Heard some radio hosts (Opie and Anthony with Jim Norton) talking about the screening they saw the other night. They saw it in a new High Frame Rate D format and said it looked amazing.
Any dopers see it yet?
Yes, I am a celebrity. I own a mansion and a yacht.
no, actually, I’m not, and I haven’t.
One of our vendors has invited me and some of the senior staff to see a private screening of the movie next week. That’s the closest I get to being a celebrity. 
From Aintitcool.com:
What an evil fortune. And I am already wary.
Honestly, I have not found aintitcool reviews to all that accurate. They are mostly exercises in impassioned fanboy wankery.
Sure, but that’s no reason not to bust a Gandalf quote. And I am already wary.
True, but they generally err to the side of over-enthusiasm. A negative review from them, especially for such a geeky movie, is troubling.
Not only have I not seen it, but it doesn’t get released in Australia until two weeks after the rest of the world. The entire rest of the world! They all get to see it on December 14th, and Australia gets it on that busy movie cinema-going day (not), December 26th. The day after Christmas.
I do not understand the madness.
Re: the AinItCool review, though - I liked PJ’s King Kong (and cannot sit through the original). I have no problem at all with the setup time before we see Kong himself, I think it was well paced and works wonderfully. I stopped visiting AICN years ago because of their irritating nth degree nit-picking, poorly written articles, and arrogant assumption that they spoke for geeks everywhere, instead of the tiny subset of a subset that they actually do. Their time in the spotlight is long since over and they should now be ignored.
It’s not like we needed to be told that there isn’t nearly enough story for 2 films, let alone 3. And we already knew it would be mostly “filler”, using the definition of “story not based on the book.”
The entire idea of this new trilogy is to spend half the time on a movie original Radagast sidequest. We just have to hope it is good.
Myself, I thought the movie could have easily been an hour shorter. Jackson wouldn’t know “tight” if you gave him a wedgie.
So, it is Star Wars Prequels all over again.
Review in the Sydney Morning Herald here. It’s pretty positive.
Are you kidding? I always head to the cinemas on boxing day, and they are always packed. My sister and I saw the 3 Lord Of The Rings movies on Boxing Day - first session of the day - and always had to make sure we booked our tickets in advance, as most sessions were sold out. Looking forward to continuing the tradition with The Hobbit, although it is going to be hard to resist reading too much about them after the rest of the world has seen them.
Might go and see Les Miserables in the evening too. Assuming there’s a session after the Doctor Who Christmas special has finished on ABC. And that I’m not too drunk and sunburnt.
That’s because it’s the debut of a highly anticipated movie, not because it’s the right day to release it.
I agree with this. If Australian cinemas insist on shoving an entire month’s worth of big movie releases onto one day (we have to wait for Wreck-It Ralph too), of course it’s going to be busy.
Oh yeah, fair enough. I was just expressing incredulity at the notion that Boxing Day wasn’t a “busy movie cinema-going day”. I do like the tradition though.
160 minutes? Oh, Lordy. AND the DVD will have “extended scenes.” Someone needs to reign Jackson in. Sigh.
It won’t be as bad as STAR WARS prequels, no matter what, because at least there will be an underlying interesting story line with great episodes (the novel is, after all, episodic.)
On reflection, I think this is the same thought the distributors have: “Boxing day is really busy when we release the big blockbuster everyone was waiting for, so let’s continue the tradition.” Instead of the more logical thought of: “It doesn’t matter what day we release it, this is the biggest movie of the season, whenever we show it they will come.”
Some more reviews, all of them mildly positive (except maybe the Hollywood Reporter one) with pretty much the same complaints as the Ain’t It Cool Review:
Variety
The Hollywood Reporter
Hitfix
The 48fps shooting style seems to be a huge point of contention, with some loving it (after taking about a half hour to get used to it) and some absolutely loathing it.
I am an LOTR book geek & surprisingly loved the Jackson LOTR movies. But I fear I will hate this. They should never have been so blinded by the $ signs that they expanded a small book into 3 huge movies. My daughter is already talking of taking me to the film as a treat. I hate to tell her that I dread seeing it.