The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey especially in the early going." Kate Muir of "The Times" gave the film four out of five stars, saying Martin Freeman "perks up" the film as Bilbo Baggins and that Jackson's use of 48 frames per second 3D technology gives the film "lurid clarity". Dan Jolin of "Empire" gave the film four out of five stars and thought "The Hobbit plays younger and lighter than Fellowship and its follow-ups, but does right by the faithful and has a strength in Martin Freeman's Bilbo that may yet see this trilogy measure up to the last one" and he stated that "There
Bilbo Baggins oldest Hobbit ever in Middle-earth. (The natural lifespan of Hobbits is about 100 years.) According to Appendix C of "The Lord of the Rings", Bilbo was born to Bungo Baggins and Belladonna Took in , or S.R. 1290. "The Lord of the Rings" gives the date of Bilbo's birthday as 22 September, but the actual date in the Shire calendar was Halimath 22; Tolkien tells us in Appendix D that he "used our modern names" for the months "to avoid confusion, while the seasonal implications of our names are more or less the same", so that Halimath is translated as