J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit (Maple Films Edit)

Dustin Lee has created a great edit of The Hobbit trilogy that is definitely worth watching.

I'm going to start off and say that I have never seen The Hobbit trilogy in its original form. I loved the novel since I've read it in middle school, but I never watched the movies because I'd heard so many negative things about them. I didn't want such a great story that I adored to be ruined by a poor adaptation. I asked around to see what the best fanedit of the trilogy was that I could watch. I had two big recommends: the Maple Films/Dustin Lee edit, and the Original Two-Film Structure (which I have yet to watch). So I decided to give this one a try.

I was not disappointed. Dustin did a masterful job of editing the films into one four-hour film (that I watched split into the two-hour parts split by an intermission. In a way, this was also the original two-film structure).

Audio/Video Quality:
Both were absolutely superb. It was a 1080p MP4 with a 5.1 surround track, giving the full experience of watching the film. I especially appreciated the 5.1 track, as it is something often omitted/converted to stereo in fanedits.

Visual Editing:
At no point in the film did I notice that any visual editing had been done. This is a good sign! It means that everything was seamlessly integrated into the new story. Well done.

Audio Editing:
Also superb. No complaints here.

Narrative:
I loved how close to the book this adaptation was. Sure, there was still a bit of extra stuff in there, but I didn't find any of it to detract from the story. There was also no point in the film where I thought, "Something was definitely taken out." Dustin has essentially rewritten the film into a cohesive plot that follows Tolkien's original novel.

Enjoyment:
Overall, I very much enjoyed watching this. It will be a part of my collection from now on. Well done, Dustin!

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This is a great edit of a not-great trilogy of films, into one watchable movie. LOTR -- the extended editions especially! -- did an amazing, still unmatched, job of treating a fantasy setting properly. It was a rare occasion where a fantasy setting and its narrative was taken seriously, rather than developed into a cheesy barbarian body-builder festival, or a kiddie movie, or a low-budget-crappy-costumes mess, or into an ensemble of the latest Hollywood blockbuster tropes in a pre-modern setting. There are very few exceptions to this pattern: "Hellboy II," Conan the Barbarian" (1982), "Dark Crystal" all stand out. Don't get me wrong: I'm no art-film buff, or culture snob; I am proud to have "Yor the Hunter" on BD, and similar fare, and an extensive collections of schlock and cheese, including fantasy, and love "Labyrinth" and its ilk. But LOTR was something different, a breath of fresh air: incredible scenery and effects and cinematography, an amazing (yes, I know, not 100% fidelity) to the book (including cleaving close to its prose, without F-bombs, American slang and the rest, right-on "ba ba green sheep" rewrites etc.), great casting and music, and lots of detail. Imagine, if you will, a parallel Earth, where we got Tom Cruise as Aragorn, Danny De Vito as Smeagol, Johhny Depp as Elrond, a Danny Elfman soundtrack, lots of product placement, a few extra characters to meet the mood of the times, like a hobbit action-hero, perhaps a scientist/ hacker/ super-wizard, ideally a pretty but disaffected young woman in a tight leather bodice, and loads of slapstick etc. Then we can think what horrors might have been.

