ONTD

6:55 pm - 01/01/2013

CNN Is Like ONTD: They Hate Things Without Valid Reasons

'The Hobbit' One of the Top 10 Worst Movies in 2012 According to CNN



CNN.com writer Tom Charity has posted his 'The 10 worst movies of 2012' and decided to controversially include 'The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey' on the list. It should be noted, he specifically calls out the 48fps experience as being the 'worst' - not the actual film itself. Though he does take a dig at the length of the latest Middle-earth tome. The facts about 'The Hobbit' seem to paint a different picture: RottenTomatoes Critic index of 65%; RottenTomatoes audience rating of 81%; CinemaScore rating of 'A;' Ringer Review average of 4.5/5; Three week lead at the international box office; and breaking multiple December box office records. Looking at Mr. Charity's other films on the list, most have a RottenTomatoes.com rating of < 30% and only one breaks the 50% mark.

What Tom Charity Wrote:

Whatever you think of the film itself (and with at least one-third of the running time given over to padding, it's pretty indefensible), hands-down the worst experience at the movies this year was suffering the plastic high-definition 48 frames-per-second 3-D version of Peter Jackson's box-office smash. The technology made one of the most expensive movies ever made look like a PS3 game.

So what made Mr. Charity put 'The Hobbit' on his list? The easiest explanation is he really didn't like the 48fps experience as he states in the article.

His true intention is even more transparent. He simply wants more eyeballs and a bit of controversy. After all, he only continues to get paid if he remains interesting. (The quote from Zoolander comes to mind...'Dance Monkey, Dance!') So including a popular film on his 'worst of' list on a major outlet like CNN.com is sure to do just that. It will definitely cause some discussion.

Would you put 'The Hobbit' on your own worst list of 2012? Is Mr. Charity totally off base? Tell us what you think!

Source
I cannot deal with the stupidity of this writer. He basically hated The Hobbit because of the 48fps 3D version. What a FUCKING idiot. He just pulled the hate out of his ass cuz there was nothing else he could hate on. And there are 3 movies cuz PJ included EVERYTHING from the book and whatever else was mentioned of the Hobbit in the LOTR books.
bodyline 2nd-Jan-2013 03:51 am (UTC)
The problem is that LotR is in actuality a direct sequel. The reason for the differences in tone/etc is because it was written years and year later, and when he wrote the Hobbit he didn't intend to make a sequel. But after he did, he even intended to go back and rewrite the Hobbit to be more in-line with LotR (that's where the changes to the Riddles in the Dark chapter come from, iirc). And that's why there's all this extra information about that time period in the appendices.

And the thing is, even if the books come across as companion novels, there's no way to properly convey that on screen in a way that'll satisfy people or make sense. After the success of the first films and how beloved the books are as a set, PJ really couldn't make the Hobbit as a straight adaption and ignore all the LotR stuff. It would have been the biggest elephant in the room ever if they had.
lucciolaa 2nd-Jan-2013 03:54 am (UTC)
Interesting, I didn't know that Tolkien meant to go back and change the tone of The Hobbit.
bodyline 2nd-Jan-2013 03:55 am (UTC)
PJ and Stephen Colbert talked about it a bit during his Hobbit Week interview.
lucciolaa 2nd-Jan-2013 03:57 am (UTC)
oic I haven't been following the interview circuit wrt the film
bodyline 2nd-Jan-2013 03:59 am (UTC)
Neither did I much tbh, but I really liked Stephen's interviews with them since he's such a huge Tolkien geek. HOMEBOY KNEW HIS SHIT
hannahstarr 2nd-Jan-2013 04:10 am (UTC)
yes, he tried to basically re-write the Hobbit and his publishers were like fuck no because it would have made the Hobbit more in line with the "adult" tone of LOTR.

(I put adult in quotes because I was reading an essay by Tolkien the other day where he explains that he feels that stories shouldn't be dumbed down for children. So I don't think he would have viewed the LOTR as something children shouldn't read. Obviously his publishers disagreed)

lucciolaa 2nd-Jan-2013 04:12 am (UTC)
Yeah, I certainly don't consider LOTR adult, just darker in themes and tone. Maybe a little more grown up, but not a strict divide.
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