Reeling Backward: "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy, extended edition (2001-03)

I've in a groove. (Some might say a rut.) Exploring Ralph Bakshi's fantasy animation rekindled thoughts of his version of "The Lord of the Rings," which led me back to the Peter Jackson-directed trilogy of the early 2000s.

The 1978 animated film, which ended suddenly a little more than halfway through the novel -- even with skipping large volumes of material -- was sorta/kinda "finished" with the release the following year of a TV movie, "The Return of the King."

Bakshi was not actually involved in the second film, which picked up at roughly the same point his left off but featured a completely different voice cast. It was made by the same team that had done the lackluster 1977 animated version of "The Hobbit," and they apparently changed gears when they heard Bakshi's LOTR saga would not be completed. They even turned it into a musical, for God's sake.

Nightmares of "Frodo of the Nine Fingers" still haunt me at night.

In contrast to this slapdash effort, the live action trilogy was carefully planned from start to finish, with most of the principle photography for all three films completed over a contiguous one-year shoot in New Zealand. Jackson and his screenwriting team also wisely chose to separate J. R. R. Tolkien's 1,000+ page novel into three separate parts, as has generally been done during its printing history: "The Fellowship of the Ring," "The Two Towers" and "The Return of the King."

For our purposes here I'm going to deal with them as one work, and specifically the longer, extended editions that were released on video within a year or two after "RotK."

Specifically, I want to focus on how the movies differ from the book, and how the extended versions for home video vary from the theatrical films. And why I think that, although the extended versions are superior, they're specifically better for the more leisurely experience of watching them at home instead of a movie theater.

To wit: let me be up front and say I did not watch the trilogy in one sitting. With additions the extended versions hit right around four hours per movie, adding somewhere between 30 and 50 minutes of screen time to each. I watched them over a one-week period with my 9-year-old as my enthusiastic companion. My 6-year-old was also there some of the time, flitting in and out as his interest waxed or waned.

I should also preface that I am a lifelong fan of LOTR and was both excited and greatly afeard of the project before the first movie came out. The Bakshi film and its wayward "sequel" are pretty universally loathed by true fantasy fans as kiddie cartoon bastardizations of a great work of literature.

Perhaps the biggest way the movies differ from the books, and the extended version from the theatrical, is the love affair between Aragorn and Arwen. If you had just read the book (and not the long appendices) you'd wonder if there even was a romance going on. It's barely mentioned in passing in the text.

This interracial affair between Man and Elf is a continuation of another romance, between Beren and Lúthien, that previously occurred in Tolkien's vast mythology of Middle-earth. You have to dive into his much less readable works like "The Silmarillion" and "Unfinished Tales" to get at that stuff.

Suffice it to say that Arwen's father, Elrond, disapproves of their love. He wants Arwen to take the ships west to the Undying Lands -- roughly the immortals' equivalent of passing into the after-life -- and Aragorn to take up the throne of Gondor. Aragorn and Arwen try to do their duty but find the pull between them too strong to resist.

Uplifting this romance, nearly to the point of having it equal Frodo's quest to destroy the One Ring, essentially makes Aragorn the trilogy's co-leading character. In the books, he's a sort of generic, stolid hero-type who mostly stays in the background, doing his derring-do, until nearly the end.

In the films we watch him gradually transform from surly Ranger to reluctant leader of the Fellowship to a kingly figure embracing the incredible weight of his destiny.

Among the added or extended scenes, we learn more about Aragorn's lonely childhood upbringing among the elves, how the romance came to be and how their love for each other presses heavily on their actions. "The Two Towers" in particular is replete with quite languid flashbacks and visions that help us embrace their melancholy.

There is also a lot more footage of the relationship between Aragorn and Eowyn, the princess of Rohan who falls in love with him. The extended editions have a number of interactions added not in the book, from taming a wild horse to the revelation that the long-lived man of Númenor is 87 years old at the time of the events in LOTR, having fought alongside King Théoden's grandfather during his wandering years.

Eowyn's ache is quite palpable in the longer version, and the addition of glances and dialogue heightens our sense that he returns her affection in at least some way. (This takes place during the section where he mistakenly believes Arwen has departed Middle-Earth.)

The additions also flesh out Eowyn's character to a much greater degree, so at the moment when he dismisses her -- "It is but a thought and a shadow that you love; I cannot give you what you seek" -- her pain is sharply palpable. It colors her subsequent decision to secretly accompany the men to war as not just proto-feminist bravery but the actions of someone who has truly given up on life.

Another character who sees a lot more screen time and shadings than in the book or theatrical movies is Faramir. When I first read the book, he instantly became my favorite character: an introverted, scholarly figure whose worth is often discounted in a world of men-at-arms. Living eternally in the shadow of his older brother, Boromir, Faramir is openly scorned by his father, Denethor, the increasingly mad Steward of Gondor.

The late romance between Faramir and Eowyn is given, I think, just a few sentences in Tolkien's text, and got even less in the theatrical films. Here we get a couple of sequences of their interaction, and we grasp how these two, wounded in body and soul, would find refuge in each other's company.

One addition to the extended versions I'm not especially keen on is Faramir's interaction with Frodo and Sam on their journey to Mount Doom. In the extended version Faramir forces them to return with him as far as the river fortress of Osgiliath -- quite a diversion from their journey, both geographically and thematically -- before allowing them to continue on their way. This never happens in the book.

Ostensibly this makes sense, since Faramir learns of the Ring and seeks to give it to Denethor as a way to show his "quality" to his father. But from a strictly narrative standpoint, it feels like a bit of a bait-and-switch, creating tension solely for the purpose of releasing it.

