About once a month, or possibly every weekend, ABC Family has a Harry Potter movie marathon. There are not enough words to express the love that I have for the Harry Potter books. On the other hand, the movies make me want to hurl something at the tv. I wish that I liked the movies. By that I mean that I wish that the movies were likable. They at best rush through the story just trying to hit the main points and at worst completely rewrite the story violating those sacred texts. I realize all movies based on books have to make changes to the story and drop less important side plots to make the movie fit the desired time limit. I believe that instead of leaving out important parts of the story, they should just make the movies longer. All of the movies should be at least three hours long, and most need to be at least six. Despite the problems, I can't keep myself from watching them. They, at times, come close to getting things right. But that only makes their failings that much more heartbreaking.
I never watch live tv, with the exception of sporting events, because I hate commercials. So the Challenge that I set myself was to see if I could watch the movie until the next commercial break.
The first time that I flip to ABC Family, Harry and Ron are following the spiders into the forest. I watched from there until they left the chamber. There were some changes but nothing major. It was strange that Fawkes did not heal Harry until after the diary was destroyed. Basilisk venom must be slower acting than I have been led to believe. It does destroy the diary instantly. That seems like a long stretch of movie. I might have even watched through the commercial break.
The next time I turned the movies on, the trio are leaving Hagrid's cabin. My first complaint is that there was no Crookshanks. Then after too little discussion in the Shrieking Shack, Snape ("Professor Snape, Harry") runs in with no invisibility cloak. Then only Harry curses him. I could not take any more. That is the best scene in the book, and it was going horribly wrong.
Later when I flipped back over, Hermione and Rita Skeeter were in the champions tent for no good reason. Then Mr Crouch came in with a very unCrouchish demeanor. Harry is then chased all over the school grounds by the dragon. I turned it off before he even got the egg. It was a great action sequence that I would have loved if I had not read the book.
Right when I turned it back on the Order were apparating into the ministry. This was the worst possible time for me to turn it on because there was no chance that I could watch this scene for long. The Deatheaters and the Order members were flying around the room without brooms (something only the Dark Lord can do). Then Bellatrix hit Sirius with the AK, and he floated through a shadowy doorway. I changed channels in disgust vowing never to watch these terrible adaptations again.
I guess I got busy doing other things because I did not flip the channel back to HP the rest of the day. So my final record was 1-3. Or maybe my record should be 4-0 because I did not throw things at the tv during any of the movies.
The confrontation
ReplyDeleteSeventeen years of waiting
Down to one moment
A boy on the run
Accompanied by two friends
With a crucial goal
Dangerous journey
Three friends embark together
to protect their world
Wrong blog Billy Geoff. hash-tag-jus sayin
ReplyDeleteFor me, the problem with the HP movies is that they have no life of their own. Like you said, they're just trying to hit the high points of the books and be visually interesting. The movies don't tell a story so much as they act as extended illustrations accompanying a story that they assume the audience already knows. In the early films, this makes them appear lifeless. In the later ones (when the books starting getting really long), it makes them confusing and disjointed. The characters in the movies, especially the second tier characters like the professors, never get fleshed out which is a very bad thing in a character driven series like Harry Potter. The directors seem to focus on the visuals more than the characters, and that is a good recipe for a crappy movie (think about the opening scene in Star-Wars episode III and you'll know what I'm talking about). It's such a shame because there are things that I really like about the movies. Hermione is winsome and charming (despite the fact that Miss Watson is far too pretty for the role) and Ron works pretty well in most all the movies. Really the trio actors do okay. It's all the stuff around them that feels forced lacks heart. I do think that it's possible to take really long, really sacred books and make them into highly edited films that don't betray the vital heart of the story (see The Fellowship of the Ring), but I think that it's REALLY hard to do so without falling into tons of stupid movie mistakes like extending action scenes at the expense of character moments (see the Mumakil charge in Return of the King) or to make stupid plot changes that serve no real purpose and detract from the larger story (see the trip to Osgiliath in Two Towers). Harry Potter does very little of the first one, but tons of the second two.
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