On the heels of Torrentfreak’s most-pirated TV shows of 2013 is its list of most-pirated movies. Not surprisingly, the list doesn’t exactly represent the refined cultural taste you might hope.
Coming in at #1 is The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. I’m guessing it only took a handful of 2012 moviegoers to spread the word about the quality of this film before throngs of would be Tolkien fans went rogue and downloaded a torrent of it to save themselves $20 and almost three hours of bad makeup and inane action sequences.
The rest of the top 10 is a smorgasbord. The obligatory action and super-hero flicks dominate, with the unexpected gem like Silver Linings Playbook thrown in. Whatever your movie tastes are, here’s to a 2014 that will no doubt be chock-full of movie pirating! [Torrentfreak via DigitalTrends]
Comments
81 responses to “I Wouldn’t Pay For 2013’s Most Pirated Movie Either”
Nine bad movies and the average/not so bad Django Unchained.
Not surprising.
Silver Linings Playbook is one of my all-time favourite movies!
Nine bad that’s a bit harsh. Into Darkness was awesome., as was the Hobbit
Gonna agree with you on Star Trek, but disagree with you on the Hobbit. But yeah, to say nine is a bit rough.
I apologize for not enjoying the same movies as everybody else.
The only new movie I enjoyed in 2013 was ‘Gravity’… and even then, beyond the visuals it wasn’t all that good. Probably didn’t help that I don’t like Sandra Bullock or George Clooney though. 🙂
I bet you wake up every morning and punch a kitten in the face.
Actually, I wake up and feed my two incredibly awesome, and expensive kittens (Maine Coon and Ragdoll).
Thanks for trying to be cool though.
WARNING: Objective unbiased and impartial fact follows
Iron Man 3 was actually rather good
I enjoyed it
Mindless fun, I agree
Ooooo you’re so edgy to call the biggest film of last year (well, 2012) bad. You’re also so cool in not liking action blockbusters. Please upload pictures of you in your fedora
Biggest doesn’t always mean best. Quite a few people felt it was unnecessarily long and dull, which is a shame because the whole point of the book was that it was quick, fun and easily digestible.
I know I wont be bothered with watching the other two. I could probably read the book in the time it would take to watch the films.
Also, where does it say he doesn’t like action blockbusters? I think the fedora is YOU!
I don’t understand why people think it is long and dull. It is like everyone expects a car to be driving through a flying helicopter every 5 minutes.
*edit* I hope there is an extended version. Because anything they can scrape from Tolkien’s world and from their work in NZ is worth seeing.
There is an extended version.
Will that one have a car driving through a flying helicopter?? Like Die Hard 4??
There are three of those scenes added in actually
You really didn’t think it was too long? It’s bad enough they are making 3 movies out of one of tolkeins shortest books just to make more money, but the hobbit was plain boring. It’s 2.5hrs and it took a horrible dwarf song, levitating plates and 1hour before they even left the Shire. You can’t understand why ppl think it’s too long, I can’t understand why people think that it’s acceptable movie making.
No this old Hobbit fan from way back didnt think its long at all. The length of the book has doing to with quality of the movies. The book doesnt included big action sequence or hell doesnt even really give details of more than a few dwarves. Tolkien wasnt interested in long descriptions of action but gave detailed accounts of the before and aftermath of them. (like Shakespeare) but todays audiences want that type of thing. Even had to deliver more character to diversity for each dwarf, that takes time. When reading a book you can forget how many dwarves are in a scene at any given time. The films are making them distinct and important.
After watching the gloriously detailed nine hour documentary of the making of the first film, the idea he is only doing it for them for money is hilarious. They really do care about the films. Anything more than that is ridiculous and hyperbole. An epic journey requires an epic start and end. (just like all them idiots complaining about all the end of Lord of the Rings). People who find this as acceptable movie making is because it is acceptable story telling. You know there are people who love to read these things called books that take time to tell. They are what a lot of people do while the “i want it all now and i want it easy” xbox generation folk are complaining on interweb forums.
