Martin Freeman Movie Weekend

This weekend I watched The World's End and The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug. Here is what I thought of them:

The World's End

 This is the final installment of the Cornetto Trilogy put on by director Edgar Wright and actors Simon Pegg and Nick Frost and includes Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz as the other two movies. It's called the Cornetto Trilogy because in each of these films, a character is seen eating a different flavor of Cornetto ice cream cones.

Simon Pegg plays Gary King, a man who never really left high school mentally and has a dream to gather up his former high school gang and complete the Golden Mile: A mile long pub crawl through their hometown. Except, when they return, things are...different.

There's a similarity to Hot Fuzz in that the movie is rolling along and seems like just a regular comedy (and a good one) and then things take a very unexpected turn and even greater hilarity ensues. Really, it's a funny movie and I highly recommend it. It's currently out on DVD.

Martin Freeman Connection: He plays Owen the "O-Man". One of Gary King's friends taking part in the Golden Mile.

The Hobbit: Desolation of Smaug
Disclaimer: I have never read the book.

 I didn't sit and watch the Lord of the Rings trilogy as a whole until last year. I had seen bits and pieces and never really gave them much thought except that I didn't really have a huge desire to see them. But, watching them back to back over a weekend, I enjoyed them. So when The Hobbit was released, I wanted to see it.

I was one of the few who actually really enjoyed The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey - probably because I never read the book. So I knew I'd enjoy Desolation of Smaug as the reviews said it was better than the first one. 

And I did like it, but not as much as An Unexpected Journey. In the first film, I like how it mostly fell on Bilbo to get them out of the many trappings they found themselves in. But in this film, the Elves were there to always save the day just in the nick of time and it got a little old. And the orcs. They never stopped. There was way more action and it became a bit monotonous after a while.

The introduction of Smaug was really well done - amazing CGI.

Really, my biggest complaint is that there wasn't enough Bilbo and way too much Legolas staring blankly into space or saving the day.

Martin Freeman Connection: He's Bilbo Baggins, duh-doy.