Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - Arkenstone Edition, The

I remember being very impressed by Kerr's LOTR fanedits, so when I heard he was working on an edit of AUJ, I was thrilled. So, I downloaded the AVCHD version and sat down to get in the mood to watch DOS at the cinema next week.

For me, AUJ was a bloated missed opportunity which had me feeling that Jackson was trying far too hard to "have his cake and eat it", by making The Hobbit a film which acts far too much as a direct prequel to the LOTR. This may please many, but that coupled with the fact that 3 films of 3 hours each, is something which I feel will lessen the effectiveness of this particular trilogy.

Reading Kerr's intention with this edit, I was pretty excited that he was going to try and redress the balance of the story to really be about Bilbo's journey and acceptance into this "company". The excellent new prologue, the cutting of the Frodo scene, the trimming of the festivities at Bilbo's house, all set in motion the tone of where Kerr's going, and I was immediately hooked. Even losing the entertaining introduction to Radagast works here, as the way Kerr now introduces this most entertaining of wizards is even better. The word is pacing... and boy is this fanedit paced to almost perfection.

All of Jackson's worst excesses have gone, most noticeably an excellent piece of editing with the trimming of the Troll scene, and then the ridiculous CGI-fest chase when the company escape the Goblin hordes, which now feels just about right.

I can't emphasize how impressive this edit is. Visually, the editing is absolutely perfect, with nothing feeling out of place or forced. To me, it's as if this is always the way the movie should have been. The same would go for some absolutely brilliant audio editing. The rebuilding of sound during various sequences is hugely impressive and to be honest, to notice a difference you really do need to be listening for it.

So, my hat off to you Kerr. This is as good as The Hobbit:An Unexpected Journey can be. You have truly created a masterful fanedit which truly shows just what can be rescued with this most wonderful and under appreciated of artforms. If you're in any doubt about visiting middle earth again... then doubt no more. Anybody interested in fanediting needs to see this.

When I saw The Hobbit in the theater I was bored. It was too long with too much filler. It felt padded for no reason other than to stretch out what should have been a single film into three. Then I watched this edit and realized it could actually work as a trilogy so long as the running time was kept under control. With over 40 minutes cut the just over two hour runtime is no longer drags the film down.

I'm not as familiar with The Hobbit as well as Lord of the Rings, but there was nothing that stood out as missing. I know certain scenes are missing or heavily cut, but it's expertly done and if you aren't familiar with the movie you won't notice. Nothing cut was necessary and I'm happy to see it go.

The audio didn't seem balanced quite right. At times it was overpowering while others low. This may be the master track and not the fanedit itself but it was mildly distracting. I'm only knocking one point off for it because the cuts themselves were flawless.

One thing I wish Kerr had done was mute the colors just a bit. When I saw the film in the theater I thought it looked too lush and I felt the same way here. The colors are so vivid and pop that it pulls you out of film. Desaturating it a bit May have helped.

But that's nitpicking and this version of The Hobbit is definitely worth a watch. It moves along at a nice pace, never becomes boring, and is my preferred version of the film.

“Some stories deserve a little less embellishment...”

Kerr’s tagline perfectly captures the woes and shortcomings of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. The tag further extends to the recently released extend edition also, Arkenstone Edition aims to tell a tighter and more streamlined introduction into Peter Jackson’s Hobbit films. Kerr has marvellously achieved just that (and a little more).

Having watched the (easy on the downloads) mp4. version of the edit there is an understandable degradation of video quality, this can be seen in scenes that feature indicate details such as the many thousands of gold coins within the halls of Erebor. The compression artefacts can be noticeable at times, however this is a necessary sacrifice to obtain the more desirable download of only 3.37 GB. The audio quality appears to be top notch, no issues were heard due to the compression.

The visual editing is high quality, the cuts are smooth and unnoticeable. Having watched the Extended Edition not too long ago, I was delighted to find none of Kerr’s cuts jarring. Coupled with intricate audio editing all the transitions flowed perfectly. The re-structure of the Rivendell scenes was highly impressive and aided the film’s pacing and Bilbo’s growth as a character. Kerr’s cutlist mentioned a slight colour correction which unfortunately was undetected by me. A harsher correction that removes the cartoon-like vividness of the picture would certainly aid in bringing An Unexpected Journey closer to the visual style of The Lord of the Rings.

The way Kerr replaces the film’s score with Howard Shore’s original compositions is uncanny, while (as I understand it) the mp4. version has some audio balancing issues such as Bilbo’s faint voice over the new music in the edit’s introduction. Upon reviewing the scenes that had musical replacements multiple times (I have an affinity for these kinds of things) there was no part where I could hear the faint echoes of The Lord of the Rings’ score. In many sections the audio has been rebuilt from scratch and mostly it is brilliantly done. However the reconstruction of the audio during the scene where the company is saved by the eagles could have had further work done. This section felt somewhat hollow audibly. Other than this one grip, the audio is well done in general. One moment that particularly stood-out as great audio editing was the removal of the Nazgul theme when Thorin confronts the pale orc.