The first two films have been perfect length. and it pretty damn clear why there is three films. Dont like them, dont watch but dont presumed the rest of the world has such a brief and simple attention span like yours.
Completely agree with you. You couldn’t have made this into one movie that’s for certain. And you couldn’t have made it two without making the films a busy chain of action sequences.
Love these films.
Also whoever wrote this article is a pretentious idiot. I’m guessing you don’t hold the same opinions of the games you play huh?
I loved those 9 hour documentaries on the Rings films, watched them a few times. So I was stoked to get the Hobbit extended edition. I’ve probably had more fun watching the behind the scenes than the actual film. How insane is the set up for the bag end table sequence? Filming in two separate rooms. It’s a true feat of movie making because you just take for granted that Ian is in the room with the dwarves and your mind just buys into the dwarves being smaller than Ian. You would never know the actors are in different rooms!
I honestly don’t have a perception of time. I don’t notice if a movie is long.
*edit* really? 1 hour b4 they left? Didn’t feel like it for me.
well i don’t know if it was exactly 1 hour, it really felt like like that god awful song lasted for at least a third of the movie.
My issue is that the movies feel longer and less exciting than the book they’re based off. It’s all personal preference of course, but yeah, I just feel like I won’t be able to make myself watch the others.
It’s funny that you should insinuate that gratuitous action sequences make movies bad when that is exactly what they did with The Desolation of Smaug, inserting pointless orc attacks and absurd action sequences (mostly involving Legolas) into every scene.
Worth seeing or worth seeding?
It was long and Jackson definitely has fleshed it out as much as possible but that gives the characters more screentime to develop their characters more than in the books, especially each dwarf. He’s already shown he’ll change things for the film such as killing Saruman in Return Of The King instead of making him wonder around Middle Earth as a harmless old man or not having the Shire be destroyed while the quest is taking place.
The second film is good though, but if you didn’t like the first one for the reasons that it’s fleshed out lots and changes quite a few things from the books then probably stay away from this one. As my housemate said though, as a massive Harry Potter fan of both the books and the films, she’s learned to seperate books from movie adaptations.
As for not liking action films, at least half the list are action blockbusters which he calls ‘uncultured’. I don’t know if he’s expecting every underground niche film that you can drop into conversation to make you look like an individual to be downloaded by millions of people
Truly, nothing on that list is representative of ‘refined cultural taste’ when using a base interpretation of the phrase. But then you open up the argument as to who get’s to define ‘refined’ or even ‘cultural’.
I don’t think it suggests the films are bad. You wouldn’t call the original Total Recall a ‘refined cultural’ film. Doesn’t stop it from being fucking rad!
Now I’m imagining a hat sitting in front of the computer with hipster glasses set upon its brim, typing edgy and intellectual yet snarky comments on websites.
Tell tell him his comments are intellectual, it’ll go right to his brim.
The book was actually a reason for tolkein to use his nerdy made up languages….which he made before he even wrote the book.
the best thing about Hobbit 2 was that it wasn’t Hobbit 1. It was a big improvement on the first, but it wasn’t a good movie.
I liked the Hobbit 1 more. There was more acting and character stuff and less slapstick action scenes. There was way too much action in TDOS and it bored me and made me cringe.
Any movie that has 20 minute chase sequences sure as hell had better be a chase movie. The first one suffered from exactly the same thing as the second Pirates of the Caribbean movie (I didn’t watch the third. It looked terribad); action sequences that go on for 15-20 minutes can be really fatiguing to viewers and can kill character empathy. In the first Hobbit movie, I’m looking directly at the goblin chase scene. I nearly pulled out a book. I’ll agree on the wall to wall action sequences being a bit much in number 2, but the movie as a whole felt less disjointed to me.
