Film Excess - Free Ukraine - Stop Putin - End the war NOW!!: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (2013) - Jackson returns with overrated, artificial-looking turkey

1/02/2023

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (2013) - Jackson returns with overrated, artificial-looking turkey

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A hobbit atop a giant mountain of gold and an even bigger dragon's eye behind that hobbit make up this poster for Peter Jackson's The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

The traveling group of Bilbo the Hobbit, Gandalf the Grey and a bunch of dwarfs continue their adventure and reach the dragon Smaug in its desolate mountain.

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug is written by co-writer/co-producer Fran Walsh (King Kong (2005)), Philippa Boyens (The Lovely Bones (2009)), Guillermo del Toro (Crimson Peak (2015)) and co-writer/co-producer/director, New Zealander master filmmaker Peter Jackson (Bad Taste (1987)). It is the 2nd film in his Hobbit trilogy, adapting The Hobbit (1937) by J.R.R. Tolkien (The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (1954)).

There are no fun scenes in the follow-up to Jackson's so-so The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (2012). It is a long CG fantasy bereft of charm and credibility: Seeing the ugly dwarfs survive anything and everything and defeat even the strongest orc time and again is neither fun nor thrilling.

The film also has quite a few digressions, and because it is the middle part of one story, which had been torn into atoms, the story's general direction is often consequently blurred to me.

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug ends in a long scene at Smaug's (the talking dragon's) place. - Fascinating? No, not really. And the animation in the film is so bizarre that the beautiful locations used do no longer seem like real places. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug is a horrid film.

The Lovely Bones (2009) - Despite qualities, Jackson's metaphysical crime drama is a wasteful jumble
The Frighteners (1996) - FX-driven ghost comedy madness
Top 10: The best big flop movies reviewed by Film Excess to date
Braindead/Dead Alive (1992) - Jackson's best film ever is a gore classic!
Bad Taste (1987) or, Peter Jackson's Hungry Aliens in New Zealand

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 191 - 250 mil. $ (different reports)

Box office: 959 mil. $

= Big hit (returned 4.34 times its cost)

[The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug premiered 2 December (Los Angeles) and runs 161 minutes. Shooting took place from March 2011 - July 2012 in the UK and in New Zealand, including in Wellington, with reshoots in May 2013. The film opened #1 to a 73.6 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it spent another 2 weekends at #1 and then one more in the top 5 (#3), grossing 258.3 mil. $ (26.9 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were Germany with 88 mil. $ (9.2 %) and China with 74.7 mil. $ (7.8 %). It was the 4th highest-grossing film of the year worldwide. The film was nominated for 3 Oscars, winning none: It lost Best Sound Mixing to Gravity, Sound Editing also to Gravity, and Visual Effects to Gravity as well. It was also nominated for 2 BAFTAs and a Grammy, among other honors. It sold home video copies for more than 107 mil. $ additionally in North American alone. Jackson returned with the last in the Hobbit trilogy, The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (2014), also the next appearance for star Martin Freeman (Fargo (2014-15)). Ian McKellen (The Dresser (2015, TV movie)) returned first in Miss in Her Teens (2014). The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug is certified fresh at 74 % with a 6.80/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

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Donald Sutherland has passed away

Born in Canada, Sutherland battled polio as a child. His first credit was in Suspense (1963, TV-series) and his first film was The Castle of the Living Dead (1964). Later credits in his remarkable career include The Saint (1965-66), The Dirty Dozen (1967), M*A*S*H (1970), Kelly's Heroes (1970), Klute (1971), Don't Look Now (1973), 1900 (1976), Casanova (1976), The Eagle Has Landed (1976), Ordinary People (1980), A Dry White Season (1989), JFK (1991), Outbreak (1995), Fallen (1998), Virus (1999), Fierce People (2005), Pride & Prejudice (2005), Lord of War (2005), The Hunger Games (2012), The Undoing (2020, miniseries) and many more. He passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Roger Corman has passed away

Born in Detroit, Michigan, Corman had a sprawling, intellectually hungry life as a youth and young man before arriving with his first film in 1955, Five Guns West. He would follow that with titles such as Apache Woman, It Conquered the World, Attack of the Crab Monsters, Teenage Cave Man, A Bucket of Blood, House of Usher, The Little Shop of Horrors, The Pit and the Pendulum, The Intruder, The Raven, The Terror, The Masque of Red Death, The Tomb of Ligeia, The Wild Angels, The Trip, Bloody Mama and many more. As a producer he was behind almost 500 films. Arguably among the most important filmmakers of the 20th century, Corman passed away at age 98. R.I.P.

