The Hobbit

We went to see The Hobbit yesterday. I have some vacation days I have to take or lose, so naturally, not being a workaholic, I'm enjoying a few days of not providing customer service! "The Hobbit" was my first foray into the world of Fantasy/Sci-Fi. I was in 7th grade and my Social Studies teacher was a big fan who was excited about the Rankin/Bass cartoon TV broadcast and encouraged us to watch it. I did, then read the book. I followed that with "The Lord of the Rings", and immediately, upon finishing, re-read it. (I was only 13, after-all, and some of it didn't make sense to me until I read it the second time!) I've been excited about seeing this film and very curious to see Martin Freeman as Bilbo. I love him as Arther Dent and John Watson, but this is such a different character. He didn't disappoint! When you love a book as much as I have loved these books it makes one a bit nervous to see what someone else's vision is going to be. I think one thing I  passionately hoped would be included in the movie was the opening line of the book--"In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit." Not only was it included, but Jackson included the first whole paragraph. I was ecstatic! The movie is almost 3 hours long. And there are two more episodes to go--that's alot of material for what is essentially a kids book! I knew, just from seeing "The Lord of the Rings" that Jackson would pad it out with back-ground info--stuff not from this particular book, but from the indexes and The Silmarillion. Some is inferred--stuff Tolkien mentioned but never actually wrote about. I had read so much about  how the 3D version was "like riding a roller coaster" but decided to pay the extra and see it in 3D. I'm so glad we did. Maybe, if we had seen it in a bigger theater with more advanced equipment we would have experienced the vertigo that had been mentioned  but we didn't experience any of that. The background shots were breath-taking. I will say the only thing I might criticize is what I found to be an overuse of CGed goblins. I think Jackson's use of costumed actors in the LOTR movies was better. I find the use of too much CG distracting. I hate to have to wait a year to see the next chapter, but at the same time I've missed having Harry Potter to look forward to in mid-winter. Now, at least for the next two years, I have a movie to look forward to again!