Both movies have terrible pacing issues, but the second had a lot more screen time given to developing reasons to care about the characters and there was this underlying theme of growing egos and power lust throughout. I still don’t think it was great, but personally, I’d take the second over the first.
Caveat to all of this: As much as I love the world of Middle Earth, I hate Tolkien’s writing with a burning passion. Mostly for his verbosity. Which is fantastic when I look at how long this effortpost is. D:
> I hate Tolkien’s writing with a burning passion.
When I was at Uni one of the other students posted a comparison of Theoden vs. the Witch King from LOTR and Cho-Hag vs. Taur Urgas in the Belgariad, with the intention being to show the superiority of Tolkein’s prose. Both of these are ostensibly cavalry clashes between kings/heroes.
I found the Eddings passage to be much, much more readable. As an action sequence, it jumps in with both feet, using a few words to sketch the encounter while retaining momentum. The Tolkein passage is long, detailed, exquisitely crafted and (by comparison) sort of boring.
There was a lot less of this in The Hobbit.
I can understand why The Hobbit was made as a trilogy, but as a single movie it would have made an excellent, fast-paced action romp with deep background. What we got was good, but Jackson did so much mining of material from other Tolkein books that the original story is left as little more than a framework.
I actually did enjoy the first Hobbit movie but it could have been much better – a genuine classic rather than a by-the-numbers blockbuster.
Why the hell did your completely on topic and reasonable post get voted down?
I think Tolkien was a brilliant linguist. He knew the language and knew it very well. He was great at describing things in depth, but not necessarily at making it engaging. We kind of have to cut some slack in that he was basically describing something that nobody had ever seen before (thanks to his verbose, word-crazy madness, we can just say ‘elves’ and everyone understands a complete mental image), his pacing was always hard to stomach and his absurd attention to detail grinds my gears.
As on-the-nose as it is to put the name forward, I think Stephen King does it a lot better. He’s incredibly detailed in his descriptions, but he isn’t afraid to pick up the pace when the story needs it.
The Hobbit was shorter, but it still suffered (in my opinion) from the same problems, just not so badly. My go-to is always in LOTR, though. Before they head into Moria, he describes the door for something like 3-4 pages, THEN draws a picture of it. The battle in the mines is fast, but describes next to nothing. It’s basically “*4 pages of a door* There were goblins and they had a cave troll and then there was a balrog and gandalf died and then they ran out and then they walked some more *45 pages describing walking and songs*”
I didn’t hate the Hobbit and I honestly don’t think we can judge it properly until the three are finished, so we can judge them as a whole. I’ve just not been terribly impressed so far.
In the behind the scenes for the Rings films Peter Jackson talks about that very fatigue with helm’s deep, about how too much action wears the audience out. I think he needs to take his own advice. It’s especially apparent with trying to put Legolas in peril, when you know he survives to be if you’re following movies. I eventually got numb to the action because it feel meaningless. I prefer PJ’s slow scenes, Hobbiton in film 1 feels stronger than anything in both films so far. But I did really like the road trip-movie feel of film 2. The travelling scenes in the rings films were my favourite scenes and the hobbit films are 90% just that. I love the in-line walking shots sweeping over New Zealand vistas. I’d agree film 2 feels better overall, but I feel like film 1 has some stronger individual moments and character stuff.
But like you, I felt a pang of disappointment after watching both films.
I liked no.2 more just because of mirkwood and laketown
Yeah, true, Laketown was a beautiful set, up there with anything from the Rings trilogy. After seeing a lot more CG and less miniatures/real sets in the Hobbit movies, Laketown was a welcome return to that real tangible stuff. I’m looking forward to getting the blu ray and just drinking in all the detail in those scenes, my eyes just didn’t have enough time to properly feast on everything in one sitting. That kind of stuff Peter Jackson does SO SO SO well. Beautiful film making, such a great effort by everyone involved.
Also, how awesome did all those coins and treasure in Smaug’s lair look? I’m sure it was a logistical nightmare to film but I bet Martin Freeman loved being on such a gorgeous set.
