Desolation of Smaug Hobbit Movie in 3D

I am among the discontented. I did see it in 3D, for the same reason you did, and I found it jerky, but I suspect the problem had more to do with the 48 frames per second format and the filming and editing choices than the 3D. The folks directing the camera work are a bit too enamored with odd camera angles and fast cuts, which made action scenes jerky and hard to follow. Also, at that resolution, it is impossible to seamlessly integrate CGI and make-up effects. Fake stuff looks, well, fake, much more than in the LOTR movies.

But my biggest beef is what Jackson has done to the story. I do understand that going from book to film requires changes. I was able to make peace with the changes made in LOTR - I think for the most part they made the film version stronger than it would have been if it had strictly followed the books. But I can't say the same for what Jackson is doing to The Hobbit. This isn't The Hobbit any more. This is a story increasingly loosely based on The Hobbit. The material added (with the possible exception of showing us where Gandalf goes when he leaves the companions) does nothing to enhance the story, and many of the things cut were things that made the story richer. Bilbo has become a secondary character in his own story.

For some reason, Peter Jackson decided to film the Hobbit movies differently than the Lord of the Rings. He filmed them at 48 frames per second, which is double what other movies are filmed at. I've noticed that it makes it harder for my eyes to track what's going on. I didn't see it in 3D because I hate 3D, and the way he filmed it gives me enough of a headache without the 3D added.

I liked the movie itself, except for the love triangle that they added in. They have said in interviews that they added Tauriel so that there would be women in the movie instead of it all being men, because women/girls shouldn't have to sit through more than 6 hours of movies without a female presence, which is a good point as the book is pretty much just all dudes. But as a woman, I can safely say I don't need a romance shoved down my throat to enjoy a fantasy/action movie, and the love triangle really brought my enjoyment of the movie down.

No, I didn't like the way the first movie was shot. I was just talking to someone about this same thing. It really bothered me, in addition to the fact that they are making three movies out of a book that should only be one movie.

I love the book.
They drifted from the book by quite a bit.
I generally don't like 3D movies - some (not all) give me motion sickness.
Granted they had to condense the time line - there's no way they could take weeks to get through Mirkwood or spend weeks in the Elven King's lock up in a movie but they added stuff just for 3D's sake and special effects by themselves do not a good story make.
(A good story will stand up just fine without special effects but special effects with no good story is just some director blowing through his CGI budget. Special effects can enhance a good story if you use them sparingly.)
They added a pointless romance, they demoted Bilbo to almost a minor subplot status, they wasted his conversation with Smaug so the 3D people could mess about with the dragon swooshing about on the screen on mounds of treasure (in the book he spoke with Smaug twice and he didn't find the Arkenstone till after the dragon left to smash the mountain side to close off the secret door and then burn Laketown).
The dragon breathes fire for crying out loud - WHY did they think molten gold would do anything to hurt him? - it wasn't in the book and they didn't need it in the movie.
And it's a relatively small book and yet they felt the need to break it into 3 movies?
I really like what they did with Lord of the Rings but they are butchering The Hobbit and there just wasn't any need for it.
It would have sold just fine and been a timeless classic without mucking about with it.
It was ok to build on Gandalf's back story a bit the way they did.
They totally eliminated the story line where they were introduced to Beorn a few at a time.
I was very disappointed.
I'll see the 3rd movie when it eventually comes out but I will not be buying the DVDs - I don't want to own this one.

haven't seen the 3D version yet, so can't speak to that.
SPOILER ALERTS!
i liked the movie, but not as much as i'd hoped. i knew jackson was going to beef up the plot, which is annoying for tolkien purists, but it's what hollywood does. but i didn't think he did as well with this as he did with the LOTR.
i liked the new chickaboomba, and it was fun to see legolas again, and i LOVED thranduil. if you must have CGI, then cumberbatch's smaug is the way to go. delightful dragonishness.
that being said, they changed the plot in ways that were weird and unnecessary. all the orc battles are predictable but really got on my nerves. (not to mention the orcs looked far more like the fighting uruk-hai that hadn't even been developed by saruman yet than misty mountain goblins, but that's geekin'.) the beorn storyline could have been developed much better. i would have loved to have seen the eerie mirkwood movable elf-feasts, and bombur's sleep attack, and the disappearing path. so much tension and terror could have been built into that instead of having everything devolve into the spider attack. having the chick rescue the travelers from the spiders instead of it being solely bilbo's feat took away from his accomplishments. and why didn't he put the lids on the dang barrels?????
the sauron scene was silly from a plot standpoint, but loved how they presented him.
CGI was overused. my brain does not look at CGI sequence and think it's real. it's necessary for some things to make modern epic movies, but that doesn't mean it should take the place of puppets, robots, people in costumes, and great acting. movie makers have become lazy.
i really wish someone with jackson's gifts for great casting and beautiful scenery would do a real, honest, straight version of the tolkien books. don't suppose it will happen, though.
khairete
S.

I can't tell you how much I don't like Peter Jackson's rendition of "The Hobbit". It doesn't go by the book. At least "The Lord of the Rings" went pretty much by Tolkien's book. He's made "The Hobbit" out to be another "Lord of the Rings" AND he changed it SO much that it's barely recognizable.

I would never have gone to see it in 3D myself - I know better that that. I saw one of the Superman movies like that and it was too overwhelming...

I liked it. I knew going in that it would not hold true to the book, so I went in with low expectations for that. So then I was pleasantly surprised at any scenes with references to the actual story! Yes, the lady elf/love triangle was not necessary, but I think the lady being such a great warrior was worth her character being there (not even going to go there, about how she 'found herself' as a caregiver instead of a warrior - what year are we in, anyway? I'll believe the healer part instead). I also think the actor that played Bilbo Baggins was way more true to the original character than the other movies, so I appreciated that. And I didn't mind the cinematography. I was really impressed with the dragon.

It had nothing to do with being in 3D...

But yes, the cinemtography SUCKED EGGS!!

It was the same director of photography as the first Hobbit, & all three Lord of the Rings... I don't know why he changed how he filmed this movie.

What I noticed was the camera angles made you feel like you were sitting front row @ a live-performance theatre production. There was constantly a soft white light coming down over one shoulder of the actors, even in otherwise darkly-lit scenes.

Additionally, the music score was very sparse, and so you heard the footfalls of the actors as they moved around on the sets... eliminated a lot of the drama that normally comes in such scenes.

The plot was good, the CGI were outstanding, I thought the girls in the fishing village were rather amateur (the screaming didn't come through as authentic at all). But overall, I got the impression I was watching some show off the BBC, & not a multi-million dollar film production.

I will say, the 3D effect was phenomenal... more realistic than any I've seen before. But I took a few times to remove my glasses, & it wasn't the 3D effect that made it seem poorly filmed, but simply the cinematography itself.

Bummer... T.