"Come on," you say. "That's ridiculous. Of all the people you could have included on this list, you've gone for Peter Jackson... the man who brought us seminal works such as The Lord of the Rings and, uh, The Lord of the Rings!" Yup! Despite the fact that Peter Jackson is a talent unto himself and an otherwise great director, there's no escaping the elephant in the room when it comes to his Hobbit movies: Jackson compromised his reputation in his decision to split a relatively short book into three overstuffed pictures. Seriously. Even viewed as a loose adaption of the source material, with Jackson adapting the book to fit the world he crafted for his Lord of the Rings trilogy, and The Hobbit movies still feel much too loose and baggy around the edges, with far too much padding and not enough "story." Whether or not Jackson bowed to studio pressure (and that's the most likely scenario) and opted for a 9-hour rendering of The Hobbit because Warner Bros. knew how much money they could make is beside the point: it was a totally inessential move.
Sam Hill is an ardent cinephile and has been writing about film professionally since 2008. He harbours a particular fondness for western and sci-fi movies.