I have the same quibble with Treebeard initially refusing the plea from Merry and Pippin to declare war on Saruman, something wholly absent from the book. The ents have their (ridiculously overlong) entmoot and say no, preferring to weather out the coming storm. The hobbits trick Treebeard into taking them south, instead of west, so that he can witness the destruction of his beloved trees of Fanghorn Forest by Saruman and become enraged into action.

Aside from the obvious question -- how would the halflings know Saruman had done this? -- it again feels like a screenwriting ploy that's too clever by half. It also presents a logistical impossibility, of Treebeard being able to travel for hours through his forest for what must be dozens of miles, do a little toodley-toot to call the other ents, and having them appear almost instantly.

I caught one other temporal incongruity created by the addition of the extended footage. In this case Sam and Frodo, having finally made it inside the rim of Mordor, talk about having to "find a way down" to the plains below infested with orcs. We then cut to a discussion of the surviving leaders after the battle of Gondor, followed by a mustering of their forces and riding to the Black Gate many leagues away to draw Sauron's eye and armies. Then we cut back to the hobbits arriving at the bottom just in time to watch the orcs shuffling away.

So we have parallel timelines conjoined even though one action must have taken, at most, a couple of hours and another that would have needed, at a minimum, a few days' time.

Gimli the dwarf and Legolas the elf get bits and pieces of added screen time, mostly to affirm their growing friendship. Their friendly competition in killing the most orcs, which seems like a Hollywood add-on but is right there in the book, is given a few extra beats.

Similarly, Merry and Pippin are both rounded out a bit more, with some shadings to make them seem more than just fun-loving rapscallions. I also enjoyed the addition of the little subplot about them growing much taller as a result of drinking Treebeard's ent draught, with commensurate one-upmanship.

Within Tolkien's book the younger two hobbits are supposed to be in their "tweens," aka in their 20s, which would make them about late teen years for humans -- so not beyond the possibility of a late growth spurt, with a little entish help.

Speaking of ages, Tolkien was quite specific about those of Frodo and Bilbo. At the time of their shared birthday party that launches the book and films, Frodo is turning 33 (roughly 21 for human), signifying full adulthood, and Bilbo is turning 111. However, the movies omit the 17 years that passes between the party and the beginning of Frodo's quest with the ring.

Both Frodo and Bilbo were about 50 when they had their great adventures, which would be approaching middle age for humans. I think that greatly colors Frodo's personal journey. Elijah Wood was only 19 when they began shooting the movie, and was fresh-faced as a new apple. By the end of RotK, he legitimately seems decades older.

It's also harder to explain such a large gap of time in a cinematic version than one on the page. It makes it seem like Gandalf, Elrond, Galadriel and the other leaders of the resistance against Sauron were tragically inept. As one of the five Istari sent by the godlike Valar to Middle-earth to oppose the enemy, what else exactly has Gandalf to do?

Maybe he was off spending too much time infatuated with the halflings' tobacco leaf, as Saruman mocks.

Samwise Gamhee also is greatly elevated in the extended versions of the films, almost to the point of being the dominant character in the last film. Many people were vexed when Sean Astin did not receive an Oscar nomination for his performance, and my recent viewing has only served to underscore those complaints.

In many ways, Sam is the heart and soul of LOTR. Not coincidentally, both Tolkien's book and the extended version end with his return to Bag End.

With regard to the film's historic haul of Academy Awards, "The Return of the King" won an astonishing 11, despite not receiving a single acting nomination, which must represent some kind of record. It also won in every single category in which it was nominated, besting the batting averages of even "Ben-Hur" and "Titanic," which also won 11 each, the most ever.

Finally, let us talk of Tom Bombadil.

None of the film versions of LOTR have even attempted to depict him. Even Peter Jackson saw no reason to include him in the extended versions. His part in the story is not long, and surely could've been handled in 10 minutes, or even less.

But I understand the reason for the omission. He's a mysterious figure, resembling a dwarf but having druid-like powers over his domain. Indeed, his Old Forest on the borders of the Shire is described as being very similar to Fanghorn, overgrown and dark of mood, and in many ways he's analogous to Treebeard. He's depicted as being the one entity in Middle-earth who is immune to the temptations of the One Ring.

In the end, the hobbits' encounter with Bombadil is little more than a diversion that forces them to tarry on the way to Bree, which is where the story really picks up. The only thing notable that happens in his company is when Tom rescues them from the barrow-wights and gives their ancient blades to the halflings. In the movie, Aragorn simply pulls them out and hands them over.

Reading a book and watching a movie in a theater are very different experiences, and watching a movie at home is more different from the cinema than we would think.

In general I think two hours is about the most amount of time a person can concentrate deeply on an activity without needing a mental (or bladder-related) break. We're human and our minds begin to wander, even if we are intellectually and emotionally engaged. None of the LOTR movies were distributed with an intermission like "Lawrence of Arabia" or other long films of antiquity.

(For the record, 2003's "Gods and Generals" was the last one to include one, and I don't believe there had been another since "Gandhi" in 1982.)

My DVD edition of the extended versions each came with two discs about two hours each, so we essentially watched the movie in six parts. This makes for a very satisfying experience, as we can enjoy the enhanced storytelling and have time to think about it in between.

I'm not here to tell which version of "The Lord of the Rings" is "best." The book is its own singular experience, with Tolkien's dense imagination and writing style of the language-loving academic he was. I wouldn't be the first to admit that I tend to skim over his long stanzas of poems and songs.

The theatrical movies were marvels, made for the big screen. And the extended director's cut, or whatever we want to call them, are a more sumptuous experience for watching at home.

Watching the last credits roll to the end, I let Annie Lennox's marvelous "Into the West" wash over me, with almost heartbeat-like pulses of emotion. "The Lord of the Rings" represents the apex of the fantasy genre on film, even better than anything during pop culture's brief fascination with these kinds of movies 20 years earlier.

