Potter Really Stinks

[vovat]

I had Thanksgiving dinner at bethje's house. I had turkey, lasagna, and ham. It was all quite good, but I overestimated the amount I could eat, and ended up with too much on my plate. I eventually finished it all, though.

After dinner, I went with Beth and Dorothea to (finally) see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. When the movie started out, it seemed rather rushed. That isn't to say that I wanted to see things like the Quidditch World Cup in their entirety, but there were a lot of plot elements that they introduced hurriedly, as when the students from Beauxbatons and Durmstrang showed up on what was presumably the first day. After the Triwizard Tournament started, though, the pacing started to improve. There were a few things I wish they had shown, though. They never addressed Rita Skeeter's ability to turn into a beetle, how the Dementor sucked out Barty Crouch Jr.'s soul, or Igor Karkaroff's departure from Hogwarts after Voldemort's return. I also didn't like the idea of Barty Jr. being at the Riddle House with Voldemort and Wormtail. It ended up not really affecting the plot that much, but there didn't seem to be any real reason for the change.

Things I liked about the movie:

• The performances of Mad-Eye Moody, Rita Skeeter, and Madame Maxine.
  
• The dragons were very well-rendered. Actually, most of the visuals were quite good, with a few exceptions.
  
• While I did miss Dobby, I liked Neville's involvement in finding out about Gillyweed. It gave Neville something to do, and a use for his aptitude in Herbology. I think that was one change that might have actually been for the better, since Dobby showing up in the morning with the Gillyweed seemed to me to be rather anticlimactic, and too easy.
  
• Ron and Hermione sang a few lines of the Hogwarts school song while in the woods with Hagrid. I found that to be a nice touch.
  

Things I didn't like so much:

• The haircuts. Did it suddenly become the fashion for every male student at Hogwarts to wear their hair long? I didn't think it was such a good look for Harry, Ron, Fred, and George.
  
• While on the subject of new looks, what was up with Flitwick in this movie?
  
• Dumbledore's burst of anger upon finding Harry's name in the Goblet of Fire struck me as somewhat out of character. And speaking of weird characterizations, Snape was apparently channeling the spirit of Moe Howard in that one scene.
  
• I didn't really care for the way they showed Sirius Black's face in the fire. It was hardly of the level of the Howler from Chamber of Secrets (perhaps the worst visual effect in the films so far), but I wish they'd stuck closer to the book for this.
  
• Since when did Parvati and Padma Patil become the twins from The Shining? I mean, they're not even in the same house, and I don't think they were ever together in earlier movies, but they were disturbingly inseparable in this film.
  

And a few other comments that aren't really positive or negative, just things I wanted to address:

• I think we saw considerably more of Fred and George than in the earlier movies. Ginny also frequently appeared in scenes where she didn't actually have anything to do. On the other hand, Percy never appeared at all.
  
• The crying stained glass window was pretty weird. It made me think of when people claim that their statues of the Virgin Mary are crying, and stuff like that.
  
• Was it just me, or was that scene with Moaning Myrtle very overtly sexual? That is one perverted ghost!
  
• Could they have made Death Eaters' costumes look any MORE similar to KKK outfits?
  

Even though there are more items on my bad list than on my good one, I did like the movie a lot. I've liked all of them, though; I'm not one of those people who thinks they didn't get it right until this time. I'm not really sure how this stacks up the others. As much as they ended up cutting out, I think it actually stuck closer to the book than Prisoner of Azkaban did, but I'm not really sure which one I liked better. I need to watch both of the last two again, I suppose. Chamber of Secrets was probably my least favorite of the four so far, but even that was a quality film.

Comments

[rockinlibrarian.livejournal.com]

Having just come back from the movie, I now feel like I can comment on other people's discussions of it, horray!:

They never addressed Rita Skeeter's ability to turn into a beetle, how the Dementor sucked out Barty Crouch Jr.'s soul, or Igor Karkaroff's departure from Hogwarts after Voldemort's return. Yeah, all three of these things, while I didn't really miss them myself while watching it, when I thought of it later I realized, whoa, there's some book 5 plot points that are not going to make sense without those things being addressed. Though before I saw this I wondered how they were going to introduce Cho when Harry was supposed to have met her in year 3 playing quidditch, but I guess they pulled that off without too much comment.

While I did miss Dobby, I liked Neville's involvement in finding out about Gillyweed. Me too... I liked how much Neville was in the movie period. I also liked how Harry was hanging out with Neville a lot especially when he and Ron were fighting. I've always been a big Neville fan in general, though. One thing I didn't like so much about book 6 in fact was that there wasn't enough Neville in it, and I SOOOO hope he comes back in book 7.

While on the subject of new looks, what was up with Flitwick in this movie? Weren't both this new Flitwick AND the old Flitwick in the third movie? I noticed it then. I thought it was very odd.

Dumbledore's burst of anger upon finding Harry's name in the Goblet of Fire struck me as somewhat out of character. Dumbledore seemed rather too nervous for Dumbledore in general in this movie. I always think of him as so calm and in control of everything....

Since when did Parvati and Padma Patil become the twins from The Shining? HAH! I totally thought of you saying this while I was watching. Yeah, bit creepy that. Wonder what Lavender Brown was doing the whole time with her best friend being conjoined to her sister.

I think we saw considerably more of Fred and George than in the earlier movies. FRED AND GEORGE ROCK! I totally dig as much Fred and George as sensibly possible in all movies that exist! Including ones that aren't Harry Potter related!
Percy never appeared at all. Which I wonder about... I wonder how they're going to handle his character in movie 5. Actually there's always been much less Percy in the movies than in the books, but you know, book 5, that's some kind of intense stuff. Maybe they won't even go into it considering how little they've had of Percy in the movies in the past-- one less subplot to worry about.

Was it just me, or was that scene with Moaning Myrtle very overtly sexual? That is one perverted ghost! No, one of my other friends posted the same opinion. Surprisingly I didn't find it TOO glaringly annoying, and usually I'm like the most asexual person on earth when it comes to innuendo... maybe that's why I didn't find it that glaring, I'm used to not picking up on stuff; but I do think, and I told my other friend the same, that I think it's out of character for Myrtle to be that sexual. I mean, she died when she was what, thirteen? and was a total nerd, and she had not developed beyond the Hopeless Crush phase of sexuality by that point, so now since she no longer has hormones, being immaterial, she can't possibly develop any further, so theoretically she should have just been giggling nervously the whole time.

Could they have made Death Eaters' costumes look any MORE similar to KKK outfits? They could have been white, I guess.

Hah, well, maybe I should just go and make my own post on the topic now.

[hellmutt.livejournal.com]

I agree on most or all points - I especially missed Rita's unmasking, since it was Hermione's chance to shine through cleverness rather than prettiness. Here they introduced Rita, started to make a nuisance of her but then seemed just to drop that subplot halfway through.

Myrtle disturbed me too. :D

The KKK thing was the one thing I did agree on. I've always felt the DEs ought to look fairly like the pointed hoods of the goon parade.

Okay, we've all seen the size of the book, but I suppose I didn't agree overall with their priorities in choosing what to cut and what to keep.

I ended up feeling this one would have worked better as a tv series - six half-hour-long eps (even 45 or 60 minutes, ideally) would have given them a better chance to keep all Rowling's balls in the air.