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Pottered out!
18 years ago
General
Well, I think I'm good and Harry Pottered out! Over my birthday weekend, the 7th book arrived AND we went to see the latest movie at the Imax in 3-D (although only 20 minutes of it was in 3-D...and it wasn't NEARLY as impressive as the trailers for the 3-D "Dinosaurs Alive" and "Sea Monsters" shows--THOSE were incredible 3-D!)
Even though my time is at a bit of a premium, I HAD to read the book--apologies to everyone waiting for artwork, but I'm only human!) I blazed through it in a few days. And here's my review of both Potter events.
First: The movie--HP and the Order of the Phoenix. Not bad. I wasn't really as impressed with the big wizard battle as I was hoping to be. It seemed choppy...but that may just be me, because I know how much more there is (having read the book) to the scenes and the characters that they could only touch on in the time allotted. There were a lot of things they had to leave out that I would have liked to see, but again, there was only so much time they had to tell a VERY long and complicated story. Still, in many ways I thought this movie was better than the last couple.
As for the book--I enjoyed it. There were things I wasn't happy about, of course, but she tied up the loose ends, gave us some interesting twists and turns and delivered a satisfyingly epic battle to wrap things up. All in all, I think she did it proud. I don't feel like I've wasted the years I invested in the "franchise", and I enjoyed the ride.
So...back to muggle life. *sigh*
Even though my time is at a bit of a premium, I HAD to read the book--apologies to everyone waiting for artwork, but I'm only human!) I blazed through it in a few days. And here's my review of both Potter events.
First: The movie--HP and the Order of the Phoenix. Not bad. I wasn't really as impressed with the big wizard battle as I was hoping to be. It seemed choppy...but that may just be me, because I know how much more there is (having read the book) to the scenes and the characters that they could only touch on in the time allotted. There were a lot of things they had to leave out that I would have liked to see, but again, there was only so much time they had to tell a VERY long and complicated story. Still, in many ways I thought this movie was better than the last couple.
As for the book--I enjoyed it. There were things I wasn't happy about, of course, but she tied up the loose ends, gave us some interesting twists and turns and delivered a satisfyingly epic battle to wrap things up. All in all, I think she did it proud. I don't feel like I've wasted the years I invested in the "franchise", and I enjoyed the ride.
So...back to muggle life. *sigh*
As for the loose ends being tied up, no they weren't. He left the one in the forest and what happened to the cloak except it's with him, but who does he pass it onto. And what does he do for a job? Did he raise Tonks and Lupin's kid or did he let the grandmother of him take care of him? And what happened to him? Where does Harry live now? There were too many mysteries for it to be tied up, I honestly could continue but it just wasn't the right ending to be called tied up. So the bad guy is dead, what about the rest of 'em? There are so many ways it could be continued on.
Overall I thought it was an excellent conclusion to an over 3000 page book... if she had just combined them all into one massive tree killing thing
Although I would have liked their jobs at that point in life to have been mentioned. She said it was in the original draft...I say: Hermione for Minister of Magic! Harry as Hogwarts Headmaster and Ron (who is supposedly an Auror with Harry) as permanent DADA teacher! Draco should be Hermione's secretary. ;)
I do have to say that if this book had been like the 4-6 I probably would have burned it afterwards, but just because it was good and kept me thinking redeemed my thoughts on the last three... thought I will still never read them agian. I may read the 1-3 and the 7th again, but never those others, they were just too similar and stupid for my pity...
I guess the thing that also gets to me is that in all the books, how much had Harry learned as a student at hogwarts? Pretty much everything important could have been learned in the first year, so I was kinda disappointed that no new spells and shit were shown...
Also, I was glad Percy came back, but it felt forced and rushed, and it wasn't that satisfying to me. *shrug*
My feelings on the book as a whole are kind of mixed... Maybe I had my expectations too high, but I felt almost let down by it in ways I can't even define. Maybe it's that the ending seems a little too neat and happy, I don't know...
Mostly I was happy with the book..but maybe that's just because I was so worried she was going to sacrifice one of the big three.