It’s funny, my mate commented on the same thing about the coins.
“Coming in at #1 is The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. I’m guessing it only took a handful of 2012 moviegoers to spread the word about the quality of this film before throngs of would be Tolkien fans went rogue and downloaded a torrent of it to save themselves $20 and almost three hours of bad makeup and inane action sequences.”
The most popular movies are surprisingly enough, the most torrented. I know I am not the only one that will often download a movie simply because I can’t get to a decent cinema as easily and don’t want to wait a year to get it on disc.
As for claiming that a movie that grossed over a billion bucks has been upset by some moviegoers/hipster losers complaining about makeup, yeah, I think I’ll disagree on that one Hession.
It wasn’t anywhere near up to the standard of the LOTR trilogy. This guy sums it up well:
TL:DW – Three movies from one short book versus 3 from 3 long ones.
Meanwhile, I’m glad a lot of people didn’t pay for it:
http://newsfeed.time.com/2012/11/19/27-animals-died-during-making-of-the-hobbit-say-handlers/
Actually doesn’t The Hobbit venture into other book Tolkien wrote that tied in with The Hobbit universe.. That’s what I read the other week, where hell if I can remember lol.
Wouldn’t downloading the Hobbit for home consumption counteract the assumption of going through hours of bad makeup and inane action sequences? As I’d dare say that’s what they’re downloading (enjoying) it for!
“Oh look, I found unrelated, de-contextualised data that I can pass as faint evidence that a movie I personally hated, sucked objectively.”
A perceptive comment, still, it did suck anyway.
Michael you seem somewhat disgruntled about The Hobbit. As an LoTR fan I personally loved it and the follow up even more so. Yes, you could argue that there are some scenes which pander to the Tolkien fans but otherwise these films have a lot of heart which is more than I can say about most big budget action films coming out of Hollywood nowadays. Not every film has to be Oscar quality material and I would also consider Django, Star Trek, and Now You See Me as movies I’m happy I spent 20 bucks to see on the big screen. I must be lacking in refined cultural taste I guess 😛
Also a lotr fan I was very let down by the DOS, it dragged on what was a near 3 hour movie felt like a 5 hour movie with so many pointless scenes added just to fill up the movie I loved the first hour and the last 45 mins but the rest was just pointless filler
I agree with you on all fronts. I saw most of the movies on the list at the cinema and I didn’t walk away feeling I wasted my time and money.
The use of this data to suggest people download the films to not waste thier money is simply creating a connection where there isn’t one. I could make the same judgment that the people who download the films did so either before or after watching it at the cinema.
8,400,000 downloads and because of that it only made $1,017,003,568. You wanted proof well there it is folks. PIRATING IS RUINING THIS WORLD!!!!!!!!
If I broke into Richard Branson or Oprah’s house and take a million dollars they keep laying around it doesn’t matter that they still have all the money in the world left, it’s still theft.
Downloading illegally may be a crime, but the problem is that the definition of theft however is somewhat ambiguous when it comes to the digital realm.
It specifically states theft as when a person takes “property” without consent for their own use. The implication is physical property. Since downloading doesn’t, however, remove a physical item, nor prevent the original owner’s use or sale of that item, theft doesn’t really apply.
It gets into semantics, but there is a large difference to downloading a film and stealing someone’s money. As much as they like to spin it that way, a downloaded movie “isn’t” lost revenue and it hasn’t prevented a sale.
This. It’s not quite theft when you’re not stealing the actual product. At worst, it’s unauthorised/illegal reproduction. It’s still illegal, but the original product is still there, at the cinema for all paying customer to see. Also, when these organisations claim ‘theft’ is robbing them of income, I call BS on that too, since bad reviews and bad word of mouth to a hell of a lot more to curb ticket sales, than illegal downloads, yet studios aren’t crying foul over critical reception nor sueing the asses off of critics for being a threat to their revenue stream.