Fantasy has largely moved to television shows and streaming platforms, with wildly varying degrees of success. For every "Game of Thrones," there's a crappy show with shallow-end actors swinging swords or miming spells.

But there will only be one "The Lord of the Rings" -- even if there are now several ways to experience it.

Review: "Cats"

Welcome to the 15-minute review exercise! That's how much time I have to write this on my lunch break, so you can feel free to compare it to my more studied musings.

First of all, I am a "Cats" virgin. Which is to say I had no experience or knowledge of the stage musical going in. I knew it had people dressed as cats, there was that one ubiquitous "Memory" song, and... that was it.

My understanding is the film version diverges in ways large and small from the Andrew Lloyd Webber stage version. Victoria, who is more or less a sideshow dancer live, is the main or at least the central character here, playing a castaway kitten who is our eyes and ears into the story.

Played by ballet star Francesca Hayward, a film newcomer, Victoria doesn't have a strong character of her own but spends most of the time mouth agape with awestruck eyes reacting to the stuff around her. Her dancing is unsurprisingly magnificent, as if she is not bound to the earth like the rest of us. She also has a great singing voice, like the peal of a clear, pure bell.

Frankly, I much preferred hearing her than Taylor Swift, who is being played up as the star of the movie. She actually has only one scene, a musical number that's one of the weaker in the movie. She isn't even talking about her own character, but acting as an emcee introducing Macavity, the villain of the piece played by Idris Elba.

Indeed, most of the musical numbers are a showcase for one particular cat to talk about their life and experiences. For example, Ian McKellen plays Gus (short for Asparagus), a decrepit old "theater cat" whose soliloquy is basically him relating past greatness. Like a few other non-singers who were cast, McKellen does the "talk-singing" thing that Jimmy Cagney first made famous.

I suppose I need to talk about the cat outfits. They're good... and weird. The film uses a combination of costumes and makeup with CGI for the ears and tails. They don't look anything like cats, just humans playing as cats. Some are better than others. Elba looks way too big and muscle-y for the get-up.

Weirdly, some of the cats wear shoes while others are barefoot, and they look like human feet rather than cat's paws. Some wear people clothing, hats and jewelry, while some like Victoria are essentially nude, which makes the PG rating from the MPAA seem a little incongruous.

Some actors you will recognize, like Rebel Wilson and James Corden, McKellen and Judi Dench. Others are dancers or musicians you may or may not have heard of, like Jason Derulo as Rum Tum Tugger, a capricious show-off.

The story is... straight bonkers. I couldn't make sense of it while the movie was going, and then when I read a summary of it for research afterwards I thought I had stumbled onto the secret Scientology texts or something.

Set in London we follow the tribe of "Jellicle" street cats who are in the annual process of deciding which of them will be picked to make the journey to the Heaviside Layer and be reborn into a new life. It's unclear if this marks their progression between the nine proverbial cat lives, or the end of them.

Each candidate cat performs their story and the Jellicle leader, Old Deuteronomy (a male on stage but played here by Dench), picks the "winner."

Some cats are in the front of the story, while others come and go. There's a tap-dancing "railway cat" who shows up and then leaves. Some cats get zapped by Macavity and imprisoned on a barge on the Thames, and no one notices them missing. There's twin troublemaker cats and a snobbish besuited cat and... well, you get the idea.

The last big part is Jennifer Hudson as Grizabella, a former "glamor cat" who is shunned by the others for reasons that are never hinted it. She gets to sing the iconic "Memory" song in several reprises, which is a lovely tune but when you listen to the lyrics in the context of the story are totally baffling.

Apparently Grizabella was once beloved and now is lonely and she yearns to be touched. (Sounds like my teen years.) Otherwise she'll have to wander among the lamplights and wait for a new day to begin with more ostracism, and singing.

I'm also just going to throw this out there: Am I the only one who was bothered by the copious snot trails coming out of Hudson's nostrils and streaming into her mouth while she sang? I'm sort of gobsmacked that no makeup person or PA on the set handed her a tissue between takes. Or while they were CGIing in the tails they don't wipe that out.

I like emotion in movies but draw the line at people consuming their own bodily secretions on camera.

The parts of "Cats" that work well work really well. I quite liked Laurie Davidson as Mr. Mistoffelees, a magician cat whose tricks usually don't come off very well and thus he has some pretty crushing self-esteem issues. He gets his own big musical number that, other than "Memory," is probably the best in the flick.

The parts that don't work are embarrassing or just boring. Several of the comedic numbers just aren't very funny; Wilson's is a case in point. A lot of the time I struggled to make out the words the cats were singing, other than they all seem to come down to "Hey I'm a cat so I'm doing cat stuff."

The film ends with a musical number that is so incredibly flat and purposeless that I can't believe in nearly 40 years of "Cats" no one has ever shouted at the curtain call, "Cut that last song, it's terrible."

But again, this is all new territory for me. "Cats" is still kinda magical in a goofy sort of way. No disbelief is suspended but it at least gets set aside for awhile.

Video review: "Beauty and the Beast"

When “Beauty and the Beast” came out in March, I asked why a live-action remake of one of the best animated films of all time even needed to exist. Since then, the movie has provided its own reasons: 1.23 billion of them, to be exact. That’s the film’s global box office take in dollars as of this writing.

It’s a well-crafted film, bright and engaging and full of vivid characters. No doubt there is a new generation of moviegoers who experienced this timeless tale for the first time, since the 1991 animated version now falls into “classic film” category, as strange as it may seem.

I can only hope they experienced as much joy and thrills I had when I first saw Belle and the Beast dance together for the first time.

But I bet not.

