"The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey": Reviews are in

From left, James Nesbitt as Bofur, Martin Freman(front) as Bilbo Baggins, Sephen Hunter as Bombur, Graham McTavish as Dwalin, William Kircher as Bifur, and Jed Brophy as Nori in a scene from the movie. / James Fisher

"The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" is now out in theaters and critics' reviews are mixed on Peter Jackson's action-adventure.

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"The Hobbit" premieres in New York

The film, which is the first of "The Hobbit" trilogy, follows Bilbo Baggins' (Martin Freeman) journey to the Lonley Mountain to reclaim the treasure that was stolen from him by the dragon Smaug.

• "The Hobbit": Peter Jackson talks Ian McKellen and the next two films
• Andy Serkis: The actor inside a character's skin

In addition to Freeman, "The Hobbit" stars Ian McKellen, Elijah Wood and Andy Serkis.

"The Hobbit" received a 69 percent on review aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes.

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"The Hobbit" premieres in New Zealand

Here's what critics are saying about the film:

Peter Travers of The Rolling Stone: "Part One of director Peter Jackson's planned film trilogy of J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit forces audiences to run an obstacle course before the fun kicks in."

Mick LaSalle of San Francisco Chronicle: "If you loved the earlier films, these are moments you will hold on to, but they're very few, and they're not enough."

Joe Morgenstern of Wall Street Journal :"An overlong adventure enlivened by wonders."

A.O. Scott of New York Times: "Tolkien's inventive, episodic tale of a modest homebody on a dangerous journey has been turned into an overscale and plodding spectacle."

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Peter Jackson, Ian McKellen reunite for "The Hobbit"

Michael Phillips of The Chicago Tribune: "Extracting three generously proportioned films from Tolkien's books made sense. But turning the relatively slim 1937 volume "The Hobbit" into a trilogy, peddling seven or eight hours of cine-mythology, suggests a better deal for the producers than for audiences."

Kenneth Turan of The Los Angeles Times: 'From an artistic point of view, star Mary Pickford famously said, "It would have been more logical if silent pictures had grown out of the talking instead of the other way around.' Likewise, it would have been better all around if Peter Jackson's 'Lord of the Rings' films had not come before his new, three-part version of 'The Hobbit.'"

[gnasher156]

Thanks for this post. It's good to see what everybody's been saying about this movie. A couple of my DISH co-workers saw The Hobbit at midnight and they loved it. I'm pretty confident I'm going to at least enjoy it when I finally get to see it. Unfortunately I just don't really have the time to go spend three hours at a movie theater right now. My plan is to add this to my Blockbuster@Home queue through my DISH account when it comes out on DVD. That way it'll show up in my mailbox and I'll be able to have a movie night with my boyfriend in the comfort of my own home. Plus, when we're done watching it, I can return the DVD to the Blockbuster store down the street for the next movie in my queue.

[GeekedoutSteven]

Finally it is here the movie that defined a generation is back for another round does it deliver? If you want a close look at the film and what i thought of the Frame Rate check out my channel- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJRt-HmFgQ8

[used_to_be_entertainment]

Yea the guy who wrote the above story got it wrong and is probably just some idiot paid commentator who was just making up his review without really seeing the movie

so this review should not even be taken seriously.

HOWEVER

I did find some scenes fake looking like when the brown wizard was being chased by the orks and there super sized wolves, it really looked bad very noticable, but other scenes were very amazing, I did not see it in 3D but I swear some scenes were so crisp it felt like it without it really being in 3d.

Im not happy about being a trilogy though and did not even know till the end of the movie, I feel we are being screwed enough at the box office, I did notice the empty theater so i think crowds knew what I did not.

I miss being entertained, I missed good special effects without so much stuff going on screen you cant see the awesome tree for the forest of little crap flying all over.

I miss great stories and I miss feeling good after leaving a movie theater, now I just feel screwed in knowing entertainment has just been a carrot dangling in front of me that I will never catch!

[dlantz2012]

The theater i saw it in was packed, and judging from the lines for the other showings that night they were going to be packed as well.

[DrNope]

The movie was alright. The CGI was a bit overused compared to LOTR, and there were a few moments of corny, almost slapstick comedy. But for the most part this was another fun, satisfying Tolkien film from Peter Jackson. I really didn't find much of anything in the film to really complain about. The cast was terrific and the music takes you right back to the Middle earth we knew a decade ago.

However, the 3D and 48fps gimmicks were absolutely terrible. It looked like paper dolls performing in a daytime soap opera. The 3D adds depth between the characters, but adds no depth to the characters themselves. So you can see that Gandalf is standing about five feet farther away than Bilbo, but both Gandalf and Bilbo themselves are completely flat. And with the ultra-clarity of 48 fps, the movie looks more like home video than film. There isn't that natural film grain and natural film blurring that makes a lot of the make believe more forgiving. None of the sets, costumes, and special effects looked real, and the frame rate simply can not handle fast motion. This format did live up to it's promise of high definition, but at a severe cost to the depth and draw of the film. At least in it's current state, 48fps is better suited for nature documentaries. It is a shame that the first major experiment in 48fps was a beloved fantasy adventure. Just not a good fit at all. So I recommend you skip the cheese and see it in proper 2D 24fps.

[larry2012]

You would think that if one were to review a movie based on a book, that the writer would at least have read the book. The second paragraph reveals that either Jackson has once again changed Tolkien's story in order to tell the story HIS way (as he did in the trilogy)or the writer wasn't paying attention. The offending paragraph claims that the story is about Bilbo Baggins and his journey to the Lonley Mountain, "...to reclaim the treasure that was stolen from him by the dragon Smaug." To be fair the writer got Bilbo's name and that of the dragon, but failed to notice that it was NOT Bilbo's treasure in the first place, but that of the Dwarves who once dwelt in the Lonely Mountains. As pretty as Jackson's cinematography may be, Mr. Jackson has apparently missed the tone, flavor and depth of Tolkien's characters in favor of what is undisputedly clever CGI. He changes the story line in order to inject plot "enhancements" apparently because he doesn't think Tolkien was good enough at it. The most glaring example when the Lady Arwen perportedly "saved" Frodo at the crossing of the fjord of Bruinen. This bit of dubious "poetical License" cheapened Frodo's character, making him weak and dependent when in fact all the books pointed to the deeply seated strength of character of the Hobbits. I'll probably see this film for the 3D alone, because I don't think I could stand Jackson's treatment of this epic fantasy.

[Vasparianwow]

You haven't seen it. You are judging the movie on what some one else said. Stop being a sheep.

[dlantz2012]

For fans of The Hobbit and of LOTR that have read the books, and know the subplots, the extra additions to the film are not needed. They are added for the people who only know the story through the LOTR trilogy. Though unnecessary for me, they were tolerable.

I thought the movie was neither overlong NOR boring. The use of perspective in this movie was no worse than it was in LOTR.

Like vasparianwow says, go see the movie before reading reviews from not tolkien or non fantasy film liking reviewers. Judging it for yourself.