William Friedkin has died

Born in Chicago, Friedkin accrued TV credits prior to his advance to the big screen as the director of Good TImes (1967), The Birthday Party (1968), The Night They Raided Minsky's (1968) and The Boys in the Band (1970) before his major breakthrough, The French Connection (1971), for which he won his only Oscar. He followed it up with the even bigger smash, The Exorcist (1973), arguably the best horror film of all time, for which he was Oscar-nominated. Later credits include Sorcerer (1977), Cruising (1980), To Live and Die in L.A. (1985), Rampage (1987), Rules of Engagement (2000), Killer Joe (2011) and The Devil and Father Amorth (2017, documentary). Friedkin passed away at age 87. R.I.P.

Louise Fletcher has passed away

Born in Alabama to deaf parents, Fletcher got her first credits in late-1950s TV-series.She took a 10 year-long sabbatical to devote her time to motherhood after the release of A Gathering of Eagles, but then came back and soon saw her career's most important part, as Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1975), for which she won her sole Oscar. Later credits include Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), The Lucky Star (1980), Brainstorm (1983), Two Moon Junction (1988), Cruel Intentions (1999), A Perfect Man (2013) and many more. Fletcher passed away at age 88. R.I.P.

Jean-Luc Godard has passed away

Born in Paris, France, Godard lived much of his life in Switzerland. He wrote for French film criticism magazine Cahiers du Cinema and became foundational for the New French Wave that inspired new waves in scores of other countries across the world with his Breathless (1960). Later credits include A Woman Is A Woman (1961), Vivre Sa Vie (1962), Le Petit Soldat (1962), Contempt (1963), Alphaville (1965), Pierrot le Fou (1965), 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her (1967), Weekend (1967), Every Man for Himself (1980), King Lear (1987), Century of Cinema (1995, documentary), Goodbye to Language (2014) and many more. Godard died of assisted suicide at age 91. R.I.P.

Wolfgang Petersen has died

James Caan has died

Caan was born the son of Jewish immigrants from Germany in New York. He got his start on TV in the early 1960s. His credits include El Dorado (1966), The Rain People (1969), Brian's Song (1971, TV movie), The Godfather (1972), - for which he earned his only Oscar nomination, - Slither (1973), The Gambler (1974), Funny Lady (1975), Rollerball (1975), Silent Movie (1976), Hide in Plain Sight (1980), - the only film he also directed, - Thief (1981), Misery (1990), Honeymoon in Vegas (1992), Bottle Rocket (1996), Eraser (1996), Dogville (2003), Elf (2003), Las Vegas (2003-07), Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs (2009) and many more. Caan passed away at age 82. R.I.P.

Jean-Louis Trintignant has died

Born in Vaucluse, France, Trintignant's theatrical debut as an actor was in If All the Guys in the World... (1955). Later credits include ...And God Created Woman (1956), The Seven Deadly Sins (1961), Inferno (1964), A Man and A Woman (1966), My Love, My Love (1967), A Man to Kill (1967), The Great Silence (1968), Z (1969), The Assassination (1972), Three Colors: Red (1994), Amour (2012), Happy End (2017) and many more. He also wrote and directed two films in the 1970s. Trintignant passed away at age 91. R.I.P.

Ray Liotta has died

Adopted from an orphenage at a young age, Liotta got hooked on acting in high school. He had various TV credits in the late 1970s and early 80s, with his film debut in The Lonely Lady (1983). Later credits include Something Wild (1986), Field of Dreams (1989), Goodfellas (1990), Cop Land (1997), Hannibal (2001), Blow (2001), Narc (2002), John Q (2002), Identity (2003), Observe and Report (2009), Youth in Revolt (2009), The Details (2011), Killing THem Softly (2012), The Place Beyond the Pines (2012), Shades of Blue (2016-18), The Simpsons (2018, TV-series), Marriage Story (2019), The Many Saints of Newark (2021), Black Bird (2022, TV-series) and many more. Liotta passed away at age 67 in his sleep while on production in the Dominican Republic. R.I.P.

Philip Baker Hall has died

Born in Ohio, Hall didn't start acting until he was 30. His long list of credits include Zabriskie Point (1970), Miami Vice (1987, TV-series), Midnight Run (1988), Ghostbusters II (1989), Cheers (1993, TV-series), Hard Eight (1996), The Rock (1996), Air Force One (1997), Boogie Nights (1997), Seinfeld (1991-98), Rush Hour (1998), The Insider (1999), Magnolia (1999), The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), Bruce Almighty (2003), Dogville (2003), The Zodiac (2005), Zodiac (2007), Curb Your Enthusiasm (2004-09), Mr. Popper's Penguins (2011), Modern Family (2011-12) and many more. Hall passed away at age 90. R.I.P.

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1/02/2023

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (2013) - Jackson returns with overrated, artificial-looking turkey

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