Let’s start with the fact that Emma Watson has many wonderful qualities, but a singer she is not. Her frail little voice just can’t carry big Broadway-style show tunes (by lyricist Howard Ashman and composer Alan Menken). Her Belle doesn’t have that sense of hesitation we admired, existing more as a latter-day proto-feminist.

I also didn’t care for the look of the Beast (Dan Stevens), who can’t help looking like a dude in a fur suit. It seemed like the filmmakers were trying to turn him more into a classic romantic figure than a tragic, magically cursed prince.

The story is well-known: inquisitive young girl comes to be the prisoner of the Beast, who is trapped in his castle along with his entire staff of servants by a fell hex placed on him a decade earlier. If he doesn’t find someone to love him soon, the curse will remain forever.

Luke Evans plays the villain, martial hunter Gaston, who covets Belle for himself. Josh Bad is his right-hand henchman, LeFou, who does some pining of his own.

Rounding out the vocal cast are Emma Thompson, Ewan McGregor, Audra McDonald, Ian McKellen and Stanley Tucci. Kevin Kline plays Belle’s (live-action) father.

There are four brand-new songs in addition to all the originals from the animated movie, though only one, “Days in the Sun,” is memorable.

Billion-dollar payday or not, there’s just very little magic in seeing a virtual shot-by-shot remake of one of the most beloved films ever.

Bonus features are truly wondrous, though you’ll have to buy the Blu-ray version to get nearly all of them. The DVD contains only a music video.

There are about 10 minutes of deleted scenes, as well as an extended version of “Days in the Sun.” A sing-a-long version lets you jump straight to all the songs.

Perhaps the neatest feature is “Enchanted Table Read,” in which the cast carries out an elaborate table read of the film, including singing, dances and set pieces.

There is also a making-of documentary and several featurettes focusing on the people in front of and behind the cameras.

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Review: "Beauty and the Beast"

Time passes for us all, and for the movies. Since “Beauty and Beast” came out in 1991 and became regarded as one of the greatest animated films of all time, an entire generation has been born, grown up and started having babies of their own. Though it might make some of us feel old to say, it’s passing into cinematic antiquity.

I walked into the 2017 live-action remake with but a single word of question on my lips: “Why?” I left without grasping any kind of answer.

The new movie, starring Emma Watson and Dan Stevens, is almost a shot-by-shot remake of the animated film, with a few extra flourishes and minor changes. They reuse the Oscar-winning musical score by lyricist Howard Ashman and composer Alan Menken, with four new songs by Menken and Tim Rice that don’t measure up to the old stuff.

Most of the cast spends the movie in CGI form as enchanted clocks, teapots, harpsichords, wardrobes, candelabras, etc. Directed by Bill Condon (“Mr. Holmes”), it’s a beautiful, colorful film with energetic musical numbers, distinctive characters and an ageless love story.

And it has no reason for existing.

I’m not a purist on remakes and sequels. If you can make something that adds to the mythology of a film, or extends the characters and their individual arcs, then you’ll get no arguments from me. Disney has launched a number of live action remakes of its classic animated flicks, including “Cinderella” and “The Jungle Book,” and I’ve liked almost all of them.

But this one feels different… hollow, somehow. The tragic love story of the Beast (Stevens) and Belle (Watson) lacks the gut-churning emotional wrench of 1991. The best thing about the animated movie was its unexpected dramatic heft. That had the tone of “Romeo and Juliet.” This new one is the TV sitcom version.

It’s not helped by Watson’s singing voice, which is unequal to the task of carrying songs. That’s become a thing lately: casting non-singers as the leads in musicals. (See “Land, La La.”) Maybe it’s time to reconsider.

Stevens’ portrayal of the Beast using a mix of costume, makeup and CGI doesn’t exactly work, either. He looks like a smaller, softer, prettier version of the animated Beast. Even his leonine nose swoops down appealingly toward a modest snarl. I liked the cartoon Beast’s busted, crooked honker and every-which-way fangs. The new one looks like he got Jenny Craig and a plastic surgeon.

You know the story: village bookworm Belle stumbles into the castle of the Beast looking for her lost father, Maurice (Kevin Kline, changed from inventor to artist here). The master of the house and all his servants have been hexed with a terrible curse, which will become permanent if the magic rose loses its last petal before he finds true love. Belle agrees to become his prisoner in exchange for dad, and antagonism gives way to blooming romance.

The heavy is again Gaston (Luke Evans), the swaggering musclebound hunter/soldier who desires Belle for himself. Josh Gad, as the flunkie LeFou, adds notes of jaded longing for his longtime companion. Some people are upset about having a (more or less) openly homosexual character in a Disney movie, but I was more perturbed he falls into the weary cliché of gay man pining for an unavailable straight.

Ewan McGregor takes over the Lumiere role of rapscallion candelabra; Emma Thompson is Mrs. Potts, and does a reasonably good job warbling the title song; Ian McKellen is unctuous butler Cogsworth; Audra McDonald is the operatic wardrobe; Stanley Tucci is a new character as the wardrobe’s musical and marital accompanist.

Originally they were going to weave some of the songs from the stage musical version into the movie, but instead went with four new ones. Two are just short trifles, while the Beast’s “Evermore” is a bland Broadway hollerer. Though “Days in the Sun,” sung by Watson with help from the supporting characters, more adequately explores the dilemma of the servants caught up in their master’s curse.

I think the lesson is if you’re going to remake a beloved classic, you need to let it evolve. Take some risks, change it around and see how audiences react. They may not like it as much. But there’s no magic in mere repetition.

Video review: "Mr. Holmes"

Some of the best stories involve taking a well-known, even tired narrative and putting a clever twist on it. In “Mr. Holmes,” we get to hang out with Sherlock Holmes, who here is presented as a real person, now 93 years old and mentally doddering.

