The Hobbit: Spence Edit - 2014 - Spence

Fan-editor Spence combined the bloated Hobbit trilogy into one film, running three and a half hours.
Virtually all moronic humor was cut, as were most Elvish appearances not in the Tolkien book.
Big omission, Beorn. Otherwise, one doesn’t really miss the rest.
The plot stays coherent and works.
If anything, more characters could have been tossed, meaning the bulk of the dwarves. Tolkien never elaborated on two thirds of them and most could have been dispensed with.
To be honest, though, near the end I was ready for the whole damn thing to finish already.
Certainly not the fault of Spence, who has done a job here.
The narrative itself is sluggish and bombastic. Much of the film was miscast - sacrilege I know, but Martin Freeman’s portrayal of Bilbo never rings true for me.
Still, there are Hobbit fans galore, and this edit - easy to track down - is a tidy way to watch it in one sitting.
Fans of the originals should enjoy more than I did.