EPISODE 29: Long Day's Journey Into Middle Earth
[1:25:24]
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It's Episode 29 of In the Mood for Podcast, a British-based film podcast hosted by Calum Reed of Ultimate Addict and Pete Sheppard of In the Mood for Blog. This week we give our reaction to the Golden Globe and SAG nominations, assessing the races as they stand. We find our patience severely tested by Peter Jackson's epic first installment of the Hobbit Trilogy, the first of which, "An Unexpected Journey," fails to be a tale of the unexpected. We catch up with the animated "Rise of the Guardians," but Santa and the Tooth Fairy may not make the ideal dream team for one of us. And while Kristin Scott-Thomas may find herself the only performer in "Salmon Fishing in the Yemen" without a nomination this week, she may at least take consolation in the fact that she can still rock a designer gown. She takes on the luscious Ludivine Sagnier in trashy french flick "Love Crime" ...
Discussed on the podcast:
Opening Segment: Reacting to the Golden Globe and Screen Actors’ Guild nominations and assessing how that affects the Oscar race [3:15 - 24:00]
*Preconception Corner*
Reviews of:
- "The Hobbit"
- "Rise of the Guardians"
- "Love Crime"
- "Babette's Feast" (25th anniversary re-release)
- "Baraka"
[27:35 - 1:05:45]
Closing Segment: Dishing the dirt on 2012 releases we’ve been catching up with: "A Royal Affair"; "Caesar Must Die"; "The Deep Blue Sea"; "The Giant Mechanical Man"; "Vamps"; "Bye Bye Blondie" [1:05:50 - 1:20:10]
*Shag, Marry or Kill?*[Audio difficulties meant that *The Watson Factor* and *The Poupaud Range* failed to record this week -- for interested parties, 1.0 and 1.0.]
Intro Music: New theme music!
Outro Music: Sigur Ros, Hoppipolla
The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey
Directed by Peter Jackson
Starring: Martin Freeman, Ian McKellen, Andy Serkis, Cate Blanchett, Sylvester McCoy, Hugo Weaving
Grade: C - [37]
I consider myself quite a patient filmgoer, but walking into a chance 48 frames-per-second screening of ‘The Hobbit’ seemed to change that almost instantly. Subtitled “An Unexpected Journey,” for no other reason than to differentiate it from the forthcoming parts 2 and 3 of Tolkien’s modestly-leaved novel, there’s very little expectation the film fails to fulfil on a thematic level, but in employing this novel visual technique ultimately does more harm than good. Visual elements are very low on my agenda when reviewing a movie, but when they’re executed in such a frenetic and incoherent way it’s difficult to forgive; “The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” looks like a behind-the-scenes featurette, wherein action sequences feel staged and wholly distract from their grander context.
At one-hundred-and-seventy minutes the film heavily drags, especially in a first act of which 80% could be easily disposed of. Freeman’s Bilbo Baggins is established as a homely fusspot reluctant to venture out, his trademark dry brand of comedy successful in combating the staunch representation of factional warfare at its noblest and harrumph-est. Serkis gets that the film badly needs light spots, too, his and Freeman’s only scene together one of the rare highlights to recall the most accomplished parts of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. A major issue is that there’s very little rapport to the characters, or a sense of importance to their journey, to make this seem like more than a Tolkien retread. And when McKellen’s Gandalf exclaims “And Into the Fire” in response to his dwarf friend’s cautionary bellow, “Out of the Frying Pan,” you really feel like the screenwriters have run out of ideas. Proverbs 1: Cinema 0.
