The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug

"Beyond darkness... beyond desolation... lies the greatest danger of all."

2013 2h 41m EN

🙌

7.6

BANGER

🍅

74%

FRESH

👌

METACRITIC

⭐

7.8

IMDB

★7.6TMDB · 14,664🍅74%Rotten Tomatoes●66Metacritic★7.8IMDB · 752,978

FantasyAdventureAction

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

The Dwarves, Bilbo and Gandalf have successfully escaped the Misty Mountains, and Bilbo has gained the One Ring. They all continue their journey to get their gold back from the Dragon, Smaug.

“Beyond darkness... beyond desolation... lies the greatest danger of all.”

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Cast

Ian McKellen
Gandalf the Grey
Martin Freeman
Bilbo Baggins
Richard Armitage
Thorin Oakenshield
Benedict Cumberbatch
Smaug / Sauron
Orlando Bloom
Legolas
Evangeline Lilly
Tauriel
Lee Pace
King Thranduil
Luke Evans
Bard / Girion

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Peter Jackson
Writers: Philippa Boyens, Peter Jackson, Fran Walsh
Languages: English
Countries: New Zealand, United States of America

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 8

RUNTIME

Did you know

Clocks in at 161 minutes — on the longer side of feature-length cinema.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 8

MONEY

Did you know

Budget of $250M — blockbuster tier. Only ~1% of films ever made reach this.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 8

MONEY

Did you know

Made its money back 3.8× over at the box office.

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 8

ERA

Did you know

Released 13 years ago.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 8

WORLD

Did you know

International production across 2 countries: New Zealand, United States of America.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

6 / 8

CINEMA

Did you know

Part of the "The Hobbit Collection" — so the characters or world continue elsewhere.

MoodPlayr · trivia#06

7 / 8

CAST

Did you know

215+ people credited in cast and crew — a small city's worth of labour.

MoodPlayr · trivia#07

8 / 8

DIRECTOR

Did you know

Directed by Peter Jackson, shot by Andrew Lesnie. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.

MoodPlayr · trivia#08

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Peter Jackson directs. Andrew Lesnie behind the camera. Howard Shore scores. Jabez Olssen cuts. A long sit — settle in. Made its budget back several times over at the box office. Produced in New Zealand, United States of America. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

1Clocks in at 161 minutes — on the longer side of feature-length cinema.
2Budget of $250M — blockbuster tier. Only ~1% of films ever made reach this.
3Made its money back 3.8× over at the box office.
4Released 13 years ago.
5International production across 2 countries: New Zealand, United States of America.
6Part of the "The Hobbit Collection" — so the characters or world continue elsewhere.
7215+ people credited in cast and crew — a small city's worth of labour.
8Directed by Peter Jackson, shot by Andrew Lesnie. Note their partnership — DPs and directors often return to each other across a career.
9Original score by Howard Shore. Worth a dedicated listen after — most great films lose half their impact without the score.
10Editor Jabez Olssen shaped the rhythm. On an edit-heavy film, the editor does more to control your pulse than the director.
11Ian McKellen and Martin Freeman and Richard Armitage carry the top of the cast.
12Marketing tagline: "Beyond darkness... beyond desolation... lies the greatest danger of all.".
13IMDB entry: tt1170358 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
1414,664 TMDB user ratings logged — serious cultural footprint.
15Classified under 27 themes, including "gold", "lake", "based on novel or book", "elves".
16Released under 34 different titles around the world.

The technical file

Cinematography: Andrew Lesnie
Original score: Howard Shore
Editing: Jabez Olssen
Production design: Dan Hennah
Costume design: Richard Taylor
Makeup / hair: Flora Moody
VFX supervisor: Eric Saindon
Sound: David Farmer
Stunt coordinator: Tim Wong
Runtime: 161 min · 2h 41m
Aspect ratio (typical): 1.37:1 (Academy)
Status: Released
Budget: $250,000,000
Box office: $958,400,000
Return: 383% of budget
Original language: EN
Certification (US): PG-13
IMDB: The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (2013)
Rotten Tomatoes: 74% 🍅 Fresh
Metacritic: 66/100
IMDB rating: 7.8/10 · 752,978 votes
MPAA: PG-13

Awards

Nominated for 3 Oscars. 19 wins & 90 nominations total

MTV Movie Award for Best Fight

Individual records documented via Wikidata; the summary above may count more.

Part of

The Hobbit Collection

The Hobbit collection is a three-part epic fantasy-adventure film directed and produced by Peter Jackson and based on J. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy novel of the same name. The trilogy of films are set in Middle-earth 60 years before "The Lord of the Rings", and will act as a prequel to Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

Also by

Peter Jackson

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Community reviews

What people are saying

Andres Gomez2014-02-09
★ 7/10
The second part amends the fiasco of the first one. Spectacular and, again, with several moments of the already classic "platform-like" fights on the run from these series of movies that could be enhanced if some sense would be given to them. Still, the staging of every location and, remarkably, Smaug, is worth seeing.
Dark Jedi2014-04-19
★ 7/10
7 out of 10 stars would normally be considered quite okay and I guess you could say that this movie is quite okay. However, it has a reputation to live up to. As a movie in the Tolkien universe and with LOTR and The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey this movie have a lot to live up to and, as far as I am concerned, it does not. As an action/adventure/fantasy movie it is a quite okay movie. It has a lot of action of course, a lot of adventure and a lot of special effects. Of course everything plays out with the Tolkien universe as a back-drop. I guess it is rather superfluous to mention that the movie is based on the book The Hobbit by Tolkien. However it is here the problems start. In my review of The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey the first thing that I mentioned was that you should be aware of the fact that the movie did not follow the book in any great detail and that this was quite okay since the extensions were well made. Well, it should be no surprise that the first part of this statement is valid for this movie as well. Unfortunately, whereas the first movie felt like a fluid extension of the book this one feels like it is just full of fillers. There are a lot of cool scenes and a lot of action but it really feels like it was just put in there as fillers to showcase the special effects. Speaking of special effects, quite a few of them where rather unimpressive I have to say. The scenes where the dwarfs went down the rapids in barrels frequently looked plastic and artificial. The scenes with Smaug was not too bad even though he was quite overused but the parts around the forges was just plain ridiculous. I know it is fantasy but come one, getting them started and producing tons and tons of molten gold in a few minutes not to mention riding on molten metal without getting burned was just silly. On the whole I found it an enjoyable movie but I was expecting more.
Tom Goetz2018-01-15
★ 4/10
Jackson turned a great story into just another Prates of the Caribbean. Jumping, sliding, gags, etc. All the thinking parts are gone.