I made a rash decision to take advantage of a 5pm.co.uk deal offering
best seats in the stalls for £15 at performances of 'The Hobbit' at the
festival theatre in Edinburgh.
rash as it was short notice and rash because I realised that it would
mean getting home around 1am then having to get up again at 6am. Yuk!
SO after a trawl through the search results for cheap Edinburgh
accommodation on late rooms.com I got a room for £30 at the Original Raj
Hotel. http://www.tommymiahsoriginalrajhotel.com/.
I had a lovely comfy double bed to myself. Breakfast wasn't great but I
couldn't fault anything else - despite the really bad reviews some
people gave on trip advisor.
The Hobbit was pretty mediocre. Well the sets were cleverly designed
but the acting pretty poor. Gandalf delivered his lines as though he was
reading from an autocue and was waiting for the next line to appear.
For example. "Bilbo Baggins you are not the Hobbit"
I'm thinking yes he is - a Hobbit at least and the only one in this
particular story and the one the book and play are named after then
Gandalf says "that you used to be"
the Edinburgh evening news said he was the best one in it so you can
imagine how standard grade drama the rest of the acting was.
The musical accompaniments and fight scene choreography made me feel
that I was watching a production from the 1980's
A sentiment echoed by the reviewer in the Edinburgh Guide. who says
this:
"The performances are all very camp (an aspect of the entire production
that isn't helped by the awful 80's sounding music) and there are a
couple of scenes that are just cringe worthy and completely pointless. A
dancing scene towards the end of the first half is absolutely
unforgivable... but the kids seemed to love it. "
Smaug the Dragon was great though.
and this; from Forbidden Planet blog is exciting news for a geek like
me.
Ah but there is good news to balance this – the director who has been
installed in place of Jackson is none other than Guillermo Del Toro,
director of the two Hellboy movies, Blade II and the visually ravishing
(and BAFTA and Oscar winning) dark fairy tale of Pan's Labyrinth. I
have to say that I'm fairly happy with this choice – obviously Peter
Jackson would have been ideal, but I've been a fan of Guillermo's
since the early 90s and his early Ron Perlman-starring Cronos, a clever
and inventive re-working of the vampire myth while the Mexican
director's Spanish language horrors like The Devil's Backbone are
eerily atmospheric
That Hobbit wont be sucky and it will have the real Gandalf in it too.
