The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies ~ A Capsule Movie Review by Allen Kopp 

We come now, finally, to the third installment of the Hobbit trilogy: The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies. Smaug, the ill-tempered, fire-breathing dragon that has been sitting on a tremendous horde of gold inside the Lonely Mountain for a long time (centuries, it seems) was unleashed in December 2013 at the end of the second installment. For reasons that are not clear, Smaug is intent on destroying Middle Earth. Smaug manages to destroy a large part of the town called Laketown but is killed by one of its intrepid citizens, the one named Bard, with a special arrow that pierces his otherwise unpierceable hide. Of course, Bard wouldn’t have been able to do it without the help of his young son, whose name, I believe, is Bain.

So, with Smaug dead, that leaves all that glorious gold inside the mountain unattended, which, naturally, everybody wants for their own. The armies of the different races (dwarves, elves, orcs, and men) converge on the mountain to fight it out. Is all that gold worth fighting a war over? Of course, it is. Which army will prevail in the end? Will it be a force of good or will it be the army of orcs (a cruel, ugly, war-like, humanoid race) sent by arch-villain Saruman?

Thorin Oakenshield, a dwarf who is also an exiled king, is supposed to represent the force of good in the war over the gold, but something happens to him. Just being inside the mountain makes him greedy. He begins to believe that the gold means more than honor, integrity and commitment to his people. He is suffering from what one dwarf calls “dragon fever.” How will the hobbit, Bilbo Baggins, and the thirteen dwarves he has been traveling with since the beginning of the adventure make Thorin Oakenshield see how wrong he is?

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies is worth another visit to Middle Earth, apparently the last one there will ever be. Peter Jackson, the director who directed this trilogy and also the Lord of the Rings trilogy with a master’s touch, says he will not make any more movies based on the fantastical works of J. R. R. Tolkien. It’s been a lot of fun and a great run. 

Copyright © 2014 by Allen Kopp