Cloudy, with a chance of Eagles

[oloriel]

Right.
Due to LJ being under attack once more (yawn), I missed my annual Happy New Year post.
So,
have a very happy, healthy, creative and delightful new year
belatedly.

I also missed the Professor's birthday toast. Now my fan card really will be revoked for good*.

Oh wait, I missed the birthday toast because I was at the Cinemaxx, FINALLY WATCHING THE HOBBIT. Maybe I may keep my fan card after all?

So. My cinematic experience, the first since Pirates of the Caribbean 4: On Stranger Tides. What have I become.

On the technical side, I'm afraid this was a disappointment. The Cinemaxx advertises that you get to see The Hobbit with state-of-the-art technology, but obviously that only goes for the 3D HFR theatres. We went for good old 2D, which was grainy, blurry, disconcerting and, often, nausea-inducing. (Ironically, we'd decided for 2D because we were afraid that the 3D would be, as it so often is, blurry and nauseating...)
Of course, that's not the film's fault.

Further impressions will go under the spoiler cut, just in case.


On the whole, I found the pacing of this film terribly awkward. It was a mixed bag, really, made up of lots of theoretically brilliant puzzle pieces, but it felt as though they had been put together by someone who wasn't entirely sure where they were going. This did make the movie long-winded in some scenes, and I say that as a fan; I can understand why less passionate cinema-goers felt bored on occasion. The Erebor scene could've used some trimming, even though I loved the glimpse into the past of the Dwarven kingdom, and the stone giants and White Council made even me look at my watch.

That said, the puzzle pieces themselves really were brilliant (aside from the stone giants and the White Council). So much love and attention went into the design and cinematography, and it really shows! I loved the shout-outs to the past and future, which is no surprise. New Zealand is still stunningly beautiful, which is no surprise either.

Some random thoughts that went through my head during the film:

- Thranduil's facial expressions really made me roll my eyes. A lot. Also, as they've now established that Thorin has a personal reason to dislike Elves and the Sindar in particular, I'm pretty certain they won't do the Doriath flashback I was hoping for.

- Unexpected Party: PERFECT.

- They managed to incorporate a couple of songs without making it Disney-ish! I'm impressed.

- I really appreciate that they managed to give each Dwarf his own personality. I mean, it's still not like I could immediately say which Dwarf is called what or anything, but they managed to turn that heterogeneous, generic Dwarven mass that was in my head into 13 distinguishable individuals, which must have been no small feat.

- Yay, Sting without the blade inscription! See, the blade inscription was something that really bothered me in the LotR movie trilogy, because as a reader of The Hobbit I knew that Sting didn't come to Bilbo bearing that name, but that Bilbo himself chose that, so the runes on the blade saying "Yo, I'm Sting" [paraphrased] were just stupid. In this one? THERE IS NO BLADE INSCRIPTION, JUST THE WAVE DESIGN IT WILL LATER FOLLOW. So Bilbo added that later! Now it makes sense and that makes me happy!

- Radagast was less jarring than I'd expected from what I'd read and seen in the Art & Design book. Still more discworldly than I'd have imagined him, but not as disturbing as I'd feared.

- CALACIRYA SHOUTOUT! No, seriously, that was a perfect allusion in all but name.

- The Elvish (but also the Orcish) felt sort of awkward and pastede-on-yey. Not sure whether they pronounce it so awkwardly in the original, or whether they made the German voice actors repeat them and they botched it, but NO REAL PERSON ENUNCIATES LIKE THAT.

- White Council: Nobody actually takes Saruman seriously, do they? Also, how on earth is Galadriel doing that thing with her gowns, I'm not sure whether I find it beautiful or stupid.

- Some of the Rivendell design felt really over the top, and not in a good way. The houses were nice, but that "solar" (lunar?) where Elrond discovered the moon runes? That was way beyond ridiculous.

- I really watched out for the reported Fëanorian stars around Elrond's council "chamber", but I'm afraid they're rather ambiguous - they don't actually have that clearly distinctive shape. Might be any eight-pointed star, really. Oh well. I WANT TO BELIEVE.

- Dwarves saying things like "Good Heavens" or "Oh God". Um... not quite? "Sebastian" the Hedgehog. Um... no? The Trolls having names like "Bert" or "Bill" I personally already find jarring, but Tolkien at least chose Saxon-ish names for them. But Sebastian is Greek. Or Latin based on a Greek/Near Eastern place name. If you have no idea what you're doing, don't do it.

- Also, Radagast is not "an Istari". Unless Saruman means to imply that Radagast is multiple people (at least three)? Look, I see how Quenya and its tons of cases can be confusing, but the difference between singular and plural is actually pretty straightforward.

- In Goblin Town (at the latest), I wish Gandalf had said something like "DO I HAVE TO SAVE YOU ALL THE TIME? CAN YOU GUYS NOT, LIKE, STAY SAVED FOR A MOMENT?!" Seriously, it was Gandalf to the Rescue! all the time! Until it was Eagles to the Rescue, of course. It seems I'm not alone.

- Goblin Town was so absurdly over the top that I actually found it fun.

- Riddles in the Dark was perfect.

