The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

Starring: Martin Freeman, Richard Armitage, Ian McKellen, Benedict Cumberbatch, Ken Stott, Orlando Bloom, Evangeline Lily, Lee Pace, Luke Evans

Directed by: Peter Jackson

Written by: Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens, Guillermo del Toro, based on the book by J.R.R. Tolkien

After the battle outside Goblin Town, Bilbo Baggins and his Dwarvish companions are still on the run from Azog the Defiler and his band of Orcs. More pressing is their need to reach the Lonely Mountain in a matter of weeks – a journey that will take them through the treacherous Mirkwood and the slums of Lake Town. Meanwhile, something is stirring in an ancient ruin…

Adapting a beloved text must be the most thankless task in Hollywood. This suggests, given the sheer number of adaptations released each year, that the vast majority of screenwriters are rampant masochists. There are countless people just itching to tear into a film even when they aren’t already a fan of the source material; anyone with a tendency to use certain parts of the internet will, on at least one occasion, have wandered into a flame war over the creative decisions taken during the process of adaptation, whether it’s cutting a popular moment, creating a new character, or just abandoning the whole idea and writing a film about how difficult adaptation can be (see: Michael Winterbottom’s ‘A Cock and Bull Story’, Charlie Kaufman’s ‘Adaptation’). Hell, simply altering a costume can produce cries of “ruined forever!” from particularly diehard fans.

It’s all the more difficult because there is no really definitive answer to what actually constitutes a good adaptation. Rigid fidelity to the source text? That’s a bonus, but it often comes at the expense of good writing, acting and story-telling. The Harry Potter franchise is a mixed bag, all in all, but the first two films – the only two that don’t deviate from or at least severely trim their sources – are nigh unwatchable unless you’re pre-adolescent (or drunk; try it sometime, it’s fun). Zak Snyder’s production of ‘Watchmen’ was almost a frame by frame reproduction of the comic, which rendered the whole thing rather redundant. Updating it for contemporary audiences? Possible, but not a sure-fire success; the Wachowski siblings perhaps correctly felt that the anti-Thatcher politics of Alan Moore’s ‘V for Vendetta’ weren’t as relevant to an audience in 2005, but in making it more a generic anti-totalitarian story, arguably missed the entire point of the main character. Adhering to the spirit of a text, but changing details? Probably the most successful process, although you can’t please everyone. To return to the Potter franchise, the third entry, ‘Prisoner of Azkaban’, is the most critically successful, and also the one that deviates most from the source, chopping and changing relatively important details to suit the needs of making a quality film.

Which brings us to ‘The Hobbit’. When news first broke of the forthcoming adaptation, the reaction was overwhelmingly positive. Jackson had proved himself with the excellent ‘Lord of the Rings’ trilogy, and now Guillermo del Toro was involved as well! Sadly, he dropped out along the way, although his creative fingerprints can still be seen in certain parts…and then came the news that there were going to be three films. From one book, which is a relatively slender tome. Clearly a financial decision – why release one box office success when you can release three? – but has it been justified?

Part one, ‘An Unexpected Journey’, was far too long. While it must be said that, to my eyes at least, there wasn’t a single bad scene in the film, a good hour or so could have been kept back for the extended cut, or even left out altogether. The whole strand of the dwarves being pursued by orcs, while given some justification in ‘Desolation of Smaug’, was almost entirely unnecessary, if admittedly thrilling, and it took far too long to actually get the plot started. Happily, this has been corrected for part two, at least to a certain extent.

