Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Mentalist

Mentalist

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Watched it the other day in Athens.

Hard to call or rate really. I can see why there has been criticism of the movie being "slow" and "dull" but I appreciated the way the movie tackled the book head on and really delved into the deeper parts of the plot instead of going for all the shallow visual excitement. With that said this is meant to be a cinematic experience and it could of done with some more commitment to the action scenes and if you're going to go full on with pulling the plot off well (of which the HBP is very intricate) then we arrive back at the argument that like LotR the movies need serious extended cut treatment.

What HBP does it does very well though. From light humor (Rupert Grint take another bow) to plot progression and character building. Visually it's a treat as well.

It's actually very true to the book (in the parts it shows) but you end up feeling like you're trying to get through an epic piece of work in a limited amount of time and the cinematic experience suffers. Hagrid has about 4 minutes of screen time, two of which are spent snoring. No, really.

It's nowhere near beating the Prisoner of Azkaban as a cinematic piece of work (which remains the best "movie" of the lot without any question) but at the same time it doesn't feel as stilted and empty as Goblet of Fire (which is my favourite book but my least favourite movie) despite the similar lengths of the books it needs to translate to screen.

The fact that they didn't make extended cuts of the movies remains my biggest gripe with the Harry Potter series because more often than not what is done is done well. They just didn't do enough of it.

Well worth seeing at the cinema though if you can.

EMMA IS FUCKING GORGEOUS TO THE POINT OF UTTER DISTRACTION.
 
I was impressed at how faithful it was to the parts of the book that it attempted. HPB is definitely the hardest book to adapt. There's not much action in the movie because, well, until the ending there's not much action in the book, either. I was particularly impressed with the way they realized Harry & Dumbledore's trip to find the horcrux -- it was very close to how I saw it in my head while reading it.

But of course, I had some major problems with it as well:

- The ending (once again) was condensed and rushed to the point of silliness. They changed crtical parts of the climactic scene, and then skipped over the real epilogue for another generic "we'll get them next time" wrap-up. Same problem as OOP.

- The Harry/Ginny relationship - This was my biggest problem: As far as those who have only seen the movie are concerned, this relationship is still only at the flirting stage. They didn't really get together. Every great, juicy scene from the book dealing with them fumbling with romance was truncated or rewritten into shit. By the end of the book,
they were already going steady until Harry decides to cool things off so that she doesn't wind up just another of his dead loved-ones.
While it's not the major plot piece of the book, I remember when I first started reading the passages where Harry. who had led such a lonely, isolated, downbeat life for 5 books, had finally found someone to love -- I was touched. And the movie practically trivializes it. I was unhappy to say the least.

I'd have to go back and review things before finding other, less gut-churning faults. But I still enjoyed the movie very much and can't wait for the DVD to come out. All there is on the internet right now is a semi-decent telesync. ;)
 
The "I am the Half-Blood Prince!" moment was really nothing like I'd imagined it would be (in that it wasn't very good.)
 
Mentalist said:
The fact that they didn't make extended cuts of the movies remains my biggest gripe with the Harry Potter series because more often than not what is done is done well. They just didn't do enough of it.
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This is still my major gripe -- the fist "complete" 8-movie box set that was released didn't have the extended versions, but the original DVD versions. They really need to correct that, in the US at least. The only way I can see the extended versions is on commercial television (ABC Family).

RIGHT MENTY? EH WOT?
 
They add several minutes to each film. It's basically all the deleted scenes from the DVDs added in the right places. They are mostly scenes that help set up/explain other things that happen later in the film. You know, those scenes in each where people complained that anyone who didn't read the books wouldn't know what was going on.
 
The way the family crept away before the final showdown, I would imagine they left the country to find safety and to deal privately with the fact that Lucius was such a gaping asshole.
 
Did they creep away like that in the book? It's interesting that Draco never really redeemed himself. I mean he wasn't evil, but he was still too much of a coward to do anything good or heroic. ANOTHER WRITER probably would have had him make a "I STAND WITH HOGWARTS!" speech at the end or something.
 
I forget exactly how the Malfoys ended up in the book, but I saw this summary at Yahoo Answers and (shockingly) it seemed pretty accurate:
Near the end of the book, as Harry seeks the Ravenclaw diadem within the Room of Requirement, Malfoy, Crabbe and Goyle surprise him and attempt to capture him for Voldemort. Having heard Harry mention the diadem, Draco's interest was piqued, and he tried to keep Crabbe and Goyle from wrecking the Room in their attempts to capture Harry, but Crabbe refused to listen to him, announcing that he would no longer follow Draco's orders. Over Draco's protests, Crabbe then attempted to kill Harry and his friends. During the battle, Draco and Goyle lose their wands, and are thus helpless when Crabbe uses Fiendfyre and turns the Room into an inferno. Crabbe is lost somewhere in the flames, but Draco, dragging the stunned Goyle along with him, manages to evade the fire long enough for Harry and Ron, riding broomsticks, to rescue them and escape the burning room. Malfoy is left stunned by the narrow escape and the betrayal and loss of his friend.

Malfoy is seen later pleading with a Death Eater who seems on the verge of murdering him. He insists that he's on their side, but the Death Eater appears unwilling to back down. He is rescued by Harry and Ron, wearing the invisibility cloak, but as he looks around for his savior he is punched in the face by Ron, who calls him a "two-faced bastard" and reminds him that that's the second time they've saved his life. Malfoy, utterly bemused, doesn't respond.

Although Malfoy doesn't directly participate in the final battle against Voldemort, he is significant to it in two ways: first, after Harry and Voldemort's duel in the forest, Narcissa Malfoy is sent to check to see if he is actually dead; feeling his heart beating, she hisses a question to him, asking him if Draco is alive in the castle, and when he tells her that he is, Narcissa chooses to lie, knowing that she would only be allowed to search for Draco if the Death Eaters returned to Hogwarts "as part of the conquering army." Later, Draco is revealed to have been the unwitting master of the Elder Wand (after Dumbledore) as he had disarmed Dumbledore prior to his death. Since the allegiance of the Elder Wand passes to whomever disarms its former owner, this meant that once Harry had disarmed Draco, mastery of the Wand lay in Harry's hands (despite the fact that Malfoy had never even actually held the Elder Wand; somehow, it "knew" that Harry had disarmed Malfoy, though it was of Malfoy's own wand rather than the more powerful Elder Wand). This prevented Voldemort from accessing the Wand's full power, and when Voldemort attempted to attack Harry, the Wand, recognizing Harry as its true master, caused the spell to rebound and kill Voldemort instead. Hence Malfoy had an indirect hand in Voldemort's ultimate defeat, though he had no idea of it.

Following the defeat of Voldemort, Draco and his family are seen by Harry in the Great Hall during the victory celebration, although separated from everyone else. Thanks to Narcissa Malfoy's lie to Harry's advantage earlier in the Forbidden Forest, the Malfoys once again manage to "weasel their way" out of going to Azkaban.
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In the book it was made clearer that they had basically switched sides; in the movie it's not so clear, since they cut half of Dreco's actions, and since Lucius was just a stuttering pussy in the last two movies. As a result, Narcissa's decision to help Harry comes out of left field.

It's interesting (well sad actually) that even though they split the book into two movies, there were still characters and events that got shortchanged.
 
Oh yeah Ron saying "bastard" was another "these aren't kid books!" moment (except they are really.)

IT'S INTERESTING that IN A WAY a mother's love (this time Narcissa's) was what defeated Voldemort again.
 
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