People can justify this all they want. But taking something you didn’t pay for is wrong. End of story.
When you’re a content creator yourself, who feeds your family from sales of stuff you created, it’s harder to maintain the opinion that pirating stuff isn’t theft or doesn’t equal to lost sales.
Never downloaded a movie, song or TV show?
Yes, I have.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not justifying it because, essentially, you’re getting the result of their hard work or at least, reproducing it, without compensation or authorisation (even if we’ve all done it). But look at something like 47 Ronin. That film will absolutely tank because of the terrible reviews and bad word of mouth, but someone will still try to link it’s poor performance to illegal downloads, not it’s content. They’ll say “Well, when people were hearing about it, they were downloading a copy instead of judging for themselves at cinemas”, which will be true to an extent. If people hear something is a stinker, they might be inclined to do this rather than part with $50-$60 that a trip to the cinema might cost them, and fair enough, but most people won’t go see it or will possibly see it when it’s released on Blue Ray/DVD when it costs only a few bucks– a mere fraction of the price. That’ll be what kills the potential revenue stream. I just think it’s a little rich crying fowl when they have a public who wants to be informed about a product before parting with their cash, and the studios still want their ‘caveat emptor’ business model.
Yeah, there’s no denying that piracy has become a convenient scapegoat for bigger problems.
If I pirate something that I would never buy. Eg a movie with a bad review and instead of waiting till it was on free to air TV. How is the distributor loosing money? Then what would happen if it wasn’t as bad as the reveies said and I went oooh I might buy this (better image and sound quality in doing so) and the distributor made money.
Yet a number of people in the industry who are themselves content creators share the opinion that downloading their products isn’t a lost sale.
Brad Wardell who owns stardock (Sins of a Solar Empire, GalCiv ect) has very interesting things to say about piracy (and DRM). There are plenty of content creators who understand the difference between illegal downloads and whether there’s food on their families plates or not.
Wardell specifically indicates that a pirate, who downloads a product for their own use and doesn’t then buy the game, is someone that wouldn’t have bought the game anyway. It’s not lost revenue.
Interestingly, I’ve read a number of opinions that state that “piracy” has led to increased sales when you look at the issue in this light.
I don’t think piracy (a term that has been recently updated to specify it also affects digital goods btw) is “right”, however, I know full well that a number of developers have received money from me after I have obtained the game and decided if it is worth my investment or not.
As a consumer who predominately purchases products in an industry that doesn’t actively allow end users to try before they buy, I consider it a far more reliable way of determining whether I would enjoy something enough to pay for it or not.
Again, not saying it’s right, but in my own experience, I can say that piracy has led to me actually spending more than I would have otherwise.
F*** that noise. I saw that s*** on the big screen Hoyts had to offer in 3D with a big a** bucket of popcorn a bottle of water (cause it is important to keep hydrated) and went on one of the biggest cinematic adventures of 2013. Was so good. had it’s lulls. no doubt but thought it was incredible overall my only issue with the whole hobbit thing is the ol’ “why three movies? could have smashed it in two” but even with three movies my life goes on unhindered.
personally I will ALWAYS pay for a blockbuster (for want of a better term) movie at the cinema first. The experience can’t be replicated. left the house, get some dinner, mess about in the arcades relatively close to the cinemas, devastate my friends in air hockey (I take that way too seriously) see a movie, the head home discuss the movie or to a bar to discuss or drink away the movie, cause what is the alternative? sitting at home in your underpants at your PC day in day out trawling the internet for torrents hoping they release a good quality screener. seriously I know a guy, that’s his life and as I said earlier F*** that noise.
I on the other hand happily paid to see The Hobbit when it was in cinemas and own a copy of it on DVD, because it’s a good movie and while opinions are subjective yours is wrong.
So have I, after seeing it with the wife at the cinemas I went and bought the 3d version….no regrets and will prob do the same with hobbit 2
What a ridiculous title/statement.