Expertly played by the great Ian McKellen, it’s an exploration of the hero myth when the hero has lost his grasp on the very thing that made him revered.

Directed by Bill Condon (“Gods and Monsters”) from a screenplay by Jeffrey Hatcher, based on a novel by Mitch Cullin, “Mr. Holmes” finds the storied sleuther long retired and living in a remote farmhouse with his housekeeper (Laura Linney) and her precocious son, Roger (Milo Parker), whom he befriends. His former partner Watson made him famous by writing about their cases, though Holmes feels too many liberties were taken with the facts.

His memory is failing, and Holmes is trying far-out remedies to restore it, like jelly made from a rare Japanese plant. Meanwhile, he is vexed in trying to accurately recall his final case from decades ago, which caused him to give up the detective business forever.

Essentially, Holmes is investigating himself, leveraging the remains of a formerly formidable intellect to grasp for new understanding about the things in life that are truly important. He’s a man who has always prized the logical aspect of human behavior, and learns that the emotional part is less easily mastered.

“Mr. Holmes” is one of those movies where not a lot really happens, but we’re overjoyed by its subtle little perambulations.

Alas, special features are… not so special. The DVD and blu-ray both come with just two making-of featurettes.

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Video review: "The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies"

With the final film in the “Hobbit” trilogy, the Tolkien train has finally rumbled to its last cinematic stop -- assuming, that is, that director Peter Jackson & Co. aren’t intending to turn the barely readable “The Silmarillion” into a 57-part television series.

(Shhh… don’t give them ideas.)

I’ve appreciated the scope and splendor of this 13-year enterprise to turn one of my most beloved literary touchstones into movies that have been, by and large, magical. But if I could give a two-word review of “The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies,” it would be “too much.”

There are too many secondary characters and side plots, most of them greatly expanded from things barely whispered at in author J.R.R. Tolkien’s slender tome -- or simply invented out of whole cloth by the filmmakers.

As you can guess from the title, the tale of a band of dwarves trying to reclaim their mountain kingdom from a dragon usurper ends with a massive war wherein the various races of Middle-earth squabble over the spoils. Humble hobbit Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman) is literally caught in the middle, and his choices have an outsized effect on the course of history.

Other key players include Thorin Oakenshield (Richard Armitage), heir to the dwarven throne and ensorcelled by the foul magic of the dragon’s gold; Gandalf (Ian McKellen), wise wizard and counselor to the adventurers; Bard (Luke Evans), the stout warrior who brings down the beast; Thranduil (Lee Pace), the headstrong elven monarch; Legolas (Orlando Bloom), Thranduil’s son and carryover from the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy; Tauriel (Evangeline Lilly), a totally invented and unnecessary female elf warrior; and Azog (Manu Bunnett), the fearsome albino orc leader.

The battle scenes are epic in scope, but the gentle story of a hobbit’s journey there and back again gets swallowed.

Bonus features consist of five making-of featurettes: “Recruiting the Five Armies,” “Completing Middle-earth,” “The Last Goodbye: Behind the Scenes,” “The Last Goodbye Music Video” and “New Zealand: Home of Middle-earth, Part 3.”

As with the previous two movies, in a few months they will release a special extended version of “The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies” with an expanded cut of the film and better extras. Though what they could possibly add to this overstuffed meal, I can’t imagine.

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Review: "The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies"

Unlike the triumphant finale of the three “The Lord of the Rings” films, the last movie in “The Hobbit” trilogy feels more like the grateful collapse at the end of an overlong marathon.

With regards to “The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies,” the audience won’t exactly be exclaiming, “Thank goodness that’s over!” But like an overambitious runner who found they’d signed up for a more grueling race than anticipated, the series concludes with quite a bit less enthusiasm and energy than when it started.

As I’ve said in my reviews of the previous two movies: the Middle-Earth of author J.R.R. Tolkien is perhaps my most treasured mythological playground. I grew up adoring these books, dreaming of hobbits, orcs, magical rings and dragons. You could set pretty much any story in this realm and I’d be first in line to buy a ticket.

But director Peter Jackson and his co-screenwriters have so twisted, changed and augmented Tolkien’s straightforward tale that it barely even deserves to have “The Hobbit” in its title. They’ve expanded slender storylines into major themes; turned behind-the-scenes events barely hinted at into full-blown subplots; and in many cases, just plain ol’ made a bunch of crap up.

It’s still a rousing picture after a slow start – things don’t really get going into the titular battle is joined.

In case you don’t remember, humble hobbit Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman) had been plucked by deposed dwarven heir to the throne Thorin (Richard Armitage) and meddling wizard Gandalf (Ian McKellen) to help reclaim the Lonely Mountain taken over long ago by a fearsome dragon.

As this movie opens, the great wyrm Smaug (voice by Benedict Cumberbatch) has been roused from his slumbers and is attacking Lake-town, the tiny fishing village built on docks into the lake next the mountain. Dutiful bowman Bard (Luke Evans) takes up arms against the dragon and brings him down.

But Thorin, driven mad by a lust for gold from “dragon sickness,” refuses to share any of the great wealth of the mountain with the refugees of Lake-town. And he certainly wants nothing to do with the elven king Thranduil (Lee Pace), who previously kept the company prisoner and now wants his own slice of the pie.

It seems likely to come to a nasty conflict, but meanwhile the Orc armies led by the terrifying Azog (Manu Bennett) are bearing down on them all. The last half of the movie or so is essentially just a bunch of swordplay.

In the book Bilbo got knocked unconscious at the start of the fighting, and thus everything that transpired went undepicted. Jackson & Co., of course, couldn't do that with a big-budget spectacle, so we get a whole raft of CGI beheadings and splatterings (though curiously bloodless, to keep the PG-13 rating intact).

