Three days since the midnight premiere and not a single thread about the number one movie in North America?
I went to the midnight show and I saw the IMAX 3D version last night. If you have the option, IMAX 3D is the way to go. The 3D is excellent, amazing. The final scenes in the Ministry of Magic including Dumbledore's Army vs. The Death Eaters and Voldemort vs. Dumbledore are in 3D. You're completely immersed in the experience. It was much better than the Superman Returns 3D last year, where it seemed like Superman was actually father from you. With Harry Potter, the 3D characters just about leap off the screen.
The movie itself played better for me on IMAX as well. I like the movie either way and think it's good. First time I saw it I had a lot of issues, not necessarily with what was omitted from the book vs. the movie, but with how I thought it was a little lacking dramatically and how I thought a lot of moments weren't all they could have been. Second time on IMAX, I was able to just focus on what was there and had a much better time. It's a fine Harry Potter movie no matter what. Of the five movies, it's in the top three for sure. Your milage may vary on where it ranks within. Still, very much recommended for Potter fans (non-Potter fans are sure to have a lot of questions. The more familiar you are with the books or at least with the previous movies, the better off you'll be.)
I saw it this evening; and I was very much impressed. Last years offering left me disappointed, but I enjoyed this go round.
Can't say I was happy that Quiddich wasn't featured, but I'm guessing it was one of Dolores' many rules.
I've seen NINE movies so far this year: Because I Said So - (2*); Borat - (5*); Children Of Men - (4*); Fantastic Four 2 - (4.5*); Knocked Up - (4*); The Last Mimsy - (4*); Shrek The Third - (3*); Spiderman 3 - (3.5*); Transformers - (2*)
I saw it yesterday, and I thought it was pretty good, especially the ending sequence. I must admit though that I would be one of "those" people with regards to being upset that there were many things left out or outright changed. Part of this is because OotP is my absolute favorite book in the Harry Potter series, so I was more apt to be upset over this movie.
The thing I hated worst was the deletion of the portion where the Weasley's and Harry go to St. Mungo's hospital to see Mr. Weasley. One of the most heartbreaking moments in the book is when they all find Neville Longbottom with his parents, who were driven insane by Bellatrix LeStrange. Being that Neville is pretty much my favorite character, I was upset we didn't see this.
Other than that though, the movie was still terrific fun with great visuals and better acting from most of the actors...except for Rupert Grint as Ron. After five movies, Rupert is still under-acting and using his two acting faces (surprise and wonder). Daniel and Emma were both great though.
I'd recommend this movie to the Harry Potter fans, but if you are not a fan, you will be confused and likely won't enjoy it as much.
I'm going back to see it later today, so I must not be too upset over this truncated treatment.
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I read in an interview with the director in ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY (I think...) that he purposely left out the Quiddich match that Ron wins in the book, The bit with the floating brain and whole characters were cut out from the script because he didn't want to make a three hour movie.
Some bullshit about him wanting HIS version of the book to go faster and not bore the audience.
I call this bullshit because it left Rupert Grint with absolutely nothing to do except give reaction shots to the rest of the cast.
The director also was going to cut out all refferences to the Black family house elf, but thankfully Rawling raised a fuss telling the producers not to do it if they plan on filming the rest of the series, so I suppose he becomes important later on.
This was a pretty good film, anyways, but it left me wanting more. It felt like there was stuff missing, because it was so short (like 2hrs 10mins or something like that.). I haven't read the books, but I seem to remember seeing this one in book stores and it was pretty damn thick, so I'm guessing he cut out quite a lot... did he? Just wondering.
Emma Watson was quite pretty. Every few times she was on camera, I would remember those pictures of her that poped up a year or so ago with her almost swallowing a beer bottle and it made me feel dirty, but I'm cool with it.
Saw it today and have to be honest-- I think 5 Harry Potter movies in 6 years is too much. They just don't seem as special as the first few. Same settings, same actors, etc. We've seen the Hogwarts school, the train, London, Hagrid's place, people in pictures moving, all before. It's like if all the Star Wars movies were on Planet Tatooine.