Inane self-entitled delusional ‘article’.
I’m surprised the no porno made the top 10 most downloaded.
I think everyone streams that now.
This article is probably the lowest Kotaku have stooped to yet… “This movie is bad it’s so bad you shouldn’t even form your own opinion on it, I hate it and you will too. Yeah, you watch the hobbit? You like it? You got no fuckin culture, son!”
Also I’ll take anything for free.. Who wouldn’t? But I paid to see DOS and thought it was awesome.
Also, Michael Hession, who the fuck are you? Are they just letting anyone post on here now? Shiiiiiiiiiiit.
Seems only fair they let anyone post, seeing as they let anyone comment and 99% of the comments are garbage, exceeding the garbage rating of the articles by far.
Exactly. Any old person who doesn’t even have an account.
It’s not that these movies are bad – if they were bad, nobody would bother downloading them. It’s just that, well… are they worth $20 to see in a cinema? More if you bring someone, or eat popcorn?
Not really. You might splash out to see one or two, but not ALL of them.
I don’t think the two Hobbit films are bad films, but the problem is they are a little flawed and they are successors to some of the highest rated movies of all time (the LOTR films are in the top 100 metacritic movies). So the Hobbit films, coming from this incredible pedigree means that anything less than perfection is going to be a let down. They’re not bad films, but they just don’t live up to the LOTR trilogy. If these films didn’t precede the LOTR trilogy, without that point of comparison, people would probably look more favorably on them.
Now, my spoiler filled opinion on why the Hobbit films are flawed, if you are at all interested. Disclaimer: I don’t give a flying crap about the movies not matching the books (which I’ve read). I’m judging these as movies alone. I personally thought the Hobbit was a pretty crap read (probably great for kids) and would not make a good movie.
1. Heart and soul. I can’t put my finger on this one. Watching the behind the scenes footage of the extended edition you can tell straight away that this film has had an extremely troubled production. While Peter Jackson had about 2 years of pre-production on the Rings movies the Hobbit was rushed, it lost it’s director, Peter Jackson was in hospital, MGM dicked them around with the rights because they went into financial trouble. They almost stopped making the films more than once. The production of the Hobbit ended up being a mad dash up to the day they started filming. It was a rush job. As a result, the movies feel like they lack something. There’s not the same character magic of Frodo and Sam’s epic friendship, or Aragorn’s troubled linage. Martin Freeman steals the show however, he’s the classic fish out of water and he’s a strong protagonist, it’s just a shame he barely has a role in film 2. I just don’t feel like there’s anywhere near as much investment in the characters in The Hobbit movies. The dwarves especially lack character. The movie is filled with overly long action scenes but little time is taken to develop characters.
2. Slapstick. I don’t understand why there’s so much slapstick comedy in the Hobbit movies. I appreciate the idea of making the Hobbit it’s own trilogy and having it’s own individual tone, but when PJ rebuilds sets, use the same actors and tries so hard to shoehorn in references (even actors) from the Rings films, it’s clear PJ wants to remind you these movies are set in the same universe. Then you end up with these two trilogies in the same universe with the same characters and the same locations, but one of them is bordering on being a comedy. It’s a stark contrast. The problem is the Rings films have a non-fantasy sheen to them. PJ constantly said he interpreted the LOTR books as if they were history, every prop had to look authentic and nothing could look like it was designed by a graphic artist. All of the sets are filled with things that tell you it’s a real and plausible place. Then along comes the Hobbit with whacky slapstick hi-jinks and LOLs. It just destroys the tone of the movie. The combat scenes are especially jarring, Bombur bursting out of the barrel with funny whooshing sounds as he does his whirlwind attack, Legolas seesaw boosting and decapitating the Orc in Laketown. Legolas offs probably 100 orcs and then you fast forward to the Two Towers and he fights all night at Helm’s Deep abd only slays 42. Bifur’s slapstick sight gag axe handle poking out of his head. It bothers me a lot because the Hobbit films just don’t match up with the Rings movies.
