Well here is my review of the new Harry Potter movie. I have never read the book but I have watched the other movies and enjoyed them quite a bit. I have mixed feelings about this particular movie though. Some stuff was really good but other things left me feeling kind of weird.
The movie was very action packed and they finally got rid of that insipid family that Harry lives with in the summer. I can't stand those people and I wish Harry could just move in with the Weasleys or something. In this movie it kind of implies that he does. At the beginning he goes on vacation with them to the Quidditch World Cup. This was for me one of the best parts of the movie. The whole idea of a World Cup with thousands of these wizards camped out around the grounds in magical Mordenkainen's Magnificent Mansion type tents was awesome.
I am going to rent the DVD and watch the scenes over again to see if there is an American Quiddich team. I would love to see how strong Brazil and Germany are in Quidditch. I also wonder if there is a list of World Cup winners and if they wear stars on their uniforms to denote how many World Cups they won. It seems Bulgaria is tough but they do have a high school kid playing at Seeker. Also who were the other two countries seeded with Ireland and Bulgaria?
It would be cool if there was the equivalent of a Arsenal, Manchester United, or a Premier League of Quiddich. Maybe J.K. Rowlings will write this kind of info into the next book. I mean Harry plays the sport so he should probably be interested in the Quiddich version of David Beckam. He would also have some Quidditch memorabilia hung up somewhere in his room. But the freaking Death Dealers with their stupid pointy hats broke everything up before I could find out any more. That made me hate them more then anything else they did in the movie.
One of the things I felt weird about is that the kids are growing up. So it was really strange to hear Ron Weasley comment about a how big a girls boobs were getting and have gratuitous shots of him checking out girls asses. You see the testosterone flowing when Harry and Ron start to dislike one another because Harry entered the Triwizard Tourney. You can also see a Ron/Hermoine relationship starting up in its early stages. Ron gets jealous of the Russian guy that asks her to the dance and Hermoine gets mad because she was relegated to last resort by Ron. We may see an embarrasing first make-out session between the two before too long. Also Harry is starting to like this one Korean girl that had an Irish accent. Could be some sparks about to fly in the near future. Even Hagrid gets hooked up with a really tall, ugly Gaintess to get his groove on with. When the thatched hut is rocking then don't come a knocking.
It also threw me off that Harrys friend that they froze in the first movie, took Ron's sister to the dance, and then came back to the their room much later with his clothes all rumpled. It was kind of implied that he got lucky with her. There was also a scene after the dance too where these girls were consoling another girl that was crying. I have no idea why she was crying or why Ron and Harry didn't seem to care that she was crying. I guess you have to fill in that part in with your imagination. Perhaps one of the Russian School boys got too handsy or maybe he tried to date rape her or something. Also the whole part where the kids were moshing to that aweful wizard band was pretty messed up.
Later in the movie there was this one scene where Harry is bathing in this bathroom and Myrtle the Ghost pops up and helps him out. The ghost I think is the same age as Harry and his friends but she still tries to check out the naked Harry through the bubbles in the pool. I remember that she even submerged to take a peek at Harry's bits and pieces. I just wasn't ready for this kind of stuff in a Harry Potter movie. This may be why this movie carries a PG-13.
I guess I am just not prepared to see the kids I have watched for 3 movies start to get older like this. It is inevitable but it was still pretty jarring.The plot was fairly good in this one even though it had some parts that were hard to understand. The entire flashback where the Russian schoolmaster is in the spiked cage was very hard to follow and it didn't seem to have a bearing on the plot. I guess you are supposed to suspect him when that one guy turns up dead. They also implied that Snape the Alchemy teacher was some kind of double agent or something. I would think Harry would confront Snape or talk to Dumbledore about it. I guess this scene was to reveal the stuff that happens in upcoming books.
Also the Protection from the Dark Arts teacher turns out to be weird-assed again. Can't they find a decent person for that job? I didn't like Mad-Eye Moody's dorky blue fake eye as well. He was a pretty menacing character but that goofy eye made me want to laugh every time I saw it. It would have been cool to just have an eye-patch with a jewel on it or even a CGI created phantom eye that would blink or something.
Voldemort was also a big letdown too with his dorky slits for a nose. He didn't seem all that menacing and didn't look a guy who is known as he-who-should-not-be-named. I guess Ralph Fiennes did a pretty good job of playing him for the most part. I may have wanted his appearance to be more like the Witch King of Angmar.In any case this movie seemed to be a pretty good entry into the Harry Potter genre of movies.
It made me want to read the book just to get more info on some of the questions I had. For instance I want to know why that one girl I mentioned earlier was crying? Also what was in the note that the Russian guy gave Hermoine? Why did their friends agree to be put in suspended animation at the bottom of the lake for that second task? And who eventually won the Quidditch World Cup?
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