After a brisk prologue, taking us back to the first meeting of Thorin and Gandalf, via a cheeky directorial cameo, the film gallops through its allotted plot at a relentless pace. It is no shorter than the first part, but at no point did I find myself checking my watch. Thrilling moments come thick and fast, especially from the astonishing barrel ride sequence, which ties together the group of fleeing protagonists, trapped in barrels and largely weaponless mid-river, the pursuing orcs, and two Elvish warriors, leaping around like ninjas on steroids, and is probably the most accomplished set piece of any of the Middle Earth sagas thus far. It is far from the only highlight though; the journey through Mirkwood is initially unsettling, before becoming outright horrific at the arrival of a group of giant spiders which are guaranteed to send arachnophobes in the audience behind their seats, while the more leisurely trip to Laketown allows a much seedier side of Tolkien’s world to come to the fore; within this section, Luke Evans turns in a solid turn as Bard, a character destined for more prominence in the third part, and an interesting mirror in some respects to Richard Armitage’s Thorin, both rather brooding, tortured souls, but Bard exhibiting a spark of humanity (for want of a better term) that Thorin lacks. Elsewhere, Ian McKellen gets to shine (almost literally) in a single-handed assault on the Necromancer’s fortress, leading to the shocking revelation that Sauron has returned (note: not actually a shock at all).

However, as entertaining as all of this is, it’s all a prelude to the main attraction; everyone watching this, whether a die-hard fan of the novel or a complete novice lured in by the trailers, is probably going to be watching for the dragon. And what a dragon Smaug is. On a purely technical level, he’s an astonishing achievement, so well crafted that you genuinely believe he’s there, that Martin Freeman was standing in the same room as a mythical beast. Early trailers were a little underwhelming to my mind, but whether a result of being viewed on the big screen or because of a spruce up prior to release, Smaug is the most impressive thing put on screen all year. Quite apart from the technical wizardry behind his realisation though, enormous credit must go to Cumberbatch, bringing far more depth and subtlety to the role than he managed with Khan over the summer (and overshadowing his second role as the Necromancer entirely, although equally, the Necromancer is largely represented by black smoke). His voice is perfect, as is his motion-capture – clearly having spent a lot of time studying with Andy Serkis – and his scenes opposite his ‘Sherlock’ co-star are the highlight of the film by a long stretch.

An unqualified success then? Well…no.

For a start, as I said, the rest of the film is really just build up to the meeting with Smaug, much as ‘An Unexpected Journey’ was overshadowed by the ‘Riddles in the Dark’ sequence. And while it’s hardly unusual for a film’s climactic stages to overwhelm the rest of it – indeed, it is perhaps somewhat desirable – there aren’t many films that spread a single novel over three instalments. As exciting as the action is, as engaging as the voyage through Mirkwood is, as intriguing as the visit to Laketown is, it’s high quality padding. True, I was absorbed throughout, but there’s little need thus far for either film to run to such lengths.

More specifically, we have Evangeline Lilly as Tauriel, a controversial area of the film. Where much of the added content comes from the Appendices to ‘Lord of the Rings’, Tauriel is completely invented for the film. Debate has raged back and forth over the merits of this decision, which seems to have come about largely out of a desire for there to be a woman with an actual speaking role in the film, which is perfectly reasonable. However, if you’re going to invent an entirely new character in the name of female representation, then squandering her on a fairly standard and insipid love triangle is perhaps not the best way of going about it. Lilly is fine in the role, and to be fair does have some decent chemistry with Aiden Turner’s Kili, not to mention the fact that Tauriel, alongside Orlando Bloom’s returning Legolas, spends most of her screentime leaping around like a hyperactive ninja, kicking ass left right and centre. It’s hugely entertaining, but given that their action scenes add on a good half hour of screentime that is largely unnecessary, and the love story seems redundant and badly thought out, there seems to be little need for either of them to be there.

Mind you, you could say that about at least eight of the thirteen dwarves, still lacking much in personality, for all that their exquisite design lends them character. And Stephen Fry is woefully miscast as the Master of Laketown; fruitily entertaining, to be sure, but nowhere near sinister enough to live up to the man’s reputation. Worst of all, an early scene – one Tolkien actually wrote, and keenly anticipated by many fans of the book – is dispatched with indecent haste. It’s perhaps not that important a scene in the grand scheme of things, but given the extra content and drawn out battles, it’s hard not to feel that a little more time could have been lavished on it.

Still, it wasn’t until I sat down to think about the film that many of these problems came to mind. As I said at the beginning, at no point was I looking at my watch. And the film is a definite improvement over the first instalment. But it’s looking much more likely that this time next year, we will know for certain that there was no need for a third film. Enormous fun, but still too much of a good thing.