3. How do the Orcs travel in daylight? A point that was reinforced many times in the Rings films.
4. Smaug. He went from being the most terrifying CG monster I’ve ever seen to Smaug the Incompetent. I understand that the book’s version of events wouldn’t do because the dwarves never encounter Smaug so Peter Jackson brought the dwarved into the treasure room to have a big finale with Smaug. That doesn’t bother me at all. What bothers me is how terrifying Smaug was, how Bilbo was barely a mouse in his eyes, able to be crushed at any point. Then along come the dwarves and the movie undermines any sense of threat Smaug posed. I don’t know if it was the fact Smaug bragged about being able to smell dwarves yet moments late he walks right over them without noticing (Smaug could sense Bilbo’s air alone yet 9 dwarves didn’t show up on his radar?). Maybe it was how the great furnace-with-wings seemed to forget he could breath fire and gave up what looked like about two dozen opportunities to fry the dwarves over their daring encounter. SMaug also seemed to be withing snapping distance many times but then gets distracted over and over, he just seemed like like Smaug the Stupendous and just Smaug the Stupid. And then after all of that, the dwarves (who’s chief skill up to this point is being captured and defeated by every enemy they’ve encountered) manage to somehow drown Smaug in gold? Never mind the fact that creature that can melt gold probably isn’t harmed by it. That didn’t even make sense? What was that golden statue? Was it poured by the dwarves right then an there? Why did it break apart when they pulled the chains? The whole thing was just lost on me. All I knew is that Smaug was no longer terrible or threatening or god-like, he was just a dumb creature with which you could engage in Home Alone style hi jinks with and come out unharmed. That finale was a really bad idea.
5. Things that don’t make sense. This is my newest pet peeve in movies, when characters behave in ways or things take place for no other reason than the movie needs it to happen for a plot related reason. It’s a plague on movies at the moment. The dwarves giving up at the door is a prime example. My suspension of belief was shattered again when after 5 minutes of trying to enter the mountain they all just walk away and decide to go to the pub instead. It felt completely implausible. They’d been trying for so long, risking their lives, and for many of them it represented their purpose in life. So it’s hard to believe Thorin just dropped the key on the ground when it was still daylight! The movie is filled with this kind of behaviour, people acting in a way that doesn’t make sense to service the plot. In this case it happened to give Bilbo his moment where he solves it alone. But it didn’t make any sense at all in terms of characters.
6. The length. I didn’t want the original Rings films to end, but I felt like the Hobbit films went too long and I became eager for them to wrap up. That’s just me personally. The Rings films were an exercise in trimming the hefty source material down, The Hobbit films are an exercise in expanding the lightweight source material. And it shows. The Rings films were about cutting anything unnecessary and making the story telling sharp and efficient, making every scene convey as much information as possible. It was an incredible example of functional movie making, juggling several narratives and making them flow and have purpose. The Hobbit films feel bloated with filler. Without a doubt, the Hobbit book could not be made into a single film, you couldn’t fit the trolls scene, the goblin caves, the tree top encounter, the spider scene, the Smaug encounter and Laketown destruction and the Battle of Five Armies into a 3 hour package. It needed to be at least two films, three is even better. But why are these movies 3 hours? They could be two. They feel like they’ve been stretched to 3 for no reason at all. Maybe they feel people expect LOTR movies to be 3 hours? If so that’s a poor reason Either way you can tell these movies are 2 hours movies stretched thing over a longer running time. When you’re already having to write in entirely new characters and invent romantic sub-plots, why bother? Why not just leave that stuff out and make the movie shorter? Why spend all that time and money making the movies longer than they need to? It’s not like you charge people more if the movie is longer. What does it gain by being longer and padded? I don’t think people would hate the movie for being 2 hrs. It juts feels like the Rings movies are about efficiency, while the Hobbit films (so far) are about excess. And they balloons inflated way beyond their intent and the messages written on them have become blurred and illegible.
