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The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey Movie Review

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is a 2012 epic high fantasy adventure film directed by Peter Jackson and starring Martin Freeman and Ian McKellen. It’s such an underrated flick.

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“I’m going on an adventure!“

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Bilbo Baggins, a hobbit, is persuaded into accompanying a wizard and a group of dwarves on a journey to reclaim the city of Erebor and all its riches from the dragon Smaug. First off, I am not a fan of The Lord of the Rings. I have never liked those movies with the exception of the first one that was more adventurous and fun. That tradition of first movies being the best ones continues with The Hobbit franchise as this original is a high adventure that is difficult not to enjoy.

I wished for more magic, I’m not gonna lie. Magic is the most appealing element in fantasy movies and here we got that, but only sparingly. Still, the flick works because it throws so much stuff at you and most of it is actually a lot of fun. You got ogres, goblins, trolls, giants, wargs, giant eagles, Gollum, wizards, dwarfs and elves. Yes, that’s a lot, but the addition of all of these creatures made for such a spirited adventure and an epic high fantasy spectacle unlike no other.

The movie is over two and a half hours long and, thus, it can become a bit too exhausting to watch, especially due to all that visual splendor that risks of becoming excess at times. The movie should have been shorter in length and a bit better paced and structured. With that being said, it was still surprisingly entertaining, especially to me as a non-fan. The scenes with Gollum are particularly terrific. I liked those scenes more than the ones in LOTR to be honest. This was a great origin story for him and this section was initially playful, then dark and afterward it became very sad.

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Bilbo is also pretty strong as the protagonist, certainly much more likable and memorable than Frodo ever was. Martin Freeman is very good in the role. I wanted more of Gandalf as he always gets shortchange in these movies, but still he was badass and cool. The dragon is still just a hint at this point, but the overall story acts as an interesting prequel to the original trilogy.

The elves aren’t all that memorable here, but the dwarfs are just a lot of fun. They are these loud, hungry and inarticulate pigs, who are always fighting too, but they have a lot of heart and their quest to reclaim their homeland made for such an emotional arc. The first dinner sequence represents everything that is problematic and great about this movie – it is needlessly prolonged, but it’s endearing and very funny.

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey does have an elephant in the room problem and that is the fact that it’s based on a tiny book of 300 pages. Peter Jackson stretching it to three movies was definitely a choice. That made the movie slow and uneventful at times, but the charming humor, characters and childlike nature to it really appealed to me. The VFX on the creatures are fantastic, the casting was great and the action is overall quite solid. The high adventure stuff appealed to me the most, especially the middle section.

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