Bilbo and the Thirteen Dwarves

When it comes to bringing large scale sword-and-sorcery to the big screen, perhaps no one is better than Peter Jackson.  In three ‘Lord of the Rings’ movies, the New Zealand native has established himself as a master at breathing life into the enchanting realms of not only men but of Orcs, Elves, Dwarves, Goblins, Trolls, Halflings (Hobbits) and Drakes.  A gifted storyteller and cinematographer, Jackson’s movies are always breathtaking in beauty and scope, lending his movie a grandeur few of his contemporaries can match.

 

In ‘The Desolation of Smaug,‘ the middle installment of Jackson’s adaptation of J.R.R. Tolkien’s ‘The Hobbit,‘ Dwarf king Thorin Oakenshield and his merry band of dwarves continue their quest for the Arkenstone and to reclaim the lost kingdom of Erebor from the bane dragon Smaug, with the help of the wizard Gandalf (for the first quarter of the movie anyway) and the halfling Bilbo Baggins, armed with the One-Ring he took from Gollum which renders him invisible.  Their ‘unexpected journey’ becomes an even more unexpected adventure as the hapless PC's (that's 'player characters' in D&D parlance) evade Orcs, a Man-Bear ‘skin-changer’ named Beorn, get cocooned by mandibled Giant Spiders, run afoul of Wood Elves in the forest, before finally arriving at Lonely Mountain to face an awakened and royally pissed off fire-breathing Dragon.  “What have we done?!” indeed.

 

‘The Desolation of Smaug’ moves at a livelier clip than the unevenly paced ‘An Unexpected Journey’ and, like the dwarves in their white-water barreling escape from their wood elf captors (including Tauriel played by the comely Evangeline Lilly from ‘Lost‘), we can’t help but get swept along for the ride.  At 2 hours, 41 minutes the movie could have been trimmed down to a better length; the dragon talked a bit too much and the last scene in which the dwarves and hobbit evaded the dragon seemed to ‘drag on’ and on (no pun intended), but given the movie’s merits this is a small transgression I am more than willing to overlook.

 

Grade: A

So what did I think of the first movie?  Take a look:
http://moviesaccordingtodave.blogspot.com/2012/12/welcome-back-to-middle-earth-part-1.html