Goblins and trolls and orcs, oh my!

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

Crit

I was really hot for this, was planning to make the long bus ride out to hell (aka the Connecticut Post Mall) to see it in Imax 3D, but given that I really didn't have that much extra time to invest in a picture already pushing 3 hours, I allowed myself to be dissuaded by the lukewarm-at-best reviews. And I gotta say: the only better decision would have been to let myself be dissuaded from seeing it at all.

Peter, what a snoozer you have wrought. What's an adjective like "glacial" only lots slower? That's what the pacing is like (not surprising, given the decision to inflate a kids' book into a Big Important Trilogy). How can anyone make this stuff boring?

One aspect I found interesting (though not interesting enough to invest the time in parts 2 & 3 unless someone writes a review that begins "Forget the godawful sloggy first installment, . . . ") is the obvious Israelite connection of the dwarves' quest for their promised land. Unfortunately, while I found Gimli simpatico in those other Tolkien flicks Jackson made, here I find the race so uniformly intolerable that I'm forced to confront the possibility that I made be an anti-Dwarfite.

Trailers

Oddly, 3D films but 2D trailers before a 3D screening.

• Jack the Giant Slayer--Seems unlikely, though Bryan Singer directed, so maybe.
• Man of Steel--Huh! Why hasn't anyone ever thought of making a movie about Superman before?