Now: "The Hobbit" trilogy. A big step backward for the genre, and not a very good set of films in any sense. It retained the amazing sets and designs of LOTR, but was something far less in every respect. LOTR showed grim,noble dwarf kings and a stoic Gimli; in this one we got badly-dressed dwarfish buffoons and cliches. What is with those ridiculous hair- and beard-styles? Look: Bombur is fat, and his chair broke, oh the hilarity! Thorin, who looks completely out of place -- perhaps the result of an ill-advised studio decision to create a dwarf hottie? -- but he looks more like Jason Momoa's Aquaman than anything dwarfish in this trilogy or LOTR, or pretty much any high fantasy setting, ever. LOTR had awe-inspiring monsters from legend; in this one we got great spiders and a great dragon, sure, but we also got trolls who eat snot, a goblin king with a plummy English accent and wargs. Lots of wargs. Wargs who can now climb trees. LOTR cleaved to the source material; in this one dwarfs are oafs who makes fires on the floors of Rivendell, using elven furniture, and who cannot drink from a mug without wetting their beards and cheeks, plus two dwarfs who are not-very-funny recycled versions of Merry and Pippin; we suddenly have Tom Bomabil as a sort of hairy grimdark Wolverine-analogue, last survivor of a persecuted, enslaved race etc.; oh dear, there is a cringey dwarf/ elf romance as well. LOTR had a sense of urgency and peril and world-spanning, epochal change; in this one we got padding, bloat, and CGI, as the director did his best to push a 150 page book into a 12 hour movie marathon. Scenes from LOTR were recycled as well: brave adventurers fleeing within a goblin mountain; eagles summoned by a moth coming in at the last moment; wargs ridden by orcs attacking on the hills etc. The "Hobbit" keeps dragging on, and on, and on, and on. Oh my goodness, does it drag. The heroic efforts of Martin Freeman's Bilbo Baggins were not enough, alas, to salvage this Hollywood mess.

So the editors at Maple Films certainly had their work cut out. This edit is, I think, the best possible salvage operation and I must express my amazement at the job done here -- and in the standalone spin-off "Durin's Folk and the Hill of Sorcery" which you MUST see.

The worst of the slapstick is gone, the worst cringe is removed, and the bloat is reduced greatly. The story is tighter, with the removal of lots of padding, byways and cul-de-sacs. The endless, belaboured flagging of what will happen in LOTR is less in evidence. Of course, we can all think of our personal preferences for what should stay or go (maybe the dwarfs wrecking Rivendell, the whole Azog storyline?) but building a watchable film that retains the best parts of a "Hobbit" trilogy that should have been one movie from the start, is an impressive achievement by any standards.

With so much stuff gone, it's a really amazing accomplishment to retain a clear and interesting narrative. Bilbo is now central, as is his struggle within. There is some incredible scenery, camera work, special effects and choreography, which emerges from the murk thanks to smart editing, and to wonderful effect.

There is a lot work and care here, and it shows. We cannot expect any editor/s to work miracles, and even with the best will in the world, the "Hobbit"/s will never be a good film. But it can, as we see here, become something worth a watch, and maybe even two! I cannot honestly give a super-high rating for enjoyment or even narrative, but that is not the fault of the editor/s who could only work with what existed: a deeply flawed product in the worst traditions of the Hollywood blockbuster/ cash-grab.

Well done Maple Films! No one can expect more of anyone than we have here!

Looking for the best edit of The Hobbit Trilogy, I read through the descriptions and change lists of every edit I could find. I have watched and re-watched different versions of The Hobbit over several months and, finally, I found this edit - exactly what I was looking for!

All the slapstick and fluff that could be cut is gone, but not to the point that would create unexplained events as I had seen in other edits.

The efforts made to hide Smaug covered in liquid gold is about the best that will ever be. I watched an edit that tried skipping to him flying towards the town and that didn't flow smoothly.

If I had to nitpick... the first time I watched this edit, I thought my audio/video was out of sync during the new voice-over during the eagle rescue. Plus the great scene with Thorin accepting Bilbo as a useful member of the group after the eagles was cut, but there was no way to keep it with the cuts made to the battle with the orcs. I'd rather have the cuts than that scene, so not a big deal.

Also, subtitles. Awesome!

Watched this edit last weekend. I got to say this was an amazing edit, great quality. The colour correction was great as I disliked the way the original versions looked. I also thought the restructuring of the movies into a 4 hour cut was well done, the unnecessary sub-plots are removed quickening the pace and I didn't mind the long hour run time as I liked that it was split in two just like the Extended Editions of The Lord of the Rings Trilogy. Ultimately this was more in tone with The Lord of the Rings Trilogy and more structured like Jrr Tolkien's Novel and all and all I really loved this edit and for me it is definitely the definitive version.