The Day of the Doctor

Starring: Matt Smith, David Tennant, John Hurt, Jenna Coleman, Billie Piper, Joanna Page, Jemma Redgrave

Written by: Steven Moffat

Directed by: Nick Hurran

Zygons have invaded 16^th century England; something terrible is happening underneath the National Gallery; and in a far-away time and place, a very old man is about to make a choice that might change the universe forever. The Day of the Doctor has arrived.

By this stage, I’m going to assume that anyone with any interest in the matter has seen the special at least once…but nonetheless:

Still here? Excellent!

It took a while for the celebrations to really get going – I still say that the BBC missed an obvious trick by not broadcasting classic episodes throughout the year, which would have been simplicity itself – but we’ve had a veritable embarrassment of riches throughout November. The clip shows and the like have been fun if…well, typically clip show, but the Beeb has surpassed itself in the last few weeks. Mark Gatiss’ drama, ‘An Adventure in Space and Time’ was a glorious, heartfelt and moving tribute to the pioneers who created the show, while the online short ‘Night of the Doctor’ was a wonderful surprise, bringing Paul McGann back to film his regeneration, and is sure to have won him a whole host of new fans. Perhaps taking pole position for best of the side projects was Peter Davison’s ‘The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot’, the epic tale of three former Doctors – Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy and Davison himself – doing everything they can to get involved with the 50^th special. But of course, the jewel in the crown was always going to be the anniversary special itself.

It’s something of an understatement to say that there was a certain amount of expectation for ‘The Day of the Doctor’. Fifty years worth of expectation, in fact. Would it honour the history? Ignore it completely in favour of a dramatic story? How many Doctors would there be? Would it answer all the questions Moffat has raised over his time at the helm? Well..yes, no, not as many as you might have hoped, but more than you might have expected, and no. Of course not. We’ll probably never get all the answers to Moffat’s plots – he didn’t even fully resolve the cliffhanger from the last episode, for heaven’s sake. And perhaps he made a rod for his own back with the last series of episodes, which were distinctly hit and miss.

It’s ok. Whovians the world over have been reminded that actually, Moffat is a bloody good writer. And just as important, he knows his stuff when it comes to ‘Doctor Who’.

First things first. The main question. John Hurt – Who he? Speculation has been rampant since his appearance at the end of ‘The Name of the Doctor’, although answers seemed to be suggested from the ‘Night of the Doctor’, proving him to be a regeneration after Paul McGann’s Eighth Doctor, and therefore the Doctor involved in the Time War that has so dominated the show’s history since its return in 2005. Given his billing as the War Doctor, for all the build up as the person who did something so horrific that subsequent incarnations of the Doctor have refused to even acknowledge his existence, never mind that he could be a Doctor, you might be forgiven for expecting a character something like the Timelord equivalent of Bruce Willis than the weary old man we see. True, utilising the TARDIS as a battering ram is a rather more aggressive action than we’ve seen in recent years, it takes a while for his teeth to show. It isn’t a criticism of Hurt, who is as good as he always is – it isn’t necessarily a criticism at all, merely an observation that expectation is not always met, particularly by Steven Moffat. It should also be mentioned that there is perhaps a fundamental flaw in positioning Hurt’s Doctor as the one who committed unspeakable acts, given that Smith’s gloriously be-fezzed and wacky Doctor has at least three on-screen acts of genocide to his name. And of course, the Doctor – whether portrayed by Christopher Ecclestone, David Tennant, or Smith – has not been shy about reminding people, largely his enemies, that he ended the Time War. See one of the more famous quotes from Smith’s run, in ‘The Doctor’s Wife’:

“Fear me; I’ve killed hundreds of Timelords.”

“Fear me; I killed all of them.”

So there is a certain lack of logic in Hurt’s Doctor’s very existence…but then, to borrow another line from Smith, “Never apply logic to Who!” Certainly, I wasn’t pondering this question while watching. His scenes with Billie Piper are powerful stuff, and he seems to draw the best out of Piper, who has improved greatly as an actress since leaving the show (not that she was bad then). Fittingly though, it is his scenes with Smith and Tennant that see him at his best; in fact, they are easily the finest moments of the episode.

