Changes Of Bilbo Baggins Since its first publication in 1937, The Hobbit has been rendered into more than a dozen film adaptations. Each of these films portrays a new perspective to the original work with variations big and small. Essentially, the movie versions can be seen as interpretations of Tolkien’s text since visual media cannot fully convey the events and character entirely. Once put on a screen, the plot must be shortened to fit the running time, character simplified and made symbolic. A case in hand is the 2012 movie edition directed by Peter Jackson. The main difference between the film and the text is that the movie focuses more, maybe too much on the character Bilbo Baggins. As a result, in Tolkien’s text the story is told by an omniscient narrator whereas the movie from Bilbo’s Perspective. Tolkien’s description of Bilbo reflects the culture and underpinnings of Middle-earth during the third age by presenting him as a “Baggins”, a well-respected family among the Hobbit community, an eager adventurer and a philosopher who is a product of his time while the movie presents him as a cowardly man, afraid of the world outside of the Shrine. Consequently, viewers of The Hobbit see Bilbo differently, which dilutes Tolkien’s portrayal of Bilbo’s personality trait as a hero.
Firstly, in Tolkien’s narrative text, the themes of heroism and Bilbo’s character development from being an average hobbit into the hero at the end of the story looms largely not only as an exposition but perhaps more importantly, forces that lead him into discovering his true inner courage. Through out the story although Bilbo is surrounded by greed, vengeance and anger he prevails and managed to maintain his faith and common sense. The novel begins with a narration describing the life of a hobbit, Bilbo’s in particular and the history of middle earth laying out the historical and situational setting of the story.
Bilbo looked like any other ordinary hobbit you might see, he was between 3 feet and 3 feet 6 inches. Bilbo’s clothing was of green velvet breeches, red or yellow waistcoat with brass buttons, brown or green jacket, dark green hood and cloak, and a Mithril shirt. There are many differences between Tolkien’s The Hobbit and Jackson’s Hobbit including Bilbo’s physical features.
Some differences between Bilbo’s appearances were in the book Bilbo has a fat stomach and long clever brown finger but it The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey he doesn’t appear to at all. Bilbo is announced that he is more than fifty years old in the book but in the movie Martine Freeman, who portrays Bilbo, doesn’t appear to be fifty at all. These are just a few small psychical appearances that are different from the book and the movie.
There was a great deal of inadequate differences between Bilbo’s actions in the book and his actions in the movie. Here are numerous occasions that Bilbo’s actions differ from the book; In the text, Bilbo sees a group of trolls and decides to sneak up on them so he can pickpocket them, while in the move he goes after the goblins because they had stolen their ponies for food and he wanted to rescue them. A key point in this adventure for Bilbo is in the book he was knocked on and didn’t see the ring being lost and came across it by accident in the cave. In the movie Gollum fights with a goblin which is when the ring flies out of his pocket and lands on the ground. After the ring falls on the ground Bilbo sees it and puts it in his pocket and Gollum drags the dead goblin away.
Bilbo's most courageous act in my opinion was when all the dwarves were stuck in the trees as the wargs were trying to get them. In the book Gandalf fights them off with flaming pinecones and sets the trees on fire as he calls the Eagles to come rescue. In the movie Bilbo finds his courage and jumps out of the tree towards the Pale Orc who was seconds away from killing Thorin. After Bilbo's courageous act, the Eagles (part of The Five Armies) come in and save them from the wargs.