Hobbit: Battle of the Five Armies
(One Battle Too Many)
The final iteration of Peter Jackson’s Hobbit trilogy draws the curtains on the battles for hegemony raging in the middle-earth fantasy crafted by the inimitable JRR Tolkien.
Under and around the Great Mountain of Gundabad in the North a vast host is assembled after much forging and arming, which then marches South to obliterate all of middle earth.
They capture the limitless treasures enwombed within the vast level below levels of the Lonely Mountain.
It is a mythic place, the middle earth, a phantasmagoria, where astonishing creatures abound, and incredible fables, each richer than the previous in fancy, enthrall and besiege the young and old alike.
The battle, (it’s not a world war silly) being of five alleged armies, needs time to unfold. The armies, need time to forge, arm, march, deploy, posture, chest thump, bellow, sound the bugle before they join battle; vicious, where no quarter is given or asked.
Once the head banging and limb severing starts, there is no let up till the middle earth is red with rivers of blood coursing its cracks and wrinkles, and till the lights in the hall come on with the welcome popcorn and soda break from blood, gore and mayhem.
What did you expect; is the name not a giveaway? The Bard slays the fire breathing deep-throated dragon from the Lonely Mountain, leaving its treasure unguarded.
Thorin, with his 13 dwarves, and Bilbo Baggins of Shire, reclaims the lands of Erebor, and fences himself in. It seems the spirit of the dragon has possessed him, and blinded by the greed for gold, he forgets words once given to dear friends.
He refuses to part with the shares promised to the Men from the Lake and the Wood-Elves, who then proceed to besiege him till he relents.
Upon these glum ghouls descend another 500 cheery dwarves, led by Dain Ironfoot(and Ironhead too), to relieve the siege of his cousin Thorin.
As if there wasn’t sufficient passion already, Wargs and Bats, led by Bolg, roll and thump into the fray.
Clumsy giants with pieces of heads put together by jute yarn, tumble about without remorse, crushing all and sundry under their mighty heft.
To round off the celebrations Shape Shifters and Eagles swoop down like an army of Locusts and dispatch hapless souls to chill blight. Finally, Bilbo Baggins, a small man in a wide world, goes back to his armchair and his books, to live for another 60 years a happy and wealthy Hobbit, with many an enchanting tale to tell.
It won’t matter if you catch your forty winks while the armies go about their brisk business of felling each other on a fell land. If you miss a head here or a head there rolling off, how much of the thread would you have lost?
The heartwarming romance between Lilly and Kily though is the lone emotion betrayed by an otherwise stony faced cast. Evangeline Lilly, of Canada, who plays Tauriel here, looks smoldering despite those lengthy ears that I care nothing for.
Of late, there is a rising proclivity in the West, in writing as well as cinema, to root for dystopian lore set in a dysfunctional society. Take Harry Potter, Twilight, The Hunger Games, Divergent and The Matrix series…the list goes on, stretched to a point where I wonder whether it is a trend, a pattern, or just a seasonal flux.
Till now the Occident claimed monopoly over the fantastic and the mythical with its worldwide-adored treasure-trove tales of Panchtantra, Mahabharata, Ramayana, and perhaps also the Gita. But though equally spectacular, these are utopian worlds of an idealistic society.
Where is the bored, individualistic, lonely, greying, shrinking West with its piling cemeteries and shattered institutions of marriage, family, camaraderie and the complete society at large, going with this?
Why does the West need to spin so fabulous a yarn that it transports you into a strange, magical realm, a middle earth, with no just gods to make instruments of our pleasant vices to plague us with?
Does humble “earth, ” with its plain mortals and gods tending to a known range of emotions, no longer hold it under its spell or fancy? The wheel, dears; is come a full circle.
They are starting where we left off. A spectacle on a grand scale, paisa vasool, a must for the Xmas cheer, and a warm retreat from the desolate chill that blights Delhi.