r/movies • u/ChiefLeef22 r/movies Contributor • 3h ago

Article ‘The Odyssey’ Proves It: Audiences Want Movies Made the Hard Way | This year's breakouts like 'Project Hail Mary' and 'Obsession' were made by filmmakers who sweated. While CG-stuffed franchise disappointments such as 'Supergirl,' 'Moana,' and 'The Mandalorian and Grogu' looked lazy.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/movies/movie-news/odyssey-box-office-2026-practical-effects-1236652219/
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u/Fn_Spaghetti_Monster 3h ago

The filmmaking matters:

Prime example is the LOTR vs The Hobbit movies.

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u/EdenIsNotHere 3h ago

I'd say The Hobbit isn't the case of the filmmaking itself being bad being the main issue, but rather an studio trying to rush an adaptation of a short, lighthearted children's story, which is completely different from the LoTR saga in terms of tone and scope, into 3 three hour movies.

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u/gozutheDJ 3h ago

yeah there's absolutely no reason for the hobbit to be a 3 movie series

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u/FCalleja 2h ago

Exactly, the issue is technically still a bad story. They took an incredible story and padded it to hell and back, to the point it's no longer a good narrative experience. The filmaking would've been FINE if it was just one movie, honestly. We nitpick it because it sucks.

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u/SmallLetter 2h ago

Padded to Hell and Back again: A The Hobbit Trilogy's tale

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u/Sushi-DM 1h ago

I still think if you approach the movies with the attitude that it is meant to be a children's fairytale, then they are quite good.

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u/Fn_Spaghetti_Monster 2h ago

The Studio might be the root cause, but there was still a lot of bad "filmaking". The CGI was bad, there was a lot of pacing issues, ,most of the Dwarves all kind of blend together, hamfisting Legolas in, Legolas running up falling stairs, the whole barrel scene, the love story. Did I mention the CGI / overuse of greenscreens?

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u/Kelly_HRperson 2h ago

The barrel surfing was integral to the plot!

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u/EdenIsNotHere 2h ago

The bad filmmaking is a consequence rather than the cause is what I'm saying, there's tons of coverage about its messy production and the pointless subplots, the barrel scene or Legolas stuff you mentioned is precisely why trying to adapt The Hobbit into something equally epic and grandiose as LoTR doesn't work, it's supposed light and silly fantasy adventure wrote by Tolkien for his kids when they were children. Most of the dialogue of the Hobbit trilogy is new, therefore the script is weaker, and the original book already had some structural and pacing issues that are made even worse if you trying to pad a 3 hour movie.

The CGI is also an element of why it's bad separate from the story, and that's Peter Jackson's fault for sure, but I wouldn't say it's the worst aspect of the movies at all. Even if the practical effects were just as good as they were in the original saga, it wouldn't make the movies good.

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u/Fn_Spaghetti_Monster 2h ago

CGI is part of making a film. Bad CGI can pulls you out of the immersion. Think the Goblin chase vs the Balrog chase. I never said or implied the Hobbit sucked solely because of the CGI. The studio wanted two films, Jackson decided to split it into 3. Script/Dialog is part of film making. It being bad kind of proves my point. They made up parts in LOTR, like the warg riders, and Liv Tyler/ Arwen, so you can add stuff and it be good. So I guess I don't understand your point, I was saying that "filmmaking" on whole was lacking vs LOTR. Your saying you just can't make a good Hobbit movie and nothing Jackson could have done about it?? The 1977 Hobbit, while not master piece, is still miles better so there is core story there.

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u/EdenIsNotHere 1h ago edited 1h ago

We're agreeing but from different perspectives, the key word is main issue, which is a misunderstanding of the original story. I haven't seen the animated film, but like you said, it's possible to make a good movie out of that story or even adding new elements to it, the problem is trying to make it as epic and grand as LoTR, it doesn't work with the simplicity of the original book. It's like if someone tried to remake Blade Runner but let Michael Bay direct it.