But more of that later. Although the Time War and the War Doctor are the dramatic focus of the episode, they are held within a framework of other plots that bring in the other two Doctors. Tennant’s strand, set in the past as Ten romances the Virgin Queen, is the weakest; fun but disposable, and let down by a lacklustre performance from Joanna Page as Elizabeth 1^st. Tennant himself makes up for that somewhat, getting many of the episode’s funniest lines, with his romantic swagger turned up rather inappropriately to eleven, but taken apart from the wider arc, it’s rather daft, almost slapstick, without decent chemistry to anchor it. Smith’s strand, with mysterious shenanigans underneath the National Gallery, is far more interesting. Jemma Redgrave, one of the better guest stars of recent years, makes an excellent return, getting to turn in two decent performances for the price of one, not to mention one of the more compelling moral debates. The Zygon invasion plot, although weak in its initial stage, is actually a fascinating idea, and would have benefited from an episode or two dedicated purely to it, rather than utilising it as a sub-plot.

Of course, it was unlikely that the episode was going to focus on anything other than the Time War, no matter what might have been speculated, and what we see doesn’t disappoint. True, it might have been nice (in that horrifying way that global destruction can be entertaining when fictionalised) to have seen something more imaginative; much of the action that we see is Daleks fighting people in odd outfits with laser guns, and is therefore little different to any other SF action scene, which is disappointing given the four dimensional nature of it, but you have to make allowances for budget and time. Besides, the real interest is in the discussions, the moral debate over how to end the War, and whether it will be worth it.

Really, that is what so much of the show has been about, at root, since the revival eight years ago. But as the War Doctor would say, ‘No More’. Debate will probably rage until the hundredth anniversary about whether the change is justified; without going into too much technical detail, it seems to me to work perfectly well as an explanation of previous canon, rather than an alteration. More importantly though, it feels like a change for the better, and a change that is incredibly appropriate for this milestone.

I do not claim to be an expert on the show’s history and canon prior to the modern era, but it is definitely a darker, more dramatic beast than it once was, and this is in large part because of the Time War. The show may never have been sunshine and butterflies, but when it returned, it returned with a brooding protagonist quite clearly suffering from PTSD following the genocide of his entire people – including, as this episode shows, 2.47 billion children. And that was fine, and has been the background responsible for some of the show’s greatest moments…but it isn’t the entire character. The Doctor is not just the person who ended the Time War. Yes, ever since the show started, he has had a long tradition of stopping conflict, but he isn’t a warrior – hence the entire plot of ‘Day of the Doctor’. He’s a healer, an explorer, an adventurer. And in ‘Day of the Doctor’, Moffat has managed to fully reconcile the brooding, damaged, all-conquering myth with the grumpy old man who just wanted to see the universe.

The Doctor has hope again. What could be a better 50^th birthday present?

The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones

Starring: Lily Collins, Jamie Campbell Bower, Robert Sheehan, Lena Headey, Aiden Turner, Jonathan Rhys Meyers

Written by: Jessica Postigo (screenplay), book by Cassandra Clare

Directed by: Harald Zwart

The latest in Hollywood’s attempts to cash in on the post Twilight teen hysteria, City of Bones tells the story of Clary, a young woman in modern New York who wakes up one morning to find that she can see things no-one else can, most of which are horrifying or intriguingly pretty. I have to be honest. I’ve never read the books upon which the film is based, the trailer didn’t thrill me, and I wouldn’t have bothered going to see it if a friend and I had had anything better to do. I am apparently not alone in this; the sequel, which was due to start production this month, has been pushed back more or less indefinitely in the wake of a lacklustre opening weekend (as of September 19^th, it has internationally pulled in around $75,000,000, although it had a marketing budget alone of $60,000,000; with that sort of money, it’s a wonder any film makes a profit these days, but I digress). Cassandra Clare herself has gone on record as saying a delay in filming would probably be a good thing, having seen a draft of the script.

