MYST POST #5

For my 5^th MYST post, I decided to watch The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug. The Hobbit is one of my all time favorite books, so I had to see this movie. Plus I had already seen the first one so I wanted to compare the two. The movie picks up after the first one left off, them being chased by Azog the Defiler while trying to get to the Lonely Mountain. The party of Bilbo, Gandalf, and the 13 dwarves continues this journey through the forest of Mirkwood, the Elves domain, and across the lake to Laketown, and eventually the Lonely Mountain. Along the way they face a ton of enemies like giant spiders, hordes of orcs, and of course, the menacing Dragon, Smaug. Bilbo’s quest is to steal the Arkenstone, a prized jewel for the dwarves, and return it to Thorin the rightful king.

One scene that was particularly enjoyable to watch was the “barrel riding” scene. Anyone who has seen the movie will know what I’m talking about. Bilbo and the Dwarves manage to escape from the elves captivity by riding barrels out of the sewer into a raging river. However, as soon as they get out the horde of orcs that are chasing them line up on the side of the river banks and try to shoot them with arrows and jump on their barrels. Just as hope seems lost, the elves Legolas and Tauriel come out of nowhere and start killing all these orcs in a really cool choreographed way. This 7 or 8 minute fight scene was one of the coolest parts of the movie and was one of the most memorable parts for me.

I actually tried to watch this movie with an eye for detail so I could have examples for this MYST. One cool thing I noticed was the cinematography and symbolism that Peter Jackson included. It was really subtle so if I wasn’t looking out for it I probably wouldn’t have noticed, but there were certain scenes that I definitely noticed this. One of which was right before they all enter the mountain. Thorin is giving a speech about how his ancestors built this place and how he was going to inherit their treasure, and this whole monologue about his family. As he is talking, the camera is panning out and you see a huge statue of Thorin’s grandfather, Thrain, in the background, juxtaposed with the silhouette of Thorin’s own face. I couldn’t find a picture of this scene to show unfortunately, but I just thought it was one cool instance of cinematography that not many people probably noticed. The whole movie was filled with cool instances of symbolism like this though, and there is many many other places I could point it out.

Overall, I would give the hobbit an 8/10. It was a solid movie that I really enjoyed. Peter Jackson did a great job making it entertaining, and I thought it was actually better than the first one. Some people criticize it for going too of track from the book. I agree with this, but I think it added to the story instead of detracted from it. Because I read the book, I knew what was going to happen for most of the movie, but the additional scenes that weren’t in the book caught me off guard and I really liked that. I didn’t like the forced “love story”, but I can’t complain because every blockbuster these days needs to have that. I also just in general don’t like how drawn out the series actually is. The Hobbit doesn’t need to be three movies long like the Lord of the Rings series; I think it’s honestly just to get more money, which I don’t like. But other than that, I really liked this movie, and if you’re looking for a nice film to “escape” with, I suggest you check this one out.