The best of the "add-on" material involves the effort by Gandalf and other powerful sorcerers -- including Galadriel (Cate Blanchett) and Saruman (Christopher Lee) -- to force out the evil force that has invaded the fortress of Dol Guldur. As we know, it turns out to be the shade of Sauron, who will go on to cause more trouble down the road. It's a brief but thrilling side excursion.

Other new material is less successful, especially a contrived romance between one of the dwarves and an entirely concocted female elf character (Evangeline Lilly). This results in a love triangle with familiar friend Legolas (Orlando Bloom), plus his daddy issues with the king, and a journey up north that appears to serve no narrative purpose at all.

I was thrilled with what this team of filmmakers did with the "Lord of the Rings," occasionally altering the navigation but keeping the terrain intact. Here, though, they seem like they weren't content with the tale Tolkien spun, and decided to supplant it with their own.

It's still a decent fantasy flick; it's just not "The Hobbit."

Video review: "X-Men: Days of Future Past"

Once storytelling franchises have been around while -- especially ones involving science fiction and/or super-heroes -- it can be hard for filmmakers to find enough creative real estate to let their imaginations sprawl. After all, histories have been set, great and terrible deeds done, characters evolved or killed off, and it's a bad notion to retread over familiar territory.

So what to do? More and more, these movies are going retcon.

Retconning is when a new set of creators essentially reboots everything we know about a mythos, blanking the slate so they can start over from a zero point of their own choosing. "Star Trek" did this recently, and now the X-Men comic book heroes have, too.

This bold new film, the best super-hero flick since "The Avengers," looks at a post-apocalyptic world where nearly all mutants have been destroyed by the menacing robotic Sentinels. Clawed, nearly unkillable warrior Wolverine (Hugh Jackman) is sent 50 years into the past to occupy the mind of his younger self, and must convince the Professor X of that era (James McAvoy), who is wallowing in a pit of self-pity, to take action to prevent the terrible tide.

That means diverting power-mad frenemy Magneto (Michael Fassbender) and shape-shifting skulduggerer Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) from their mission to make mutants the master of regular humans rather than the object of their hatred. Needless to say, they're not happy to go along.

There's one scene that may just be the most entertaining action sequence of the summer, and it involves a new mutant named Quicksilver who is so fast he practically lives in his own dimension of time.

A satisfying mix of action, convincing characterizations and plot twists, "X-Men: Days of Future Past" delivers one for the ages.

Video extras are quite hefty, and include deleted scenes with audio commentary by director Bryan Singer, a gag reel, gallery and several making-of featurettes.

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Review: "X-Men: Days of Future Past"

I am the guy who has been known to complain about superhero movies being too somber and serious. But I don't think it's a contradiction to celebrate that same quality in the new X-Men film.

In other comic books and movies, superheroes were usually regular folks who acquired powers through happenstance. Even if they might struggle with controlling them or the implications of their newfound responsibilities, these stories rode an underlying fantasy about becoming special.

The X-Men were always different. They were mutants, born the way they were, and their powers were not a source of joy but an instrument for prejudice and even hatred. And the stakes were always higher: X-Men comics were the only ones I read as a boy where people died on a pretty regular basis.

"X-Men: Days of Future Past" is based on the concept of a 1981 storyline in which a future was envisioned where mutants had lost the war against their kind, with most of our favorite characters having been killed by monstrous Sentinel robots. It also attempts -- quite successfully in my estimation -- to combine the original X-Men trilogy from the last decade with the 2011 "First Class" movie that depicted the nascent days of the mutant movement in the 1960s.

Pop culture aficionados will recognize this as "retconning," in which storytellers retroactively alter the mythology of a franchise to fit their new schemes. (They recently did this with the "Star Trek" flicks.) But this is the mother of all retconning, in which both the present and future of the X-Men, as established in the previous films, are cleverly made to go kerbloowie.

In tackling this ambitious new project, they brought back original director Bryan Singer, who along with screenwriter Simon Kinberg manage to make a movie that is at once entertaining and sobering.
There's a darkness and a grandiosity to "X-Men: Days of Future Past" that has been missing from these movies.

Initially set in the near future, we witness a world where telepath Charles Xavier (Patrick Stewart) and his few surviving students fight against the Sentinels, which can adapt to and even copy the powers of mutants. Losing seems inevitable, so they hatch a plan to send the consciousness of animalistic warrior Logan (Hugh Jackman) 50 years into the past, inhabiting his younger self in 1973.

There, he must convince a distraught Xavier (now played by James McAvoy) to join with his friend-turned-arch-enemy Magneto (Michael Fassbender) to prevent the assassination of a power-mad scientist named Trask (a terrific Peter Dinklage) that sets off the war against mutants.

At the center of the mission is heading off Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence), a shape-shifting assassin whose loyalties lie somewhere between the just-get-along sentiments of Xavier and the them-or-us creed of Magneto.

What makes this movie work is that even as we bounce through all these intrigues about robots and time travel and telepathy, the filmmakers never forget to focus on the characters. So the emnity between Xavier and Magneto feels personal, and Logan's battle between his berserker side and his better instincts has a tragic note.

Not that they forgot to include some terrific action scenes. Some of the best involve Quicksilver (Evan Peters), a super-fast teen who lives in a world that's almost another dimension, since he can do dozens of things in the blink of an eye. One scene where the team is breaking Magneto out of an impregnable prison is an utter delight.

Where do the X-Men go from here? Wait until after the credits for a (vague) glimpse. All I know is this movie blows up the franchise while also delivering the best film we've seen in the series.

Video review: "The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug"

"The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug" is now the fifth film to be spun out of the books of J.R.R. Tolkien, each tipping near or over three hours, so it's no surprise if casual fans of the sword-and-sorcery universe of Middle-Earth are growing a bit fatigued by now.