It wasn't bad, I just found myself wanting more action. The final battle was pretty exciting, but it felt like it took forever to get there. I think a Harry Potter 3-D movie would be great.
I think I only heard one "Bloody hell" for the Ron Weasley drinking game.
I've never read the Harry Potter books, and I really didn't get interested in the movies until I caught the last half of Prisoner of Azkeban on HBO. That said, I saw this movie Wednesday evening and enjoyed it. I like how magic has gone from being used for stupid cantrippy type stuff and now its used for actual combat. I liked how the adults in the Order saved the kids in 'Dumbledore's Army' at the end of the sequence in the Ministry of Mysteries (or whatever it was called.) Sirius' death didn't quite seem like it had enough weight to it, but overall, I enjoyed the movie. Enough so that I'm tempted to start reading the books...
(Ugh. I'm still hopeless clutching to the Tim Hunter > Harry Potter argument...)
(edited by EddieBurkett on 15.7.07 0031) You believe me, don't you? Please believe what I just said...
This was so far the only book i read all of and loved it. I saw the film a few hours ago and well, it realy needed to be 3 hours. if for any thing the two sceens that I feel made the book good. The hospital sceen and the Battle at the Minastry. But it was a good film but not as good as GOF was. I can't wait for Hlaf blood Prince to come out next year.
Originally posted by TorchslasherThe thing I hated worst was the deletion of the portion where the Weasley's and Harry go to St. Mungo's hospital to see Mr. Weasley. One of the most heartbreaking moments in the book is when they all find Neville Longbottom with his parents, who were driven insane by Bellatrix LeStrange. Being that Neville is pretty much my favorite character, I was upset we didn't see this.
Absolutely agree. That was not only my favorite part of the book, but my favorite part of the Harry mythos in it's entirety. Really gives Neville the missing quality that he needed after being portrayed as a goofball for the first four, made Bellatrix look like a horrible villain and shows the absolute darkest side of the coming war in the wizard world.
As for "shit being left out" this one had it's flaws (absoutely nothing from Lupin and next to nothing from Snape who is going to need an entire hour devoted to him in Half Blood Prince in order to catch up) but didn't quite compare to the gaping plot holes of Prisoner of Azkahban.
Good overall, but I can see they're going to have some big continuity problems down the road since the plots only get more complicated from here on.
WoW Wisdom: "And then there's aggro to worry about." "What's 'aggro'?" "Well, it's complicated. But loosely translated, it means 'the priest dies.'"
I enjoyed the movie overall, but definitely agree the absence of the St. Mungo's scene was quite noticeable. All the adults have been increasingly shunted to the side, presumably on the premise that the kids who watch the movies want to see the people their own age and aren't as attached to the grown-ups (which I find doubtful, but that's Hollywood logic for you). The severe lack of Lupin and Tonks, Sirius' family background being only briefly touched on and more Arthur Weasley is almost always a good thing.
One thing I thought I'd mention is Imelda Staunton. She played Umbridge to the hilt, getting the tone just right and managing to be sinister and chipper at the same time. Who knew a room full of mewling kittens could be so creepy? Definitely the best performance in the movie, I thought.
Honestly, I think my horrible theater experience (cramped seating, too hot, didn't turn the house lights all the way down) may have damaged the movie a little for me. I'll have a better sense of my full feelings on it once the DVD comes out.
"Never piss off a hawk with a blowgun" - Conan O'Brien
Went and saw this with my 11-year old son and his friend on Sunday.
I would agree with a lot of what has been said here. When my wife asked me how it was, I told her that it just seemed like there was something missing.
I would agree that if the plan is to go forward with Neville's character, as the books do, then they needed the scene in St Mungo's. That was one thing...
I also noticed that the adults were less prevalent, but I think that was the feeling of the book too. This one really was building up the feeling of Harry by himself and that was how it should've been.