Having seen the film, it is easy to understand why the box office is disappointing, as there is little truly positive to say about it. The basic concept is one with potential – and in some respects, one I would like to see more of, albeit done with greater skill and quality – but is fairly uninspired. Cassandra Clare got her publishing contract in the wake of some popular and influential fanfiction stories for Harry Potter, so you might be forgiven for thinking that this was going to be something in the same vein. In reality, it is a fairly typical urban fantasy kitchen sink (vampires and werewolves and demons, oh my), with a liberal sprinkling of Twilight-esque romance. And leather. Lots of leather.

The early part of the film is quite interesting. We are slowly introduced to Clary – and you may well wonder about the closeness of that name to Cassandra Clare – and her artistic mother, and more importantly, Clary’s tendency to draw strange symbols apparently without realising it. Again, it’s not terribly revolutionary stuff, but it’s handled reasonably well, and there’s a nice chemistry between Collins and Sheehan as her best (and apparently only) friend Simon. Then, Clary sees a mysterious stranger in a mysterious club, and the plot really kicks in. This is a bad thing.

In large part, this is because Campbell Bower arrives on screen, playing the semi-angelic demon hunter Jace, and quite frankly it’s the worst performance I’ve seen in a very long time. You might think after seeing several of the Twilight films, I’d be a little more tolerant of – or at least resigned to – wooden performances, but Bower manages to deliver more such acting in one film than Pattinson, Stewart and Lautner packed into three films (I haven’t seen either part of Eclipse). I suppose from one perspective, that’s something to admire, but I can’t bring myself to be that generous. He has one facial expression and talks solely in monotone, whether he’s being commanding, sarcastic, or trying to display unbearable passion and sadness. Presumably someone somewhere decided his cheekbones made up for everything else, but that didn’t do much for me. It doesn’t help that the vast majority of his dialogue is truly awful; his delivery makes it worse, but it wouldn’t sound good coming from the mouth of the finest Shakespearian actor.

None of the cast really set the screen alight in fact, although in another similarity with the Twilight franchise, the side characters are far more entertaining than the main protagonists. Sheehan in particular has fun with a role that essentially involves pointing out how ridiculous everything is. Collins is probably the best value, but Clary isn’t a terribly interesting character as yet – or rather, there’s lots of potentially interesting stuff about her, but she seems to have been thrown into the character trope box and saddled with everything that stuck, leaving her a mesh of personality aspects rather than an actual character.

You can make that criticism about most of the film, to be honest; there’s an awful lot of stuff happening, but not much of it actually seems terribly important, not least because the already bland plot (a typical fantasy macguffin hunt) is sidelined a lot of the time in favour of the romantic angle, which involves Campbell Bower and therefore has all the passion of a haddock. The only interesting thing about it – and it must be said, this is a pretty unusual thing – is an eleventh hour twist which adds an intriguingly illicit edge to proceedings.

Elsewhere…well, the action scenes are entertaining enough, and some of the background concepts are fun – I’m particularly fond of JS Bach being a demon hunter. And kudos for being the first blockbuster this year that I can immediately think of to acknowledge the existence of gay characters. But essentially, this is a pretty generic film done without flair.

Riddick

Starring: Vin Diesel, Katee Sackhoff, Jordi Mollà, Matt Nable

Written by: David Twohy, Ken Wheat, Jim Wheat

Directed by: David Twohy

Way, way back in the year 2000, a little film by the name of Pitch Black was released. A low budget science-fiction thriller, it revolved around the crew and passengers of a crashed spaceship, trapped on a planet full of monstrous aliens that only came out at night, during an eclipse. It was a solid film, not particularly astounding in any respect, but taut and entertaining. It was followed in 2004 by The Chronicles of Riddick, which related the tale of Riddick’s battle against the Necromongers, a spacefaring race with mystical abilities. It was everything Pitch Black wasn’t; grandiose, epic, flabby, although I would have to admit to a slightly guilty appreciation for it.

In large part, this is due to Vin Diesel’s performance as Richard B. Riddick, notorious convict and murderer; while it is somewhat open to debate precisely how villainous he is, he is defiantly anti-heroic, but Diesel brings a certain feral charm to the role, making him if not necessarily entirely sympathetic, then at least someone you can engage with. And of course, he’s stupendously bad-ass. Seriously, in Chronicles he outruns the sun. Stupid, yes, but also rather awesome. It’s fortunate that he has this quality, as he is essentially the only surviving part of the previous film.

