Plot
Bilbo and Company are forced to engage in a war against an array of combatants and keep the terrifying Smaug from acquiring a kingdom of treasure and obliterating all of Middle-Earth.
Release Year: 2014
Rating: 8.2/10 (34,187 voted)
Critic's Score: 65/100
Director: Peter Jackson
Stars: Ian McKellen, Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage
Storyline
Bilbo and Company are forced to engage in a war against an array of combatants and keep the terrifying Smaug from acquiring a kingdom of treasure and obliterating all of Middle-Earth.
Writers: Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens
Cast: Lee Pace -
Thranduil
Evangeline Lilly -
Tauriel
Benedict Cumberbatch -
Smaug /
Necromancer
Richard Armitage -
Thorin Oakenshield
Luke Evans -
Bard
Orlando Bloom -
Legolas
Martin Freeman -
Bilbo Baggins
Cate Blanchett -
Galadriel
Manu Bennett -
Azog
Ian McKellen -
Gandalf
Aidan Turner -
Kili
Christopher Lee -
Saruman
Hugo Weaving -
Elrond
James Nesbitt -
Bofur
Graham McTavish -
Dwalin
Filming Locations: Pinewood Studios, Iver Heath, Buckinghamshire, England, UK
Technical Specs
Runtime:
Did You Know?
Trivia: Peter Jackson has stated this will be his last film he will do with the J.R.R. Tolkien's Middle Earth properties. He's done one other trilogy with the material. See more »
Goofs:
After killing Azog and Thorin stands up, his wound is not visible. See more »
Quotes:
User Review
Author:
Rating: 4/10
A couple of years ago, when I heard Peter Jackson would direct two more
Middle-earth movies, I started crying out of excitement. Those two
movies soon got changed into three and I was angry because I was
convinced the story was too short for three three-hours-long movies.
Despite the book being approximately 300 pages long, Peter Jackson &
co. proved me wrong and managed to not include big parts of the books
in these movies, even though there's more than 8,5 hours of total
screen time. "Disappointed" is an understatement.
I don't think this movie was supposed to make me laugh at the serious
scenes and sigh at the 'comic relief' scenes -basically everything
Alfrid was in- but sadly it did. At least the 'funny' scenes in the
Lord of the Rings trilogy were subtle and less in number; BOTFA was
supposed to be "serious and dark" and those silly, ridiculous scenes
pretty much ruined that.
I have nothing negative to say about the acting though. The amazing
cast of this trilogy did the best they could with the awful script they
were given, and I'm thankful for that. It's not their fault that their
character development was rushed because the movie was full of
pointless Legolas Vs. Gravity scenes, dull Tauriel scenes who fell in
love with Kili after having a conversation with him once or twice -
same goes for Kili who fell in love with her and even gave her the
token his mother, Dís, gave him.
The worst part of this movie isn't even that it's full of badly done
CGI or the big lack of proper character development. It's the fact that
Tauriel, a badly written, impossible character made up by Peter Jackson
& co., had more screen time than characters who were in the actual book
written by J.R.R. Tolkien. Beorn basically got fifteen seconds, if not
less, screen time in the last installment of this trilogy. Most of the
dwarfs from the Company barely got a line, and a LOT of things are left
unexplained.
SPOILERS AFTER THIS LINE
For instance, what happened with Thranduil and the white gems? Did he
ever get them back?
What happened to the gold? As a fan of the books I already know the
answer, but the movie didn't really care to explain this important part
of the story. Come on, the entire battle was about the gold. At least
take a minute to explain how it got divided.
Where did those goats suddenly come from?
Why were the dwarfs wearing helmets when they were still inside the
mountain, but had no helmets on when they actually went to war?
What happened to the people of Lake-Town? Why didn't the movie explain
that Bard became King of Dale? If I had not read the book, I'd get
really annoyed after watching this movie and not knowing what had
happened to them.
What was the point of those ridiculously large worms and why did no one
else /ever/ mention them before? And why were they gone after ten
seconds? Did they ever get killed?
Why mention Legolas' mother and never explain anything about her at
all?
Besides all these unanswered questions, there are certain things which
bothered me more than all of those questions combined. 1. The Durins
(Thorin, Kili, Fili) didn't get a funeral. In my opinion it's
ridiculous to cut something like that out because they were basically
the main characters. Which brings me to my second point. 2. I think
Peter Jackson forgot that this story is called The Hobbit because Bilbo
is supposed to be the main character, not Thorin. 3. Kili basically
sacrificed himself for Tauriel which is unforgivable. In the actual
story, Fili and Kili died defending Thorin in battle. Now the poor boy
is dead because he had a crush on a badly written elf which also
completely degrades the importance of Legolas and Gimli's friendship.
Let's not forget about the scene wherein Legolas grabs a flying bat, or
when Bard uses his son Bain to shoot an arrow, which should make him
fall but somehow it doesn't, or when Dain and Thorin decide to hug in
the middle of a battle, or when Azog somehow manages to float and
dramatically opens his eyes.
I absolutely loved the Lord of the Rings trilogy. They are my favorite
movies of all time and the reason I became a fan of Tolkien's works in
the first place. It's sad that Peter Jackson desperately tried to link
the Hobbit movies to the LOTR trilogy, because it's partly the reason
why the Hobbit movies are so awful. If the unnecessary Dol Guldur
scenes and the Tauriel storyline were skipped, every good part from the
book which is now cut out would have easily fit in. I'm still giving
this movie a 4 out of 10 though, because I absolutely love the cast and
I think they did a brilliant job, especially Richard Armitage and
Martin Freeman. Also, the very last scene was exactly like I imagined
it would be, with Ian Holm's Bilbo and Gandalf knocking on the door.
Loved that part. And "The Last Goodbye" by Billy Boyd was a beautiful
way to end this movie and trilogy and made me tear up.
You might enjoy this movie if you really liked the first two -I
didn't-, if you're into bad CGI or movies that look like video games or
if you don't really care about Tolkien's Middle-earth and are content
with a movie that doesn't do Tolkien and his characters justice at all.
Otherwise you're probably someone like me and you'll leave the theater
disappointed and grieving over the characters you love so much.
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