I wouldn’t have put it exactly the same way, but this is a very irritating character trait of Harry Potter.
Book 1: Hermione Granger is attacked by a troll. Let’s me and Ron run off and save her, no need to ask a teacher!
The Philosopher’s Stone is in danger, let’s all three of us go figure out the puzzles that experience wizards have set up, but let’s not ask Neville to go get help!
Book 2: We need to go save Ginny Weasley from almost certain death at the fangs of a basilisk, but it would be rude to disturb McGonagall or Flitwick to give us a hand.
Book 5: Sirius is getting tortured by Voldemort in the Department of Mysteries! Let’s not ask a member of the Order (Snape) to check if Sirius is OK (though this is partly explained by the fact that Harry “forgot” about Snape), and when we fly to London, let’s not go to Grimmauld Place to get help from other order members, instead we’ll go directly to the Ministry of Magic without first sending an owl to someone to let them know we might need help. (Plus - why don’t you use that two-way mirror, Harry, instead of breaking into Umbridge’s office to use her fireplace to try to find Sirius)?
I really quite enjoyed it – Batshit Bellatrix was a delight. The possession scene was wonderful. I don’t think Snape unclenched his jaw for the whole movie. I did think it was all rather choppy, but necessarily so…
I was about to hurt someone if I heard the gigglecough again.
My main current woe is that I’ve managed to get an advance copy of a Certain Wonderful Author’s book – which the current reader will be done with in about 2 weeks, so I’m going to be voraciously reading TWO delightful books at the same time. How am I going to choose?
IIRC from the book, Harry didn’t know he had the two way mirror until after Sirius was dead. He found it and unwrapped it as he was packing to go home at the end of term.
Well, he didn’t know what it was, but he knew that Sirius had given him something at Christmast time “to be used in case of emergency when you need to talk to me.”
Well, I think my question now is why didn’t Sirius remind him to use if after all their close calls with the fire/floo communications? I don’t think the blame on this would lie solely with Harry. Of course, I have to remind myself occasionally that we’re not talking about real people.
Because Sirius enjoys taking risks, and because every time they use the Floo network, there are other people around, and Sirius wants it to be their little secret.
Not real? As real as this disembodied character who calls himself Arnold Winkelried!
I love Thewliss as Lupin. I always pictured Lupin as a William Hurt or Donald Sutherland type person anyway–lanky, introspective, gentle, but with a side that he doesn’t like and tries to control, but can’t.
I don’t see how Harry trying to help others inconveniences anyone but himself and the other Big 2. If he went running to a teacher everytime something happened, there wouldn’t be much plot or book (or movie).
The distrust between himself and Snape can be laid squarely at Snape’s door. Perhaps now that HP is older he might think of really thinking about Snape (he has helped HP often, it’s his tone and manner that rile HP), but the first 4 books-HP has no reason to trust Snape. The issues with Snape in book 5 change that, but just like RL, people don’t change their perceptions on a dime. I also think that HP was driven not only by concern for Sirius (movie5) but also curiousity as to what was in the Ministry. In the book, McGonagall is hit by 4 stunning spells.
Ah, okay. That does annoy me. I just never thought of Harry as trying to inconvenience everyone–I just chalked it up to the “never tell grownups” cliche you find in a lot of kid lit.
Not that it really excuses their laziness, but in the first book, it is mentioned that the people in wizard photos don’t just hang out there all day, so the justification for that may be that if no one’s looking at it, the person in the picture isn’t going to move for no reason.
I realize that plotwise it’s important that Harry be the hero, but still! In the Order of the Phoenix, he almost gets five of his friends killed because he doesn’t listen to Hermione (who correctly suggests that perhaps his vision of Sirius isn’t really happening.) And I’m sorry, but if your goal is to rescue someone, then you need to make sure you have backup in case you can’t do it by yourself. In real life (what am I saying? :)) he should have made sure that other members of the Order knew what he was attempting before rushing to the Ministry.
In that case, I didn’t say he should ask McGonagall, because it’s true that she was unavailable.
The kids rushed off to save Sirius because Harry was convinced that he was being tourtred. It was as strong of a feeling when Harry saw Mr. Weasley getting attacked. That’s why he felt they had to act NOW! Not that teenagers have any impulse control or anything.
They did warn the Order. In front of Umbridge, he told Snape that they had Padfoot. That’s how the grown ups came to the ministry.
I don’t know if this was mentioned and I just missed it. Did the actor who played Vernon Dursley lose a lot of weight? I thought his face and neck looked much thinner and they had a big loose shirt on him that made it look like his middle was padded. I thought I read somewhere that he had lost weight but I’m not sure if I’m misremembering.
I keep trying to post to this thread, but it doesn’t let me. I’m only going to say a couple of the things I wanted to say, to keep it short.
I noticed Ron and Hermione were more flirtatious than in previous films. That was nice. I also liked how Ginny got a lot more attention this time around.
As for the twins’ exit from Hogwarts, I think the filmmakers held back; the book portrayed it as far more dangerous and a tad racy, what with the swamp and the swear words in the fireworks. PG-13, people, hello? However, the giant initial W in the sky was a nice touch. Did anyone else think it resembled an upside-down version of the Ministry of Magic’s initial M logo?
Swear words in the fireworks? Missed that and I just reread the book.
I just saw it again–it is as good as when I saw it the first time. I actually like it second best–some of the movies move so damned slow. In this one, it is all the contradictions and oddness that is the wizarding world are accepted-there are no set pieces where we marvel at X or Y. Also, Daniel Radcliffe is exceptional in this one–his acting has improved no end. Even Emma only overacts in the first few scenes–she calms down once they get to Hogwarts.
Yes, it is choppy and they cut too much out-but the essentials are there.
I looked closely at the viaduct scene with Dudders and Harry. You can see very briefly a stag shape when it takes out the first Dementor. It is only a pearly blur for the second one.
Grint’s acting is fantastic, for all his few lines.
Ginny does have dialogue–she speaks at least 2 lines on the covered bridge after Harry and Hermione leave Umbridge with the centaurs. She also gets a patronus first, and does a dazzling reducto spell-twice. She also brings subtlety and grace to her role–watch her eyes flick when Hermione tells Harry that Cho can’t keep her eyes off Harry for instance.
And Neville-despite the awkward scene where he tells Harry about his parents-does quite well, too.
I finally saw the movie today. We see the scene where the D.A. is being taught by Harry how to produce a patronus. I have questions on those. We see:
Hermione - otter (also mentioned in the book)
Ron Weasley - Jack Russell terrier (mentioned by J. K. Rowling: see accio-quote.org)
Cho Chang - swan (mentioned in the book - did we see it in the movie?)
Luna Lovegood - rabbit! New information, not mentioned in the book!
Ginny Weasley - what was it? This is bugging me, I know we saw it in the movie but for the life of me I can’t remember now.
Any others?
Her patronus is either a horse or a colt. Luna’s is a hare; Hermione’s is an otter; Ron’s looks like some kind of dog. Not sure what Neville’s is (or if he could conjure one). Cho’s is not seen in the movie.
Missed that and I just reread the book.