last one. Though I think the first scene in Battle of Five Armies should’ve been the last scene of whatever the second movie was called… wait… Desolation of Smaug… it came to me.
Dustin: Peter Jackson initially said the reason he didn’t want to direct The Hobbit is because he didn’t want to compete with himself having already done LOTR. The argument didn’t make a lot of sense to me, but I think it sort of informs one about what went wrong with these movies. He was trying to outdo himself with much lighter material. Del Toro might not have taken that approach. Jackson is a great director, but del Toro probably would’ve been able to show more restraint in this project. I think there is a five-star movie inside these three 3½-star movies. They just need to be trimmed down.
Nick: Actually, Jackson was frozen out of doing the movie because he was suing Miramax for funds he never received from The Lord of the Rings trilogy. So they originally hired Del Toro, but the process was taking too long, so Del Toro dropped out, and the lawsuit with Jackson was settled, and then they let him direct the film. This was like an on-going battle that lasted five years and was almost more intense than anything that happened in these films.
Dustin: Perhaps they should make a trilogy out of that.
Nick: Del Toro still stayed on as a writer/producer. But you’re correct. The first film is my least favorite, while the second one is slightly better than this last one. Though I think the first scene in Battle of Five Armies should’ve been the last scene of whatever the second movie was called… wait… Desolation of Smaug… it came to me.
Dustin: Peter Jackson initially said the reason he didn’t want to direct The Hobbit is because he didn’t want to compete with himself having already done LOTR. The argument didn’t make a lot of sense to me, but I think it sort of informs one about what went wrong with these movies. He was trying to outdo himself with much lighter material. Del Toro might not have taken that approach. Jackson is a great director, but del Toro probably would’ve been able to show more restraint in this project. I think there is a five-star movie inside these three 3½-star movies. They just need to be trimmed down.
Nick: Actually, Jackson was frozen out of doing the movie because he was suing Miramax for funds he never received from The Lord of the Rings trilogy. So they originally hired Del Toro, but the process was taking too long, so Del Toro dropped out, and the lawsuit with Jackson was settled, and then they let him direct the film. This was like an on-going battle that lasted five years and was almost more intense than anything that happened in these films.
Dustin: Perhaps they should make a trilogy out of that.
Nick: The films are good, but they don’t even come into consciousness when compared to the Lord of the Rings trilogy. All of the events, whether mental or physical, are wrapped up with such ease it’s mind boggling why three films were needed to lead to that simplistic outcome. Sigh...
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