The family plus two friends of my son went to see this last night to celebrate son's 12th birthday.
Thoroughly enjoyed everything...could have lived without the goblin song and dance, and the disney-esque dishwashing sequence. Otherwise I was thrilled at the addition of Radagast and completely surprised by the Sauruman. Loved those scenes probably most out of the whole movie.
Right as the dwarves climbed the trees the house lights in the theater came up...and stayed up until the end of the film. I kept thinking an usher or projectionist would correct this but it never happened. Complained to the manager afterwards, and he apologetically offered to refund my money. At first I thought...no...but then decided that taking six people to a movie is an expensive outing and it's not too much to expect that theater actually stay dark, so I accepted. He also threw in six passes on top of refunding the ticket price.
When I got home, I actually counted the money he refunded and realized that he gave me regular showing as the refund, when we only paid matinee prices since this was the 4:45 show.
Two adults, and four kids walk in to a matinee. Walk out with refunded ticket price, plus 7 extra dollars, PLUS six passes for future shows.
Best 12 year old birthday party I've ever thrown..