[Rumil]

Hmm, Hoooom, indeed,

well at last I've seen it, and do you know, I quite enjoyed it overall.

Reading the present thread I find myself nodding along with or wincing painfully at many of the same points people have raised above.

But after all "He that breaks a thing to find out what it is has left the path of wisdom", or so some chap said once, so am not going to detail every niggle.

One thing I find very difficult is to try and imagine the film from the point of view of someone who doesn't know the book. I think this is all but impossible, The Hobbit has been with me for a very long time, as it has with most of you here. Perhaps this may explain some of the odder decisions, perhaps not.

My major frustrations with all the PJ films is that they have been astonishingly good at portraying the scenery, very good at finding the right actors to play the characters, and where they have stuck to the Book scenes and dialogue, have been wonderful. The divergent plots are generally the weakest in my view.

Certainly there was a choice to be made - go for the 'fairy' vibe with full on Tra-la-la-lallying or choose the 'Quest of Erebor' route. In my mind from a LoTR perspective this means choosing the real story rather than Frodo's bedtime tale. It had to be this way really.

People have commented that Thorin seems to have been more prominent than Bilbo. I wonder if that might have been the way to go all along? The Saga of Thorin.