If you dismissed the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy as a whole bunch of walking with too many endings, then you might well be put off by the prospect of director Peter Jackson finding three movies worth of material in Tolkien's earlier, slenderer tome.

I still enjoyed the movie quite a bit, though they've ratcheted up the action set-pieces considerably over those in the book, and introduced or expanded a bunch of other characters. The net effect does tend to diminish humble hobbit Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman) as the central figure of the story.

As the second film in the trilogy opens, Bilbo and his troupe of dwarves have survived a deadly trip over and under goblin-filled mountains, and must now face the daunting Mirkwood Forest rife with giant spiders and less-than-friendly elves. At the end of their journey lies Smaug (voiced by Benedict Cumberbatch), the fearsome dragon who usurped the dwarves' homeland long ago.

Jackson and his screenwriters tend to skip over some of the best stuff in the book and substitute it with concoctions of their own that aren't nearly as compelling -- such as a made-up elven she-warrior (Evangeline Lilly) who strikes up an unlikely flirtation with one of the dwarves.

Your interest level for this movie will likely fall in line with your ardor for Dungeons & Dragons-type of stories. If you deem it all a bunch of adolescent silliness, best to steer clear. For those (like me) who let their geek flags fly proudly, "Smaug" is essential viewing.

As with previous iterations of Jackson's Tolkien movies, video extras are just ample enough to leave you hungry for better stuff that will likely come out later along with an extended version of the movie.
You get a making-of feature, "Peter Jackson Invites You to the Set," along with some short videos short throughout production. There's also a travelogue of New Zealand where it was shot, plus a music video.

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Review: "The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug"

The sort of people who slavishly read fantasy novels in general and the works of J.R.R. Tolkien in particular (like me) also tend to be the sort who play video games, especially the role-playing variety. (Again, me.) These overlapping constituencies are no doubt familiar with the concept of the expansion pack.

This is when the creators of a successful game issue a supplement that keeps the basic architecture in place, and just adds new elements -- extended storylines, new characters, new monsters, fresh hardware and so on.
There isn't nearly as much work involved in churning out an expansion pack as an original game, so they tend to be handsome going concern for game-makers.

In blowing up Tolkien's modest novel "The Hobbit" -- 287 pages in my ancient Ballantine paperback edition -- into a trio of movies tipping near three hours each, director Peter Jackson and his cohorts have essentially applied the M.O. of the expansion pack to moviemaking.

Oh, Tolkien's delightful children's story is still there, about an unassuming hobbit named Bilbo Baggins (Martin Freeman) who gets recruited to accompany 13 dwarves and a wizard on a journey to faraway lands to slay a dragon and win back a stolen kingdom. But it's been "augmented" to such a ridiculous degree that keepers of the original flame might have a hard time recognizing the quaint little tale they remember so fondly.

I still liked the final product, which is a rip-roaring, action-packed good time, because as I said this sword-and-sorcery stuff is totally in my wheelhouse. But in giving it the grand, elongated "Lord of the Rings" treatment, I fear casual fans may feel Tolkien's tender prequel has been burgled of much of its charm.

At the outset of the second film of the triplet, "The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug," Bilbo, dwarven leader Thorin Oakenshield (Richard Armitage), sage wizard Gandalf (Ian McKellen) and their companions have successfully crossed through the Misty Mountains and escaped the clutches of a horde of goblins and orcs who want their heads.

They still have a long way to go to reach Erebor, the lonely peak where the eponymous dragon lies sleeping under a mountain of treasure. To get there, Bilbo & Co. must brave the suffocating Mirkwood Forest, battle giant spiders and encounter some woodland elves who aren't so sprightly in their attitudes toward dwarves.

For me, this section contains some of the most rapturous portions of Tolkien's novel, as the wayward adventurers are forced to navigate both treacherous terrain and tricky political/racial territory. For some reason, though, Jackson and his co-screenwriters (Fran Walsh, Philippa Boyens and Guillermo del Toro) decided this is precisely they area where they must economize the story down to bare bones.

Thus, the party's encounter with fearsome "skin-changer" Beorn (Mikael Persbrandt) is over almost before it begins. Likewise, the claustrophobic taint of the Mirkwood isn't allowed time to settle in. And Bilbo's comedic-yet-scary rescue of his compatriots at the hands of the spiders, employing his new magic invisibility ring, stinging sword and a bit of clever poetry, doesn't summon up the scares or the laughs it ought to.

Instead, we're treated to a whole bunch of byplay involving elven king's son Legolas (Orlando Bloom), brought back from the "LOtR" movies for another go-round, and Tauriel (Evangeline Lilly), a badass warrior elf woman who's completely invented out of whole cloth. We also get to know a lot more about the internal power struggles of Laketown and its would-be hero, Bard (Luke Evans), than is really necessary. Plus an expanded look at Gandalf's investigation of a mysterious Necromancer down south.

And, most bizarrely, the stirring of an interracial romance 'twixt elf and dwarf. Yes, really. The way Jackson and the gang are building this thing up, I think we're in store for the full Romeo/Juliet entanglement in the third installment.

I couldn't help noticing that  nearly every time the film deviates significantly from the book, it's to diminish Bilbo as a character. Instead of being the center of the action and the doer of deeds, he becomes merely the person who sets in motion events that others take full advantage of.

So for example, instead of single-handedly rescuing the dwarves from their elvish captors using empty wine barrels, he's a bit player in a big action set-piece starring Legolas and Tauriel. And rather than being the one who notices the not-so-proverbial chink in the armor of the mighty Smaug (captivatingly voiced by Benedict Cumberbatch), here he merely confirms what others have told him.

I still enjoyed the second "Hobbit" film. But in piling on so much extraneous other stuff, we feel less like we're watching a movie than playing it on our game console. Consequently, it's less consequential.