If you didn't like that, the next one will probably be worse for that, so....
Overall, I liked it. Probably not as much as the others, but it was good.
In terms of the kids, they came out of the theatre saying that it was scary. I am glad that my wife took the two younger kids to Ratatouille instead. We will watch it with the younger ones at home when the DVD comes out...
(edited by haz on 17.7.07 1137) There's a World Container with your name on it, and a billion ways to go bezerk!!
I loved it. I thought it was the best of the Potter movies so far. Radcliffe finally seems to be coming into his own as an actor. The best thing they did was cut about 14,000 pages of Harry whining out. The wizard battle at the end was just all kinds of awesome. I sure didn't miss the extraneous story lines and details of Harry's love life and guilt. The only thing I really missed was Firenze.
No Quiddich and very little Ron - both of which were huge pluses. On the other hand, Alan Rickman practically had a cameo role in this one. So I suppose the whole thing's a bit of a wash.
Even when these movies have had flaws I've kinda overlooked them and enjoyed them all. Even though the last offering was lacking in a lot of ways I thought. But this one was horrid. Maybe it's because I can't seperate it from the book, but wow I hated it.
The director is a fucking idiot. I'm not one of those guys who knows anything about directors. Couldn't begin to tell you who directed my favorite movies for instance. But this guy sucks ass. The whole movie it was skipping from part to part with horrible transitions and just kept pissing me off. The changes he made were plain old stupid and didn't work.
Granted the book is huge, but come on. No way this couldn't have been done better than it was. And have some friggen consistancy between movies at least. Sirius's head in the fire should have been done the same as last time, not totally different. Didn't make any sense. It's a small thing, but it bothered the heck outta me for some reason.
The final battle stuff was ok, but again too changed to me. Could have been much, much better.
Such a shame. This seems to be getting good reception from most Potter fans so maybe I need to see it again.
Originally posted by wmatisticThe director is a fucking idiot. I'm not one of those guys who knows anything about directors. Couldn't begin to tell you who directed my favorite movies for instance. But this guy sucks ass. The whole movie it was skipping from part to part with horrible transitions and just kept pissing me off. The changes he made were plain old stupid and didn't work.
This is director David Yates first full length movie since an indy film he did in 1998. So yeah, he did seem like a strange choice to be the director of a film costing $150 million.
However, he has already been tagged to direct "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" as well, so I don't know if there's anything to be done.
As long as the 7th movie is good, the quality of the intervening films is almost irrelevant. Not that it's much consolation to you, of course.
Still haven't seen the first 3 movies in the series but I did take my 9 year old daughter to see this one - SHE LOVED IT - but I think that had more to do with the fact it was the first time she had seen Harry on the BIG SCREEN than anything else. Yates said that he thought that the other Potter movies were too long so it was his goal to shorten them but this was a movie that really could have done with an extra 10-20 minutes. There was just too much in the book that should have made it to the screen. Granted, it is a dark movie that does a good job of transitioning Harry from a young wizard finding his way to a young man finding his destiny.
It was still worth the $8.50 I paid.
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I'm late to the party, but I finally saw it tonight. It was worth the wait for me, as it was probably one of the better HP movies. The final climax was worth the slow progression through the movie.
I'm not big on the Quiddich, so I'm not too torn up that it was taken out. The Weasley twins stole the show for me, personally. It felt like some of the more established faces were given little screen time (Snape, Ron, Draco Malfoy), but that's understandable considering that this was the book where Rowling started to make the stories the size of encyclopedias. Still a good night at the movies, though.
Originally posted by OlFuzzyBastardOn the other hand, Alan Rickman practically had a cameo role in this one. So I suppose the whole thing's a bit of a wash.
Judging by how the next two books went, this will definitely be rectified in the next two films. The man's presence will be felt in a big way.
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It's not a theory. It's a (movie) fact. The "fucking" bullet hit the "fucking" adamantium on his "fucking" skull and thus popped out FLATTENED without it "fucking" killing him.