An Unexpected Journey, or the morning after

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by Zigur

I might also quibble about some elements of pronunciation. Names like Glóin, Óin, Thráin and Dáin were pronounced with their vowels as dipthongs. I was taught in my Old Norse course at University that names like these should be pronounced something like "Glowin" and "Owin", and "Thrawin" and "Dawin" where the ó is pronouced as a sort of clipped 'or' as in 'bore' and á sounds a bit like the vowel sound in 'pound'.

That reminds me of one little thing I noticed and I wonder if anyone else did - at one point Gandalf pronounces Thorin as 'Torin', in what I assume is the correct Norse/Scandinavian way? Am I right? I used to know a Norwegian woman with a son named Thor and she pronounced it as 'Tor' so that is how I have always presumed it is correctly said since then.

Whether this fits with the way Tolkien intended it to be pronounced I don't know, but it made me look it up again, knowing that the name was taken directly from the Voluspa verse from the Poetic Eddas.

A random point maybe but you just reminded me of it....

[William Cloud Hicklin]

Originally Posted by Lalwendë

That reminds me of one little thing I noticed and I wonder if anyone else did - at one point Gandalf pronounces Thorin as 'Torin', in what I assume is the correct Norse/Scandinavian way? Am I right? I used to know a Norwegian woman with a son named Thor and she pronounced it as 'Tor' so that is how I have always presumed it is correctly said since then.

Whether this fits with the way Tolkien intended it to be pronounced I don't know, but it made me look it up again, knowing that the name was taken directly from the Voluspa verse from the Poetic Eddas.

A random point maybe but you just reminded me of it....

I would think quite the reverse: as Tolkien of all people knew very well, in Norse (and Anglo-Saxon), T and TH were even different letters!

[TheGreatElvenWarrior]

Phew. Reading this thread is exhausting work. There were many posts that reminded me of things I wanted to say about my experience. Here it goes.

My mother surprised my brother and I by taking us (along with a cousin and uncle) to The Hobbit on Christmas. I went in not knowing what to expect. Soon thereafter I was pleasantly surprised by the introduction. I really liked the backstory and old Bilbo starting his story. The part where the camera pans out from Bilbo reminded me of when Bilbo was writing "Concerning Hobbits" in the EE FotR. It was a nice element of nostalgia, reminding me why I decided to read the books in the first place. I think that my favourite part of the whole ordeal was Smaug coming, but us not actually seeing him. It was a nice bit of foreboding. I really enjoyed the dwarves in Bag-end. I was disappointed that Bilbo did not invite Gandalf in for tea, but the way they led into the dwarves coming worked. Martin Freeman made a very good Bilbo, not excellent, but then, we didn't really see a lot of him.

After the company left the Shire, the film quickly went downhill. With the exception of Bilbo messing with the trolls, I did not find the next hour of film enjoyable. When Balin told the Azog backstory, my mother turned to me to ask me if that really happened in the book. I affirmed her that it was Tolkien, not part of TH, but an interesting backstory to put in as filler. After that, I assured her that Azog had died in that battle and we didn't need to worry about him returning. One might imagine my surprise when Azog turned out to be a (or the) main character in the story. I found that inclusion galling. Every scene that Azog was injected into I found boring and superfluous. I didn't like how the orcs were chasing the company, and I really didn't like the big chase scene leading up to Rivendell. Gandalf deciding that the rock the dwarves were hiding behind was the entrance into the valley seemed too off-the-cuff to me, so did the random elf that greeted the company. Thorin's anger at Gandalf for taking them to Rivendell was silly, and felt wholly out of tune with Thorin's character.

Speaking of Thorin, my mother complained that he was too "Aragorn" and not enough of his own character. She and I both found his beef with Azog boring and unneeded. The film was all about Thorin and his history, and Mr. Baggins was hardly featured at all. I was very disgruntled at the lack of Bilbo. This whole affair was about Bilbo going on his adventure with the dwarves. The Hobbit was told from his point of view, and to not have Bilbo be the central character of the film really spoiled it for me.