Overall Kerr’s Arkenstone Edition focuses the narrative into a tighter-paced and much more enjoyable experience. The shorter running time also encourages the chance for multiple viewings without thinking of having to endure the computer generated mess that many of the action scenes embraced. Kerr has nicely done away with the over-the-top antics that were present in the troll fight and the escape from goblin town. Arkenstone Edition sets a brisk pace yet still allows for the extra subplots to naturally flow and expand foreseeing the possibilities of the two remaining Hobbit sequels.

First of all, I should say that I haven't yet viewed my copy of the official Hobbit Extended Edition (As it's in it's still in it's cellophane upstairs awaiting Xmas morning) so I approach this review with only knowledge of the Theatrical cut. Secondly I didn't read the cutlist until after viewing it, so these are the reactions I had without that knowledge...

Audio/Video Quality 8/10: The look of the original Hobbit was horrible and cartoony (It brought back unpleasant memories of Indy4 IMO) and needs somebody to bring it visually in line with the nicer looking LOTR trilogy. The MP4 of Kerr's edit looked fine quality wise but I'm not sure the colour correction was a huge improvement overall. Some scenes did look massively improved, some looked very slightly worse and some still looked cartoony. I appreciate the effort though.

Visual Editing 10/10: Absolutely first class. I never felt jarred out of the experience by any removals (And there were many) and every cut was well handled and smooth to my eye. Clever little moments like using a shot of a doubtful Gandalf at the end of the council scene to change his motivation were wonderfully subtle (The faneditor in me was almost going to applaud at that bit but sadly this change was oddly contradicted in the later cave scene). From the cutlist it seems footage from LOTR was used in places but despite my near-obsession with those films none of it drew my attention as an obvious addition (It must have been blended very skilfully).

Audio Editing 9/10: Amazing and ambitious work on this front. The many changes/restorations to the score are wonderful to hear and without exception an improvement on the original. Obviously changing this amount of music required a lot of sound FX work to cover it. For the most part this was also beautifully handled but the final 'Out of the frying pan...' scene wasn't quite right. The sound FX felt a bit sparse and empty but given the complexity of this action scene nothing short of full Foley team was going to sort that out. Luckily the new/restored music in this scene was the best in the whole edit so I could easily forgive the sound FX issues.

Narrative 10/10: For me this is the edits crowning achievement. If I was to say the pacing in this edit was slower than the Theatrical cut I really do mean that as high praise. Instead of the stop-start/slow-quick/dialogue-action uneven pace of the original I just viewed a measured, well-judged and consistently paced cut. It felt like scenes like Bag End and Rivendell were given the time to breathe and us as viewers given the time to soak up the middle earth atmosphere. Then the action scenes were better cut, shortened or skilfully removed entirely. To put it simply, nothing overstayed it's welcome and nothing felt rushed.

Enjoyment 10/10: This was a joy to view from start to finish. I dimmed the lights and armed myself with a mug of ale and various cheeses and crackers (To fill up the corners) Hobbit style but instead enjoyed the filmic feast Kerr has created. If I had to find big fault, it would be in the retention of the truly awful Thorin scene at the end (I was very happy with Menbailee's removal in his cut) but again Kerr's new music improved on even this... making it at least bearable. A short list of my favourite changes (Music aside) would be the total removal of the Goblin chase (Not missed for a second), the removal of Radagast's first scene (Despite my love of Slyvester McCoy) and I loved the removal of many little silly moments throughout.

A new Kerr fanedit of Tolkien material is always a cause for celebration. The Hobbit AUJ Arkenstone Edition was conceived from start to finish with definite ideas for tone, pace and story, and those ideas have been applied with brilliant judgment to achieve a consistent and lucid viewing experience.

First off I want to call attention to the sound design. The musical score has been changed or replaced in many sequences and Howard Shore's original score has been used as much as possible. That makes the whole movie sound and feel much more familiar (which is a good thing). It also makes for much better integration of action and musical atmosphere, really bringing the plot into better focus and making it more readily comprehensible and coherent. Given how much of the soundtrack has been reworked and redubbed, the final product sounds very clear and smooth with very minor variations in sound level and balance. The reworked sound design by itself transforms the movie.

Kerr has trimmed about 40 minutes from the movie and it is so much better with lighter baggage. Many times the action moves along smartly instead of slogging through scene after scene of fan service. Even some suspense is restored to some of the sequences that were buried under layers of meandering exposition, cartoony slapstick, and call outs to the first trilogy. The action and fights through the whole movie are more believable, something I appreciate a lot. Everything in Goblintown was far more snappy and the riddle sequence is more powerful now that it isn't intercut. You get a stronger sense that Bilbo has survived a test that has changed him. Everywhere there's less grandstanding, more subtlety.

The editor's knife is more deft than ever and sequences are rebuilt with a great feel for maintaining the rhythm of scenes, inserting reaction shots that flow well, synchronizing with musical beats - all the fine points of the fanediting art.

I have my disagreements with the story structure that Peter Jackson & Co. came up with and the fanedit still has at least two too many flashbacks for my taste. But here they move along better and don't bog down the main story quite so much. The Rivendell sequence seems more relevant and less pointless and inert, and I could not detect the rotoscoping even though I was looking for it.

I'm still eager to see Kerr's more radical edit that he is planning after all three Hobbit movies are released. For now, this version is one that complements the LOTR trilogy instead of being an embarrassment. I hope that anybody who hasn't seen the Hobbit yet gets to see the Arkenstone Edition as their first experience of the movie.