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Now We Know Why the Hobbit Movies Were So Awful (theguardian.com)

Posted by Soulskill on from the legolas-river-scene-was-the-worst-thing-i've-ever-seen dept.

HughPickens.com writes: Everyone seems to agree that the key to the success of Peter Jackson's Lord Of The Rings trilogy was years of careful planning before production ever began. Now Bryan Bishop writes at The Verge that in what can only be described as the most honest promotional video of all time, we find out why the Hobbit trilogy turned out to be such a boring mess. In the clip, Peter Jackson, Andy Serkis, and other production personnel confess that due to the director changeover — del Toro left the project after nearly two years of pre-production — Jackson hit the ground running, but was never able to hit the reset button to get time to establish his own vision. Once the new director was hired, the harried crew members had to scramble to redesign everything to suit Jackson's vision, but they could barely even keep up with the production schedule, let alone prepare anything in advance.

At some junctures in the process, Jackson found himself essentially having to improvise on set because there was nothing really prepared for his actors to do. "You're going on to a set and you're winging it, you've got these massively complicated scenes, no storyboards and you're making it up there and then on the spot," said Jackson. "I spent most of The Hobbit feeling like I was not on top of it."

But wait: "Peter has never made a secret of the fact that he took over the Hobbit directing job with very little preparation time remaining before shooting had to begin. It was a challenge he willingly took on. His comments are an honest reflection of his own personal feelings at times during the movie's production," says a spokesman for Jackson. "Somebody has decided to create this cut-down, using only the sections of The Gathering Clouds that discuss the difficulties faced, not the positive ways they were addressed and overcome – which are also covered in this and other featurettes."

7 of 175 comments (clear)

  1. it was just too long by prasadsurve · · Score: 5, Insightful

    3 movies for such a short story was what killed it. I mean did it have to take 1 whole movie just reach the damn mountain?

    1. Re:it was just too long by Gr8Apes · · Score: 3, Insightful

      But the Hobbit, at best, was a 4 hour movie. Yes, the sitting around the fireside staring morosely into darkness or flashbacks add to the overall "feel" but if you add so many that they make the movie plod along like a hamstrung zombie, perhaps it's not too entertaining?

      --
      The cesspool just got a check and balance.
    2. Re:it was just too long by AthanasiusKircher · · Score: 4, Insightful

      3 movies for such a short story was what killed it. I mean did it have to take 1 whole movie just reach the damn mountain?

      Agreed. Before I even saw the first movie, I said, "I'd rather have a 9-movie series doing The Lord of the Rings rather than 3 long movies about The Hobbit." There just wasn't enough material and enough stories to fill the time.

      Anthony Lane, after alluding to Wagner's seemingly never-ending "Ring Cycle" of operas, in his review of the first Hobbit movie in The New Yorker probably summed it up best, concluding:

      As Bilbo says, nearing the end of the book, "Roads go ever ever on." Tell me about it.

    3. Re:it was just too long by lgw · · Score: 4, Insightful

      3 movies for such a short story was what killed it. I mean did it have to take 1 whole movie just reach the damn mountain?

      That's key, but they also failed because the tone was wrong (and inconsistent). The Hobbit was a kids book back when those were allow to get scary - a fun adventure story with some dark moments for our hero. Our hero was clearly Bilbo: it was his narrative, and his character arc. The places where the tone got dark were specifically the places where he needed to grow, and find to courage to overcome the new difficulty. The mix of fun adventure and dark moments made perfect sense.

      This was a very different tone than LOTR, which was fundamentally a war story for adults. The Hobbit film just didn't understand that, and rushed production is no excuse. The film never really felt like Bilbo's journey "there and back again." Almost all the filler was dark and dramatic, so much so that the original fun parts of the book were now jarring and inconsistent in the movie. The inclusion of a kooky Radagast could have worked with the original story, but felt completely out of place in the film.

      But dammit, lose the cartoon rabbits. From the SW prequel trilogy and Jar Jar to the Hobbit and the rabbit sled, I support a Constitutional Amendment banning cartoon rabbits in prequel movies!
       

      --
      Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
  2. One Book vs. Three Books by ZahrGnosis · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I didn't think there was much of a question; the lord of the rings simply had a huge amount more material that was fully assembled by the original author than the Hobbit did. It was one book, with a scattering of notes and addendums, that got stitched and stretched into three epic movies.

    It's interesting that they're admitting directorial mayhem at this point, but the direction taken from the outset was overkill and greedy. I'm sure it could have been better, but still, it took a lot to make this mess.

    Of course, I'm still going to watch them again. Someday.

  3. How about the one fact..... by Lumpy · · Score: 2, Insightful

    That they made a 6 hour trilogy out of a FUCKING SHORT STORY?

    Honestly.... what the hell, a single 2 hour movie is stretching it.

    --
    Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
  4. typical by bigdavex · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Many making-of documentaries emphasize the challenges to create a narrative around the miraculous production. IMHO, these movies sucked because:

    A) Lots of stuff happened but the characterizations were so weak that we stopped caring.
    B) The CGI orcs were boring and unbelievable next to the live footage.
    C) It was too long.

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    -Dave