Another thing that really irked me was how dark it was. Not in the lighting department (Riddles in the Dark looked like it was filmed in in a cave with skylights on a brilliantly sunny day), but in the mood of the movie. Dol Gildur did not look how I personally visioned it, but once inside, it scared me. I felt as if the mood of this film was gloomier and darker than LotR, but with more slapstick. I thought that it was gross when one of the dwarves was snoring and inhaling all of those flies at the same time, a point that my brother thought it hilarious to point out to me later. During the bulk of the film, I felt this nasty sense of foreboding, like some kind of evil was behind it. The feeling is hard to describe, but I was thoroughly creeped out by parts of it.

Mum continuously had to ask me what the hell was going on, and I honestly can say that half the time, I didn't know what to tell her, because I didn't know what was going on myself.

Radagast was really adorable. Not exactly how I imagined him in the books, but pretty close. I don't really know what he was doing in TH, I wondered how they were going to place him before I saw it. Now that I've seen how they've done it, I am satisfied. One more thing about Radagast, I never thought that it was possible for a human being to scurry, thanks to Radagast, now I know.

I went to the bathroom during our stay in Rivendell, honestly, I don't think I missed much. I caught the White Council scene.

The stone giants looked and felt completely different from my version of them, and I think that I have to agree with Legate about them looking like Transformers.

I didn't mind the Goblin King. He sounded similar to how I imagined.

I enjoyed Riddles in the Dark, aside from all of the sword waving and the extreme brightness of it all. The lighting in Bag-end was darker than that of Gollum's cave.

I really disliked the ending. It made no sense for Bilbo to jump out like that. Azog was obviously a filler. When easily entertained people obviously notice filler, that is just going too far. They put in all of that fluff about Azog being bad and ugly, blah, blah, blah. Then at the end, it cuts to Smaug, as if to say "btw, we totally added a useless villain in here to make you forget about the actual villain of the story, but we'll insert the real bad guy right at the end to make you curious about the next movie. we're stealing your money...lol!!!!!"

The experience was bloated. My mother and my brother were both bored. I found myself wondering after Riddles about when it was going to be over. Bilbo's pantry had made me hungry almost three hours prior, and all I wanted to do was eat. I am a bored eater, and that it what TH made me feel like doing. The film was too long. When seasoned Tolkien fans get antsy in the cinema for a film to end, that is where you need to start cutting. I agree with so many sentiments here that this would have been great fun if someone had at the film with a pair of scissors. It would have made a nice two-parter.

There was something else I wanted to say, but I've forgotten it. I suppose it will come to me as I am trying to sleep tonight. I'll come back to that later.

EDIT: I remembered what it was! Some bits were quoted almost line by line out of the book, which I thought was fabulous. Others, though, missed the mark completely and were a disappointment to not only my inner Tolkien nerd, but also my inner movie-goer.

[elvet]

I'm a big fan of both the books and the movies. I consider the movies to be an interpretation of the books, so I don't mind the inconsistencies. They are 2 different medias, each with it's own way of telling the story. I am glad that the Hobbit landed on Peter Jackson's lap, since I think he makes an effort to be faithful to the book, yet still have an entertaining film for the non-readers. Plus, he has the resources to have all the bells and whistles.
Having said that, I still have some criticisms about the film (when compared to the previous film experiences, not compared to the book). In some ways it was truer to the source than the LotR movies, but I thought the previous movies worked better. I didn't like the rehash of LotR's scenes - Gandalf and the moth, Gandalf and company in goblintown (shades of Moria), the mountain pass rock avalanches, etc. As much as I love the new Song of the Lonely Mountain, the rest of the soundtrack felt recycled to me. I saw the film in 24fps 3D and 48fps 3D. The latter just seemed liked seeing HD TV for the first time, much less blur. I enjoyed both versions of the movie. I'm seeing it in 3D IMAX this weekend, it will be interesting to compare.
Thing I liked about the movie:
- It still grabbed me emotionaly. The dwarf version of the Song of the Lonely mountain gave me shivers. I teared up when the eagles came to get Thorin and was stirred by Bilbo's moment of 'staying his hand". The sleigh bunnies were just too cute, and I couldn't help but giggle at those scenes.
- I liked that Jackson focused on a few of the dwarves, trying to get camera time and dialogue for all 13 would have been too confusing.
- His choice of 'hunky' dwarves worked for me. I fell for Thorin, Fili and Kili and am going to be an emotional wreck at the Battle of 5 armies.

