Lo Hobbit - La battaglia delle cinque armate

I was distinctly underwhelmed by the first two Hobbit movies, I thought they were good but just that "Good". They live in the shadow of the Lord Of The Rings movies and simply paled in comparison and so going into The Battle Of The Five Armies I expected more of the same.

According to both IMDb and the profit margin this was the most poorly received of the franchise, clearly people did not like the film by comparison. But as usual, I have to be different.

I consider this to not only be the best of the Hobbit franchise but also hot on the heels in quality as the LOTR trilogy.

The story culminates beautifully and if you can get past the many changes that were made you'll see the finale of a wondrous tale and a battle on screen that blew me away.

Once again the fantastic cast, stunning score, mind blowing effects and sheer beauty envelope you into the world of Middle Earth and I was gripped.

Yes its not flawless, but it is pretty damn close.

The Good:

Amazing opening

Action scenes are brutal

James Nesbitt

Evangeline Lilly

The Bad:

Still a lot of changes

One death was poorly done.

I should have loved this film. One of the aspects I love most about Return of the King, my favourite of Jackson's adaptations and one of my favourite films of all time, is the sprawling, mass fantasy battle scenes and The Battle of Five Armies is pretty much one elongated battle scene. However, there's something that's not quite right.

It's not the lack of emotion, characterization or plot. Indeed, there are plenty of those, there is just something I just can't put my finger on that stops the film from being truly epic. Perhaps it is because, for me at least, this film will always live in King's shadow but, really, where I think the film falls down, is that the battles simply aren't done well enough. The context is not explained very well, the actual engagements not that exciting too much repetition and, most crucially, too much cutting away from one place to another. This cutting worked fine, well, even, in Two Towers between the crucible of Helm's Deep and the quiet conversation of the Entmoot, but, here, there are just too many places that the actions flits between. I appreciate this is a battle of five armies, and that there are plenty of characters, but, sadly, the action did seem to be all over the place. And the repetition I mentioned earlier: a huge portion of the film seemed to be entirely composed of either someone running to warn others, a main character leading the charge into battle, and several one-on-one battles. The latter may be entertaining, sure, but there is a line which is stepped over in this film.

The ending, too, seemed like it was rushed by the filmmakers, especially when we consider that we don't actually find out what happens to the Arkenstone in the end. Many people criticised Return of the King's dragged out ending, but that was full of emotion and was a fitting, yet sad, farewell. Here, where not only does Bilbo say farewell to Gandalf and the Dwarfs, but where we say an almost certain farewell to Middle Earth, the end is far too brief and unlikely to instil emotion. Though, it is, to be fair, nicely linked into Fellowship.

Ultimately though, the film has plenty of positives. Despite being full of battle sequences, Jackson fits in plenty of emotional scenes and develops many of the characters fantastically. In particular, Armitage's Thorin is different and darker, yet changes a great deal throughout the film - all in all, a fantastic performance. There's plenty of typical Jackson humour, some brilliant cameos and some great nods to the Lord of the Rings films and some elements of the film's production, which die-hard fans will no doubt pick up on with a smile. It's also important to realise that, whilst it's easy to criticise the long battle sequences, they are entertaining, and keep the pace of the film up throughout.

So, whilst it is easy to concentrate on the negatives and, in particular, the lack of a Grey Havens-esque adieu to Middle Earth, The Battle of Five Armies is still a great film and a fitting end to what has been a true achievement: a series of beautiful film adaptations that many will be sad to see end.

• Ed

The Battle of the Five Armies title is a great exaggeration of what an army entails. The movie is about more or less a skirmish with some rather imaginative weaponry. The plot goes sideways and after two three hours long previous films we get a two hours and a half mess that is half completely over the top battle scenes and the other half people talking out of their asses. It is pure chaos, where orcs are either mighty unbeatable beasts bred for war or cardboard armor wearing morons easily defeated by fishermen's wives and children, as the action demands. Things start to remind of Pirates of the Caribbean, and not only because it's the same actor doing kind of the same stuff.

There is even a prolonged ending with Bilbo Baggings returning to the Shire, almost as if wanting to undo the good idea in the Lord of the Rings movies in which they removed the boring book ending with Saruman taking refuge in the Shire, and that portrays hobbits as petty bureaucratic creatures, rather than kind and resilient and courageous as declared everywhere else in the films. If I enjoyed the first two movies and wanted to see how it will all end, the third was a ridiculous failure, trying to do too much with too little: making a country brawl look like an epic battle, keeping the lighter more children oriented tone while killing characters and trying to express deeper heroic emotions, trying to somehow raise on the same level three organized military groups and a bunch of fishermen and animals and tying up lose ends that were there only to make this a trilogy rather than a pair of decent movies.

It is now when all the jokes about the eagles made in good fun in the first two movies (and in Lord of the Rings as well) turn smirky, when the only logic to the plot and action seems to be the panic of production companies trying to achieve their financial goals rather than tell a good story. It is here where the disappointment that everyone talks about when referring to The Hobbit movies raises its ugly head and grows on the small mistakes of the previous two movies. So in order to enjoy the trilogy, one must somehow detach themselves from the ending and see it as an imperfect finish to an otherwise fun movie, maybe imagine their own.

I really enjoyed the first two. I don't buy into the criticism that a 300 page book couldn't be made into a full blown trilogy. That said, I found the last episode way too full of battle scenes and gratuitous violence, big armies banging into each other, terrible orcs riding wolves, and the ultimate confrontation. In the process, all the charm that had been built up in the first two movies seemed to be dropped for a bunch of special effects. It starts well with the appearance of Smaug who fulfills his promise of destroying the town. But after that its a hodge-podge of romance and revenge and ultimately death. As this one ended, I literally felt, "Oh, is that the end?" Having read "The Hobbit" a couple of times, I knew what was going to happen, but it didn't quite work the way I thought it would. There was just something empty. Don't get me wrong, I could revel in the effort, but I can't say that this will stay with me for a long time.

So I went to The Hobbit marathon. Yes, my fangirling has reached the level where I'm willing to sit in a theater for nine hours straight.

First of all, seeing the first two movies on the big screen again (and for the last time) was a wonderful experience. Seeing all three on the big screen in one night? Very cool. And getting to watch the character transformations and story lines in a row, fantastic. The effects, casting, acting, setting, action... everything was good.

Martin Freeman should win some major awards for his acting... actually everyone should. They're all incredible. I must say, I cried for most of the last fifteen or so minutes. If you've read the book etc., you know why. If not, please go so you can cry too.

The action and battle scenes are captivating, intense, and extremely fun to watch. We get more info about Sauron, which makes me very happy. We also get more Legolas and Tauriel, and let's be honest, who doesn't want more Elvish epicness?

There were a few moments I could have done without, and a few moments where the CGI seemed off, but other than that, I honestly couldn't ask for a better movie. I feel like braiding my hair and learning to wield a sword now.

People complain about these movies so much, but honestly, this is as good as it gets when it comes to book adaptations.

9/10

Once again, thank you Peter Jackson. Agorel vae. Galu.