Video review: "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey"

Too much or too little? When it comes to Tolkien screen adaptations, there seems to be little agreement in how much material to stuff into these movies.

The choice by director Peter Jackson and his team to divide “The Hobbit” into three films may be a bridge too far for many viewers. There certainly is enough story in J.R.R. Tolkien’s slim novel (273 pages in my paperback version) to justify splitting it in twain. But the filmmakers chose to go further, layering in all sorts of material from extended Tolkien lore to pad out what was a simple children’s tale into something as grand -- and grim -- as “The Lord of the Rings.”

The result is languidly paced and overstuffed. The iconic “Unexpected Party” dinner that opens the tale, with meek hobbit Bilbo Baggins being invited by dwarves to go on a great adventure, overstays its welcome by at least 10 minutes.

They also bring in all sorts of figures who weren’t in the book, including Galadriel and a flighty colleague of Gandalf named Radagast. It sometimes feels like a “Greatest Hits” retread of “LotR.”

I still enjoyed the movie, while recognizing that people less enamored with Tolkien’s dense fantasy mythology won’t like it nearly as much. And several sequences, such as Bilbo’s deadly game of riddles with the creature Gollum, are positively thrilling.

“The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey” shows it is possible to have too much of a good thing.

It’s being released with a decent amount of extras, including 10 making-of videos that cover a broad range of production topics, from initial conception to the decision to shoot in 3-D with a special frame rate of 48 fps (which reportedly turned off some viewers).

If Jackson & Co. hold to form, though, expect to see a special edition come out in the next year or so with even meatier goodies and possibly an extended version that pushes the run time past three hours. For some hardcore Tolkienites, more is never enough.

Movie: 3 stars out of four  
Extras: 2.5 stars

Review: "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey"

Let me say right up front that I quite enjoyed "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey," but I don't expect most other people will. At unless they're hardcore Tolkienites like myself.

Director Peter Jackson and his creative team have more or less abandoned the modest children's book by J.R.R. Tolkien that acted as a gentle precursor to the grander, grimmer "Lord of the Rings." In its place, they've given us something like "LotR 2: The Prequel."

In tone and in story structure, the first triad of the "Hobbit" adventure feels like a further extension of the trilogy from 2001-03. There's a big fight in the goblin mountain home that visually owes much to the Mines of Moria sequence in "Fellowship of the Ring." Gandalf the Grey (Ian McKellen), the wandering wizard do-gooder, again whispers into a moth's ear to summon giant eagles to save the day. Andy Serkis, the digital acting god who brought the tortured Gollum to slithery life in "The Two Towers" and "The Return of the King," is back to play the ultimate riddle game with wayward hobbit Bilbo Baggins.

In stuffing "The Hobbit" with all sorts of elements from Tolkien lore not contained in the book -- and inventing a whole bunch of new stuff entirely on their own -- Jackson and his cast and crew take a major risk. Splitting the 300-page book into two movies seemed like an obvious move, given the carryover of ambition from the "Lord" trilogy.

But in choosing to make it into three flicks (and not short ones, either -- "Journey" clocks in at 169 minutes), they may have crossed the proverbial bridge too far. This movie seems overstuffed and languidly paced. The iconic "Unexpected Party" that opens the tale just seems to ramble on and on, like ... well, an uninvited dinner guest who overstays his welcome.

And yet I did not mind the extravagance, because I'm such a big fan of Tolkien's various works. The real appeal to people like me is the expansive mythology that the British author spent a lifetime building. Reading his books always felt like we were exploring an entire world, but only seeing a small glimpse of it any given time.

As a result, I did not mind the inclusion of another wizard character named Radagast the Brown (Sylvester McCoy), despite the fact that he gets a mere one mention each in "The Hobbit" and "The Lord of the Rings," and never plays any kind of significant role. Here, he more or less takes over the movie for a small stretch.

The one thing I find most questionable was the choice by Jackson et al to raise the stakes of the story. The novel starts off as a simple adventure yarn about 13 dwarves determined to kill the dragon who drove them off their mountain kingdom long ago, and gradually snowballs into important events that affect the entire world of Middle Earth.

This movie appears to lose patience, adding to and twisting around the plot so it seems like all the great powers of the land -- wizards, elves, orcs, a mysterious Necromancer occupying a dark corner -- have their entire attention bent toward this little misfit band.

Bilbo (Martin Freeman) acts as our eyes and ears, the proverbial normal person recruited to go along on the adventure at the behest of Gandalf. Purportedly a professional burglar, Bilbo is a timid soul who seems to possess no discernible skills other than writing letters and taking long walks. But he soon shows his true stuff, helping the dwarves battle three lumbering trolls and conniving his way past the murderous Gollum when he's cut off from his troupe in the bowels of the Misty Mountains.

Thorin Oakenshield (Richard Armitage), the leader of the dwarves, gets the Aragorn treatment by being gifted with all sorts of backstory and inner turmoil that's only hinted at in the book. Armitage is a commanding presence, and helps us see why others would follow this beggar prince on his outlandish journey.

Having other actors from the "Lord of the Rings" films thrown in haphazardly quickly grows old -- Elijah Wood as Frodo, Ian Holm as older Bilbo, and Hugo Weaving and Cate Blanchett as elf lords Elrond and Galadriel, respectively. The latter pair show up to fret and scowl at Thorin's trouble-making ways.

"Every good story deserves embellishment," Gandalf tells Bilbo at the beginning of the film, and Peter Jackson appear to have taken this up as their motto and mantra. Personally, I mostly welcomed the copious add-ons. But my guess is that casual fans of the "Lord of the Rings" will be turned off by what they may regard as an unnecessary reboot.

3 stars out of four