4.0 out of 5 stars Extended version highly recommended
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 14, 2019
We very much enjoyed The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey after seeing it again, now with our young daughter.
The extended version of these movies are highly recommended as it allows you to immerse yourself deeper into beautiful Middle Earth and its lore. And even though some of the critics labelled An Unexpected
Journey too long we loved the extended version and some of the extra material. We would have gladly taken more of the added scenes. If anything, the last 45 minutes of this movies is a brilliant rollercoaster.
Yes, the 13 minutes of added scenes add to an pacing issue that the movie already had in its original form, essentially a stretched-out version of Tolkien’s children’s book. The issue might be that the story that was meant as a children book perhaps doesn’t lend itself as much as a 9 hour experience. To deal with this many characters like the dwarves get backstories. And new interesting characters are introduced. I still think that the overall story line doesn’t compare well with the gravitas of the Lord of the Ring story line. The Hobbit movies lean more on action and slapstick. Yet we were thrilled to see the movie again and the extended version particular.
So watching the Unexpected Journey on our fairly high-end Oled screen with proper surround sound was a delight; the picture is fantastic and of high quality with the colours looking vibrant and bright. The blu ray does do a lot of justice to all the detail of the movie. The audio is equally great with the dialogue, score, and sound effects very well balanced. Such audio visuals combined into an experience that could hardly be better. The Hobbit visuals are much better than the 1st LOTR The Fellowship of the Ring that we now started to watched again in blu ray. LOTR looks more blurry and dated, with some scenes clearly relying on 1990’s movie technology. Some of the old LOTR trilogy effects, apart from the Gollum scenes, start to look noticeably off - comparable to the issues that Star Wars A New Hope had vs its later trilogy movies.
Where possible we buy the 3D version of movies, I even prefer it over the cinema 3D experience. The Unexpected Journey looks very crisp and immersing in 3D.
An unexpected Journey tells the story of dwarf prince Thorin Oakenshield’s quest to drive the dragon Smaug from his ancient dwellings in the Lonely Mountain (Erebor). For the main character it’s a story about accepting new challenges and finding new friendships. The confrontation between Bilbo and Andy Serkis’ Gollum are particularly notable. And the scenes with the dwarves are quite pleasing. But you only get glimpses of Smaug, most as he flies over burning battlements and city ruins.
The extra 13 minutes are scattered throughout the movie. You’ll get a few more dwarf songs, naked dwarfs in an Elf fountain (!) more elaborate gatherings and an extended Goblin-king scene. And perhaps most importantly you finally begin to understand why these particular Dwarves and Elves do not see eye-to-eye, and why Thranduil coldly refused to help the Erebor exiles after Smaug’s attack.
The 3 discs contains about 9 (!) hours of extra’s and the list of included extra material is impressive (if you are into it);
- The Filmmakers Commentary,
- New Zealand: Home of Middle-Earth -
about the location with cast interviews.
- The Chronicles of The Hobbit – Part 1 – a very extensive documentary about the film production.
- The Appendices, Part 8: Return to Middle-Earth – another extensive documentary about character and set design
So it’s a lengthy movie and we watched it in 3 parts, we treated the remainder of the trilogy in the same manner and it got us into a similar mode as with a streaming tv series.
The set also includes a digital copy. Nice in a sense. But I get very frustrated by the fact that I now have to run 4 different apps from movie studios each filled with their own digital copy format; iTunes, Flixster/Ultraviolet, Googleplay ect. And so far there is no proper way to integrate my collections of digital copies. Moreover, most will require wifi, which is not always available when travelling. Until this is being addressed these digital copies remain a half-baked freebie in support of self-copies.
The Hobbit Extended Edition comes with exciting new Extras, amounting to almost triple the length of the feature. A LONG-EXPECTED JOURNEY, a 14 part look at the chronicles of The Hobbit. Followed by RETURN TO MIDDLE EARTH, a 15 part look at the unforgettable effort put forth in the creation of the film, the sets, and the characters. Ending with NEW ZEALAND: HOME OF THE MIDDLE, a look at the shoot locations, including the shire. CBFC Rating UA. Certificate Number
DFL/2/80/2012-MUMAbout this movie
Ratings and reviews
The director has put lot of effort to create a middle age earth. It is worthy to watch it in theatre and the 3D is superb and way better than Avatar. Movie is full of thrill and adventure also. It is legend and classic also and gives a message to society. These kind of movies should be encouraged.
71 people found this review helpful
It's a very very very adventures movie and the actions are also very awesome it is so good that while watching the full dete is of this movie sometime I feel that I am also a part of it ...It takes my heart .This is My favorite movie ever..And the most cool part is that it is having a very nice happy ending I love it..
2 people found this review helpful
As long as the theatrical version was, the EE adds some much needed meat (and heart) to the story, allowing us to empathize with some of the main characters just that little bit more for it all to matter.
36 people found this review helpful
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