The Hobbit: The Battle Of The Five Armies - After nine hours, the Hobbit trilogy finally comes to a close.

The Hobbit: The Battle Of The Five Armies

Movie Review

by Brian Wezowicz

I am a huge fan of the Lord Of The Rings trilogy.  It may be my favorite trilogy in of all-time.  Each film in the trilogy has grown better with time, and the director's cut are actually BETTER than the theatrical versions (a cinematic anomaly for sure).  In a way, Peter Jackson is the anti George Lucas.  The more he adds to his movies, the better they are.  I own both the theatrical and the extended version of all three LOTR movies.  I've done multiple marathons where I've watched the trilogy in one sitting.  I can't get enough Middle Earth.

When it was announced that they were making not one but TWO Hobbit films, I remember being more than excited.  Then, when it was announced that they were making THREE Hobbit films, I nearly passed out like a teenage girl at a One Direction concert.  I've always said that a bad day in Middle Earth is still a pretty good day.  The first two movies have their highs and they definitely have their lows.  They do a great job of setting up this third and final film.  Whereas each Lord Of The Rings film could almost be considered a stand alone film that serve a larger story, The Hobbit trilogy is one long story that is broken into three parts.  Yes, the action lags at times, but when Peter Jackson gets it right, he really really gets it right.

The Hobbit: The Battle Of The Five Armies is not a perfect film by any means, but it's the best and most exciting film in the trilogy.  It suffers from the same shortcomings as the first two (parts drag at times), but amps up the action with an epic battle that only Peter Jackson can deliver.  The Five Armies picks up right where The Desolation Of Smaug left off... with Bilbo and his merry band of dwarves bearing witness to the seriously ornery dragon bearing down on the inhabitants of Lake Town after being dispatched from the mountain he inhabited for decades.  The dragon burns that mother down like the saucy little (er, huge) minx that he is.  I wouldn't want to tick off a thousand year old fire breathing dragon.  Smaug's destruction of Lake Town looks magnificent on screen.  It might contain some of the best (non Planet Of The Apges) CGI in a 2014 movie.  The downside to this scene is that it really should have occurred at the end of the previous film.  For such a big moment, it happens rather quickly.  Before you know it (spoiler alert) the dragon is dead and the fine folks of Lake Town are left to rebuild their lives.  They turn to the mountain and the piles (and piles) of gold inside of it for help.  The Dwarves inside it have holed themselves in their reclaimed homeland, and aren't exactly feeling charitable.  Thorin Oakenshield (the new dwarf king) has undergone a rather quick turn into crazy town.  In the span of, oh, five minutes, he's gone from courageous leader to Scrooge McDuck swimming in his bank vault full of gold coins.  He boards the dwarves in the mountain and closes them off from the outside world.  Before you know it, the elves and what's left of Lake Town have lined up outside looking for some help/cash.  This leads to a battle over control of the gold inside the mountain.  Also, the Orcs and Goblins  join in on the fun, and it's on.

This battle is the high point of the entire Hobbit franchise.  It makes you remember back to the epic battles of the LOTR films, while doing more than enough to stand on its own two feet.  I saw this movie in IMAX 3D and it was worth every penny of the extra cost.  There are few directors (if any) who can create this level of large scale battle sequences.  It was, by far, the highlight of the Hobbit trilogy.

The rest of the movie suffered from the same short comings as Hobbit 1&2.  It felt like they were stretching scenes out in order to justify the third film.  I'm always of the opinion that the more time I spend in Middle Earth is a good thing, but even I was checking my watch by the 9th Hobbit hour.  I don't think Peter Jackson could have fit everything into a single Hobbit film, but I definitely think there is enough pork to cut to have The Hobbit be a really good two film series as originally intended.

I'm giving this film 2.5 stars out of 4.  The actual battle of the five armies was spectacular, but the rest of the film was just fller between battles.  This film satisfied my Hobbit thirst nicely.  If you're a die hard Middle Earth fan you will probably enjoy this movie, but I would avoid it if  you aren't.

Until next time