The book makes it sound like there were a lot more arrows than the movie depicted
Yeah... you really can't expect anything from the film to be very representative of the book. Most of Fellowship is pretty good, but past that very little of any of the films, LotR or Hobbit, is very faithfully translated. Even where the core plot points are the same, the details make for a completely different style and presentation.
And this is why I resent the films so much... because they will probably muddy every discussion I will ever have with anyone about anything Tolkien for eternity.
Have you seen the latest Hobbit movie? It's complete crap. At least the Lord of the Rings movies were still good.
I didn't even bother to watch any of the Hobbit movies, and I never will. I'd had enough after LotR.
My reaction to Fellowship - "It had some problems, but easily stuff I can overlook. This is still so damn exciting, I can't wait for the next one!!!!"
My reaction to Two Towers - "Umm... ok, I can still stomach it. He made a lot of changes that made no sense to me, but I guess I still enjoyed it. I'm really apprehensive about Return of the King, but I'll still go see it."
My reaction to RotK - "Peter Jackson is my mortal enemy. This was pure cash-grabbing garbage."
And it had been a few years since I'd read the books (for the second time) when the trilogy came out, so at the time, I didn't even catch everything that he'd changed. Re-reading them again now, I'm catching loads and loads of stuff that is different and makes absolutely no sense for any directorial purpose to have been changed, but alters the audience's perspective of the characters. Not a single character portrayal in the films seems to match up with the way they're written, except maybe Aragon. His personality was mostly intact, but he was fucked up in other ways.
The Hobbit was the first novel I ever read, and I continued to read Tolkien all throughout my childhood. His writing was a huge influence on who I am. So the movies are a major sore spot for me.