The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey 3D (Warner Brothers, M)
Director: Peter Jackson
Starring: Ian McKellen, Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage
‘All good stories deserve embellishment,” Gandalf the Grey tells Bilbo Baggins in the opening scenes of Sir Peter Jackson’s first movie based on The Hobbit.
Actor Sir Ian McKellen, who plays the lovable wizard, is almost winking at the audience as he delivers the line, no doubt referring to the amount of embellishment The Hobbit book had to undergo to turn it into a trio of screenplays.
But the best part is that none of the embellishment comes from the pen of anyone other than Middle Earth’s creator, the late JRR Tolkien, who bridged the story of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings with scores of pages of appendices.
It is from these appendices that the extra material comes from.
Some thought 169 minutes too long, but even after half a dozen viewings it still feels like a couple of hours to me.
The spectacle of this movie is just as powerful on the small screen as the big. In fact in at least one place it is better on the small screen.
When the cinema picture is metres high in 3D and projected at twice the normal frame rate, an ultra-real 48 frames per second, it is hard not to keep thinking the slapstick chase through the underground lair of the goblin king is largely computer generated.
But when it’s viewed on a home entertainment system, whether it’s from a superb 3D Blu-ray or not, it is not so obvious.
Composer Howard Shore also deserves kudos for his bold and beautiful new theme based around the dwarves that has its musical roots in Celtic dirges.
If you’re interested in how this film was made, there’s 10 video blogs, which Jackson posted online, detailing the process from the first day of shooting to the premiere.
It includes a road trip from Matamata to Piopio and then to the South Island for location shooting.
The extras last just over two hours.
This release is a must for any movie lover.
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