The Rings films stole my heart, but with them Hobbit films, I’ll learn to love them. I’m going to NZ this year to visit the film locations of both trilogies and see the film 3 premiere. So I’m a huge fan. If you’ve read this far, allow me to reiterate, I don’t think the Hobbit films are bad movies, they are incredible movies with some flaws and blemishes. You cannot deny either way that for 3 hours, you are subjected to gorgeous vistas, both real and CG, and the love and care gone into making the hobbit films in undeniable. Also, Martin Freeman’s Bilbo and Ian McKellen’s Gandalf are worth the price of admission alone. Both great actors giving incredible performances.
Now you see me, Greatest Movie Ever
I’m spewin I missed it at the cinema. Gonna have to give it a rent
I paid for the hobbit…. I pay for everything. People still do that right?
Disliked The Hobbit. Dislike judgmental, prejudiced and inherently cynical/insecure writers even more.
Paid for it at the Movies
Bought the Collectors Edition on Blu-Ray
I also pirated it for a DRM free digital copy
2/3 ain’t bad New Line Cinema
The Hobbit was massive fun. Preferred it even more than LOTR.
Absolutely amped about seeing Smaug this w/end!
+1 for longest comment ever
Personally when I see a list of this, I think, ‘why the fuck would you watch a pirated version’?
Also the hobbit bitching, I wonder if it’s like all the fan boys online pissing and moaning about how bad avatar was, when they downloaded a shitty cam version.
Anyway The Hobbit, why would you download it, and not want to see it on the big screen? It’s meant for the big screen.
Django – Tarantino’s best film. I guess probably didn’t really need to be seen in cinema, but it’s an odd choice. I would have to say, the only reason for it to be here is people being cheap and lazy.
Fast & Furious 6 – Again a film designed for the big screen.
Iron Man 3 – A big screen film. Of course the cheap arseholes, but I suspect a lot of people probably saw in the cinema and then also downloaded it to watch again at some stage.
Silver Linings Playbook – good film, but I bet people just downloaded it because they fancy that lady with boobs.
Star Trek Into Darkness – While typical fan boy fodder for downloading, I bet people downloaded because they wanted to see it, had heard mixed/bad things and so were too cheap to pay. Also a film you’d lose something not seeing on the big screen.
Gangster Squad. Probably a good example of where piracy can hurt a film. Not a good film, but it has general enough interest but no one can be arsed seeing it in a cinema so just download it.
Now You See Me – similar thing, people have interest in seeing it, but are just too lazy and cheap.
Hangover Part 3 – I assume people have decided the franchise has had enough of their money, but they still wanted to see the third.
World War Z, I’m pretty sure this is a case of, people heard mixed stuff and so wanted to see it but didn’t want to pay.
So, noone should ever buy the DVD/BluRay of Iron Man 3, Star Trek, F&F6 and The Hobbit, because they won’t be seeing it on ‘the big screen’?
Everyone else sees a hipster here. I see a rich guy with a monocle sitting around the hearth drinking red wine and complaining about how movies have become “awfully low-brow, old chap”.
Really, I think the Hobbit films have been good so far; It’s always nice to be brought back into Middle Earth, especially when you get to listen to Howard Shore’s wizardry at work. My only complaint about the films so far is that the orcs are completely CGI, whereas virtually all orcs from the LOTR trilogy were real people. I feel that a certain magic is lost as a result, but, alas, i’m sure Jackson & Co have their reasons for doing this.
@inquisitorsz: I think you’re being rather harsh in regards to the Dwarven theme (iirc the song in Bag End only lasted a minute or two). I think it’s quite moving and nicely seperates itself from the other musical tones throught the films. Whenever I hear it I’m reminded of the Dwarves’ motivation to reclaim their homeland, their stubborness when the odds are against them, and pursuing their heritage. It symbolises the pursuit of their quest.
But each to his own :p