And really, with all the hype--how could your expectations NOT have been too high? Still, I found the book generally satisfying, and it had an ending I could live with, so I'm pleased.
Phoenix still wasn't as good as Prisoner of Azkaban and the others.
As far as Book 7, I finished it in 4 days, which is a record for me for a 700+ page book!
A nice page-turner, just like the previous 6 books!
The Epilogue could have been longer - or dropped altogether - but I find no real faults with the rest of the book.
I'm both happy and sad right now.
Happy we got to get the whole series of 7 promised books in less than 10 years,
but sad now that there's no more Harry Potter on the way, as far as books (new stories).
Azkaban was my favorite book for a long time. I liked the movie, but somehow it just wasn't great as a movie. I have to read book 7 again before I can decide where I rank it. My favorite of the movies is still the first. It had all the wonder and fun of the first book...and being a shorter book, the movie wasn't as hacked up as the later ones are.
But ok, you beat me :-P
That's the problem with movies, especially ones based on books that are so beloved. A director, no matter how good, can never incorporate all of the loyal fans' favorite moments, because everyone has different ones! And, Jo has filled these books with so many clues, it's impossible to know in Book 5 what will be important in Book 7, or to know in Book 2 what will be important in Book 6, etc. So director's are only given so much info and the script writers have to guess what might become important later on!
Even Jo, who "consults" on each movie, said she was surprised that in Azkaban[b] director Alphonso Cuaron (or more specifically, writer Steve Kloves) had put in one or two things "...that will become important later on..." without even realizing it. (This is on the Extra DVD in the 2-disc set).
Anyway, as I said, I think they did a slightly better job on [b]Order of the Phoenix than they did on Goblet of Fire, but not nearly as good a job as was done on Sorceerer's Stone, Chamber of Secrets & Prisoner of Azkaban (which remains my favorite).
You're right about the movies--nobody can get everything in--I absolutely agree with that. On the other hand--I think with material like this, a director has an obligation to try and represent the source material as faithfully as possible.
One of Bel's biggest complaints about the movie was the little, entirely correctable problems...why did Dudley have dark hair? Why doesn't Percy wear horn-rimmed glasses? Things like that.
The thing that disappointed me most about Azkaban, the movie, was that The Marauders (the origin of the map) weren't identified (as they were in the book), and it goes a long way to explain why Harry's patronus is a stag.
More than a few of my friends who've never read the books, didn't understand the significance of Msrs. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot & Prongs and I had to explain who they were and why Lupin had knowledge of the map - which he warned Harry about, but not how he knew (again, the book explains all tis, the movie did not.
In Goblet, I really missed the Dursleys (though I can understand why that whole part was cut for time), but that would have been rectified by cutting back on the Yule Ball (which I'm sure ran overlong because of the girls in the audience).
Anyway, no more Harry Potter
Feeling all lonely now...
But to read the book, come to certain imagery conclusions, and then see the movie can't be anything but a disappointment. Every deviation from the text due to cinematic time & money considerations jumps out at you. Every line delivered differently from how you first imagined it delivered in your imagination from the book reminds you over and over again that you are sitting in a theatre watching actors/actresses on a screen.
It’s rather like unwrapping all your gifts on December 24th, to see what you are going to get for Christmas, then rewrapping them and opening them all again on the next day with the expectation of receiving something different.
Fortunately--we HAVE the books! We can enjoy both mediums to their fullest. But it defintely sucks when somebody makes a really BAD movie based on something you love. I mentioned several examples in a past posting.
As for the epilogue, yeah. When I first read it, I was dreadfully disappointed. I reread it a few times before I started appreciating it, though. I wouldn't like to think that everything significant that Harry goes through after killing Voldemort could be fit at the end of such an amazing book-- To get a sense for his life afterwards, you'd need a lot more pages, not even starting with the other characters. Rowling has, on the other hand, closed up a few more gaps if you're interested! I guessed almost all of this before actually reading it though. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19959323/
And really--like you said, with an epilogue all she needed to do was give a sense of where things went after Voldey fell. Life went on, they were happy, they have families and stayed together...
I think we got what we really wanted most.