[Kuruharan]

Originally Posted by TheGreatElvenWarrior

Riddles in the Dark looked like it was filmed in in a cave with skylights on a brilliantly sunny day

Actually...now that you mention it, you have a point there.

[TheGreatElvenWarrior]

Originally Posted by Kuruharan

Actually...now that you mention it, you have a point there.

I don't have a problem with seeing what is going on, but really, they made Moria dark enough to look like a cave. Why not Riddles in the Dark? There was even a light on in Moria.

[davem]

According to Billy Connoly (Dain)

Billy - who also stars in new Dustin Hoffman movie Quartet - admitted he wasn't a fan of the novel.

"No I never read it. And I probably never will. It's not my cup of tea. Youthful society when I was younger was divided into Tolkien and non-Tolkien and I was a non-Tolkien and I didn't like the Tolkien people," he said.

"They were all corduroy and limp wrists and we were all string band people, banjos and bluegrass players and blues players, chasing women about the place, having long hair and they were all talking about the ginks fighting the gonks."Connolly: No plans to read Hobbithttp://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/en...-16255688.html

Which got me wondering whether Billy is the odd one out, as all the other actors/production team have been praising Tolkien, the fans & the books to the skies, but surely, for most of them its first & foremost a job & they may not have any time at all for the book/fans.

And actually, should we care whether they like the book or not, or whether they think the fans are a bunch of sad geeks who can't get a girlfriend/boyfriend? Not everyone is going to like Tolkien, & isn't the most important thing that they play their part well & give the audience a good time? And yet, and yet.... what about the niggling little feeling that when you watch Dain on screen the actor is thinking "I can't believe they're paying me to do this rubbish! Right, now am I a ****** Gink or a ****** Gonk?"

The other point to be made is that if his reference to 'string band people' is to The Incredible String Band, then he's making a big mistake as Mike Heron & Robin Williamson were deeply influenced by Tolkien:

Heron and Williamson fashioned a visionary environment out of odd and ends of Tolkien, Blake, Celtic folklore, Western occultism, Romantic poetry, British children's literature, The Golden Bough and The White Godddess, the Bible and the Bhagavad Gita. And that was just the lyrics. They were gifted, if highly eccentric songwriters. They were deeply versed in British folk music, having come up on the coffee house scene during Britain's own version of the American folk boom.http://www.thebluegrassspecial.com/a...viewjune09.php

[Nerwen]

Originally Posted by davem

And yet, and yet.... what about the niggling little feeling that when you watch Dain on screen the actor is thinking "I can't believe they're paying me to do this rubbish! Right, now am I a ****** Gink or a ****** Gonk?

I think it should be as nothing to the niggling suspicion that you've taken the bait exactly as he intended.
Ha, ha, they should have got him to play one of the trolls.

[Lalwendë]

Originally Posted by davem

Which got me wondering whether Billy is the odd one out, as all the other actors/production team have been praising Tolkien, the fans & the books to the skies, but surely, for most of them its first & foremost a job & they may not have any time at all for the book/fans.

And actually, should we care whether they like the book or not, or whether they think the fans are a bunch of sad geeks who can't get a girlfriend/boyfriend? Not everyone is going to like Tolkien, & isn't the most important thing that they play their part well & give the audience a good time? And yet, and yet.... what about the niggling little feeling that when you watch Dain on screen the actor is thinking "I can't believe they're paying me to do this rubbish! Right, now am I a ****** Gink or a ****** Gonk?"

I think Cumberbatch also doesn't particularly like Tolkien, it's just a 'job' to him. But I'm not objecting to him being involved. Personally speaking Connolly does my head in, his comedy seems to consist of a good joke surrounded by hours of shouting, but he should in theory make a good Dwarf. He's good at acting, I'll give him that. Nerwen is right that he probably wants to stir people up a bit, that's the kind of person he is. But the irony is that he's quite close to turning into one of those 1970s gonks anyway...