The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (2014)

I watched the final part of The Hobbit film trilogy by Peter Jackson: The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies, released in 2014.  It covers the portion of The Hobbit book from when the dragon Smaug leaves the Lonely Mountain to attack Lake-town, to the end of the book.

Galadriel

In my favorite part of the movie, Galadriel (played by Cate Blanchett), accompanied
by Elrond and Saruman, rescues Gandalf, and battles with and defeats Sauron, along with the Nazgul (the Ring-wraiths), banishing them to the East.  She expends tremendous power in this effort, which explains why she seems somewhat diminished when we get to The Fellowship of the Rings.  However, Tolkien does not explain this in The Hobbit, where Gandalf mention he was detained on a mission longer than he expected without explanation.  Apparently Tolkien explained this in the appendices to The Fellowship of the Ring.  So I appreciated that Jackson included this aspect of the story in the film.

Smaug attacks Lake-town - Bard takes aim

I also liked the scenes where Smaug attacked Lake-town - brought down to his death by Bard the Bowman.

However, Jackson dragged out the battle scenes too long.  The battle does not take up much length in the book, and Jackson seemed to want to get every ounce he could out of the battle scenes, and then more.

Still I enjoyed the film, as well as the film trilogy, and recommend watching it.

The Hobbit (the book)

The Lewis Tolkien Friendship

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey (film)

The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug (film)