The Hobbit trilogy has come to an end with The Battle of the Five Armies. Director Peter Jackson received a lot of criticism breaking the story into three separate movies, but I have no problem with three three-hour films depicting The Hobbit. The movies are visually stunning; watching it on an Imax 3D screen is breathtaking and allows you to feel like you are part of it.
The Battle of Five Armies is essentially a three-hour movie filled with battle scenes, and it lacks a few essential elements to make it a good film. It just starts abruptly with no prologue, for example, and I found myself scrambling to remember where the last one left off.
The movie also has an absence of some character development, except the relationship between Thorin and Bilbo. As a viewer I became invested in all the dwarf characters in the previous two films; in this installment they were just characters short of any substance. There was also an unnecessary and confusing scene with Galadriel that ties in to the The Lord of the Rings trilogy, but does not add to this story.
But The Battle of the Five Armies flourishes in the battle scenes. The final battle has orcs, men, elves, and dwarves battling out for the gold using different tactics, weapons, and cultures. I particularly enjoyed the humour between characters used to break up the lengthy battle scenes.
Overall, in three hours, Jackson concludes the trilogy tying up loose ends and settling scores, utilizing a visually spectacular landscape.
The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies plays daily at the IMAX: see imaxvictoria.com/movie/the-hobbit-an-imax-3d-experience/ for details.