Chronicles of Riddick was not well received, for the reasons stated above, and it is telling that there is nearly a decade between Chronicles and Riddick. The new film attempts to rectify this by going back to basics: Riddick trapped on a hostile planet, forced to rely on only his wits and his ferocity to survive. And for the first half of the film, that’s more or less what he does. At the start, he’s badly injured, stripped of his ability to defend himself, and for probably the first time certainly on screen, we see him vulnerable. It isn’t spoiling anything to say that this doesn’t last long, in no small part because of some of the most macho surgery seen this year, but for quite a while, Riddick is almost more of a wild-life docu-drama than anything else. We see him rebuild, train and bond with a puppy (well, a space-puppy), and live what he seems to feel is the good life.

And then the plot kicks in.

This is a distinctly mixed blessing. On the one hand, it’s a much simpler affair than its predecessor. On the other hand, it’s essentially the same plot as Pitch Black. Almost literally the only difference in a synopsis would be that the monsters only come out when it’s raining rather than when it’s dark. Now, don’t get me wrong. There’s a lot to be said for a series of cool action scenes of people killing monstrous aliens, although Pacific Rim rather has that market sown up this year. However, if you’ve seen Pitch Black then you aren’t going to be surprised by anything after the halfway mark. As plots go, it’s perfectly serviceable, and there’s a nice sub-plot that calls back to earlier films, but essentially there’s nothing you haven’t seen before.

Equally, the expansion of the cast list at this stage works for and against the film. It does provide us with the film’s best sequence, with two groups of mercenaries holed up in a bunker while Riddick stalks them. It’s this sort of thing that the series has always done best; it’s an incredibly grim universe, and while Riddick is a fairly unpleasant person in many respects, he has always been slightly more likeable than at least one other member of the cast. At first, this rule holds firm. The first batch of mercenaries we meet are complete scum, and there’s an undeniable satisfaction in watching Riddick thin them out. The second bunch, though…well, while they’re not exactly well developed characters, they aren’t obviously unpleasant enough to make us root for Riddick over them. This is a problem; while it is, as I’ve said, somewhat open to debate as to how villainous Riddick is, when the people he’s hunting mostly appear to be relatively upstanding individuals, it rather undermines the whole point of the film.

Far, far worse though is the sexual attitude of the film. Of the thirteen or so cast members, discounting a brief flashback, only two are women. Not an unusual statistic in modern cinema, but of those two, the first, as played by Keri Lynn Hilson, gets literally two minutes of screentime, just long enough to establish her as a multiple rape victim but not long enough to give her a name before she is killed off to provide Riddick with a justification for killing the mercenaries (because the fact that they want to cut his head off and put it in a box wasn’t motivation enough). Then there’s Dahl (Sackhoff, and pronounced as Doll throughout), the strong, tough mercenary who emphatically declares that “I don’t fuck men.” Now, fair’s fair; given the wide variety of sexual identities present in the world, and accepting the possibility of an even more wide-ranging variety in a futuristic science-fiction universe, this doesn’t necessarily have to mean that she’s a lesbian, and it is certainly never explicitly stated. And it could be put down to Dahl trying to minimise sexual interest from her colleagues. However, it doesn’t seem to unreasonable to take her statement at its most obvious interpretation, which makes Riddick’s confident declaration that he’s going to finish his day’s work “balls deep” in her, but only after she’s asked deeply unsavoury. The fact that he succeeds is indicative of a sexual attitude that was distasteful in Goldfinger, and ought to have been consigned to the past long before then. That’s before we even consider the wholly gratuitous topless scene she has, and the fact that she suffers repeated rape attempts that, once again, serve only to highlight how unpleasant Mollà’s character is.

A film of two halves then. One is interesting and entertaining, the other is predictable and really rather sordid. Far from a must-see, but despite the above criticisms, it would be unfair to say that the film loses all semblance of quality after the halfway mark; it’s just a lot harder to sit back and enjoy the mindless entertainment.