- The Aquilae Ex Machina amused me way too much. It really is like I said in that one shoddy comic back in the day, the Eagles are totally the "Sea Turtles!" joke of the Tolkienverse.²

- Some of the Big Moral Moments were laid on a bit too thickly, I think. That said, Thorin's manly hug for Bilbo was still kind of awww!-inducing.

- LOL, a production manager who worked on this film is called Arwen Munro. I bet her parents are really thrilled now. XD

There was more, but it has now slipped my mind. So I'll leave it at that, and possibly add more later.



On the whole, I liked it all right. But I do have a slight headache from the bad quality of the theatre, which is annoying. In the olden days (TM), we used to say that this or that was a film you just had to see in cinema. These days? If it didn't take so bloody long, I'd indefinitely prefer a BluRay on our home TV set.

- - -
*I actually have one, in that I have a membership card of the German Tolkien Society. They don't easily revoke that one, though, as long as you pay your membership fees and don't criminally misbehave.

²The text, in case anyone really wants to know, goes: Panel 1: Fingolfin: "But... how..." - Fingon: "Eagle." - Panel 2: Beorn: "And why did the Orcs not get you?" - Gandalf: "Eagles, my friend." - Panel 3: Elrond: "How did you escape?" - Gandalf: "Eagle." - Panel 4: Elanor: "But why did you not fall off the Eagles' backs?" - Sam: "Because we roped ourselves to them. ... with Hobbit hair OFF OUR FEET."
If you don't get the joke, you should watch Pirates of the Caribbean some time.

Comments

[oloriel.livejournal.com]

"He looks drugged."

Yup. Precisely what made me feel really anti-3rd Age-Elf after the LotR movies. I get that they were trying to make them super-human, but as far as I am concerned, they only made them appear aloof in a bad way or Heavily Under The Influence Of Valium. Thorin was way more majestic (ok, occasionally OTT majestic, but still) than Thranduil. The Rivendell Elves weren't quite that bad in this one, though, which is something at least.
(Occasionally, I'll explain my love for the Silmarillion Elves with "They actually do something. Often the wrong thing, but at least they don't just stand around giving you dazed looks and useless platitudes." XD)

Pretty much all camera pans were blurry when I saw it. Probably a combination of outdated hardware in the cinema and the fact that it was actually filmed in 3D and 48fps and had to be recalculated/converted into 2D, which probably didn't do it much good. I guess I'll watch the next part in 3D HFR.

[independence1776]

The LotR Elves are what made me decide PJ doesn't get Elves at all. Aloof they are not.

Occasionally, I'll explain my love for the Silmarillion Elves with "They actually do something. Often the wrong thing, but at least they don't just stand around giving you dazed looks and useless platitudes.

That is pretty much how I explain the differences, too. (Mom is actually reading LotR for the first time in decades because of the movie, despite the fact that I've been after her to read them for years! She's in the middle of The Hobbit and keeps popping up with "PJ didn't do this, or he did this" and it's pretty amazing.)

My theater upgraded all their equipment early this summer, so that probably helped on my side. But I can't see it in 3D-- it makes me nauseous.

[oloriel.livejournal.com]

Sure enough, Jenny Dolfen just recently got a comment (to her finished "Drawing of the Sword" painting) along the lines of "Not sure you'd call it cooking as they don't eat meat."
I really admire her for not snarking at the person who said that. (Who already said a couple of things before that, including but not limited to "Yeah but these aren't Elves"...)
Right. Elves totally are fond of archery, but would never use those bows for anything but... war? That totally makes sense. In any world. It does cast a new light on them warlike Teleri, of course. "Slender bows", uh-huh... But it's in the movie, so it must be true!

So far, I got nausea and a head-ache from 3D movies as well. But if I'm going to get that anyway now, I can as well give 3D another try. >_>

[independence1776]

I am half-tempted to search that out, but I'm not sure I want to see it and hurt my brain further. And how are they not Elves?

Given that there's a line in the Hobbit about the Mirkwood Elves hunting… PJ can shut up. (My headcanon was that it was either a first course or a veiled insult.)

:( I wish there was a way to avoid the side-effects.

[oloriel.livejournal.com]

Their ears were hidden beneath their hair, so the poster couldn't see them, so s/he assumed they were no Elves. Reading the description (in which they were named, and in which Jenny also explained that they were High Elves from the Silm) would probably have been too much work.

Headcanon happily accepted.

Me too. I've been suspecting so far that part of the problem is that my brain doesn't accept being told what to focus on in the real world, so for a 3D movie - which closely resembles what the brain is used to from the real world - it tries to focus even on the bits that are background, and were never filmed to be in focus. That means the brain has to expend a lot of energy on something that just won't work, so in the end it'll send out a "Danger! The world has gone wonky! Either you forgot your glasses, or you're drunk, or it's really foggy!" Except it won't be so eloquent, but just push the nausea! headache! button.
No idea if that's really it, but it makes sense to me, so I'll stick with it until I get a better explanation.
Of course, they say that the 48fps comes closer to the natural viewing experience, so maybe I'll have less trouble with that? I will give it a try at some point, but admit I'm skeptical.