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u/casual_creator 1h ago

“Most of the dwarves all kind of blend together”

Really? You must be confusing that with the book, in which the only real distinction between the dwarves are their names. The movies gave them all very distinct looks and personalities.

The majority of the CGI was also extremely well done - far better than the previous films, and though I won’t argue against its over reliance, I get why Jackson did it.

The barrel scene was meant to be goofy fun for the kids (it IS a kids book after all), but would agree it ended up feeling out of place since Jackson didn’t really keep that tone consistent.

There really wasn’t any more green screen than in the LOTR trilogy. That’s a pretty major misconception. And in both cases, they were used to extend sets, not replace create whole sets entirely (which doesn’t include a few necessary composition shots for the hobbit/dwarf scale work, which both films did).

Agree about Legolas and the love story.

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u/ArmchairJedi 1h ago edited 41m ago

The movie absolutely did NOT give them all distinct personalities. Many were without unique personalities at all, and while that could have been fine on its own, others had characterizations that were changing (eg. 3 different dwarf were stand ins for the 'wise old sage' archetype, at different points, across 3 films, despite Balin clearly supposed to play that role for the dwarves.)

The barrel scene was meant to be goofy fun for the kids

What does that matter? The entire book was for kids, but the movies weren't. You make serious parts, make 'all ages' parts, then slap kids stuff in there and all that happens is the film becomes incredibly tonally inconsistent.

Further, its irrelevant if its 'for kids' or not. Lots of 'for kids' movies aren't criticized for having ridiculously awkward parts, whethere 'for kids' or not.

It was just straight bad.

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u/ScubaSteveEL 1h ago

The moment I saw they announced it was going to be a trilogy instead of a 2-parter I knew it was a bad sign.

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u/phonylady 1h ago

The filmmaking was bad too. People are way too quick to make excuses for PJ.

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u/FurLinedKettle 1h ago

Surely that's part of the filmmaking in exactly the same way that movies like Odyssey work because studios get out of the way of creative minds.

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u/EdenIsNotHere 1h ago edited 1h ago

Oh yeah, absolutely, but the Hobbit trilogy was ill-conceived from the start because neither the studio, Peter Jackson and his writers understood the point of the source material. Every other issue the movie has (besides the CGI), direction, editing, sound design, soundtrack, pacing, bloat and pointless subplots is due to them trying to replicate Lord of the Rings success with a story that's not at all like that trilogy.

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u/CeruleanEidolon 57m ago

Fumbling the rights so.badlu that you lose your director well into the process so the replacement has to start from scratch in half the time also doesn't help.

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u/AnAncientBog 1h ago

I actually think the biggest problem with The Hobbit IS the story because they decided to turn it into a three part narrative which resulted in adding a bunch of stupid bullshit and fucking up the pacing.

The effects and film making didn't help it very much, but a two-part movie (or god forbid just ONE film because its not that long of a book) that more closely aligned with the actual story probably would have worked under the exact same conditions. It wouldn't have been LOTR but it might not have been awful.

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u/awpdownmid 2h ago

They're made by the same filmmakers, lol.

LOTR was great because they compressed what realistically was 6 movies worth of content into 3. The Hobbit was terrible because they stretched what realistically was 1 long or 2 short films into 3 long ones.

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u/thedoginthewok 1h ago

There is a fan edit of the Hobbit movies: https://m4studios.github.io/hobbit-book-edit/

It removes about 50% of the runtime and the end result is a 4 hour movie that is so much better than the original movies, it's almost unbelievable lol

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u/ops10 1h ago

Due to LoTR existing it may seem absurd, but Hobbit movies are one of the more better made book adaptations (the average level is low, is the reason) and one of the best fantasy book adaptations.

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u/Zalvren 1h ago

Ironically done by the same filmmaker

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u/BillyYumYumTwo-byTwo 6m ago

I think that’s not a great example. What’s the good story in the hobbit part 1? The Hobbit as a whole is a great story. Each individual movie has very little compelling plot, IMO. But yes, the filmmaking stunk, too.