Order of the Phoenix
Jul. 17th, 2007 08:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
meddowOotP is my favourite of the books. I adore the two resistance group and the politics and the message about protecting oneself and the thing you love from creeping encroachment of evil and not just the cackling villain kind of evil. Also, I love secondary characters, and I love the moments may secondary characters get in OotP, like Molly and her boggart and every McGonagall vs Umbridge moment.
Anyway, that’s from where my opinion comes from and having said that - I really liked the movie.
I just wrote down things as I they came to me and somehow my thoughts seem to have progressed from stupid grips to legitimate grips and then onto things I liked to things I really loved. I guess that’s how my mind works.
Stupid gripes that probably only I have
1. Kingsley was not hot. In my interpretation of the novels, Kingsley is in the top three most attractive males we’ve met in canon and movie!Kinglsey does not cut it.
2. Where the heck was Amelia Bones’ monocle? I demand the monocle!
I think I’ve worked out what’s so wrong about EW’s performance. She’s trying seem like she talks to fast without actually talking too fast (because then we wouldn’t understand her?). I think that explains the weird breathing pauses when she reads her lines. Someone should do her a favour and give her a copy of The West Wing or Gilmore Girls and illustrate who fast talking can be done.
Rupert Grint is still the by far the best of the trio. I just think either he’s so Ron already he doesn’t need to act or he’s just has more natural talent than the other two, since he’s the only one who doesn’t seem to be noticeably trying to pull of a performance. Most of the child actors were really good, though I have serious doubts about the kid playing Dudley, though that could be put down to the editing of the scene where he was taunting Harry. The way it was cut just seemed to be a bit odd.
TPTB should really give some of the adult actors more to do. They had Maggie Smith and Emma Thompson and they had, what, somewhere in the realms of 10 lines between them. That’s 2.5 lines per Oscar. I was really disappointed by the general lack McGonagall. Some of her best moments in canon were in OotP and they pretty much all got cut. Though I do think the McGonagall being taken out by Aurors scene was filmed but cut, since there were on set photos of Maggie Smith being filmed in a wheelchair with Hagrid. I’m hoping we get deleted scenes.
Didn’t miss the Quiddich so much in the end and I think I was just so glad that Julie Walters was back to really miss Mrs Weasley’s boggart.
Imelda Shanton was amazing. Umbridge is one of my favourite characters because she is so evil and horrible and Imelda Shanton even managed to make her physically scary in her scenes, particularly in the detention scene with Harry, without losing the pink.
Movie Tonks was really good. Very few lines, but I liked how she always seemed to be doing something regardless, whether it was grinning at Harry from her broom, or tripping over the umbrella stand or pulling Ginny and Luna to safety. It got the character across nicely despite the little screen time.
Movie Luna was excellent. I adored the scenes between her and Harry and she really seemed to pull off Luna’s etherealness.
Wasn’t so sold by HBC as Bellatrix, but I think that’s just because we really didn’t have any work up to her showing up, which is due to the lack of her in GoF.
The actor who played Mr Weasley was really good, some really great comic moments. And I have maintained since GoF that it’s not Michael Gambon, it was the writing and direction that was responsible GoF!Dumbledore and I think my opinion was vindicated. He was really good in this movie.
Speaking of Dumbledore, the Dumbledore vs. Voldemort fight was amazing. Possibly the best magical fight scene I’ve seen in a movie. It was only watch that when I realised that it is the only time we really get to see those two duel, which is really a shame.
And random things that I adored
1. Flashbacks to the earlier movies, particularly the moment when Snape would show up. I though those were brilliant
2. The Umbridge taking power montage was hilarious.
3. The DA. That was done really well.
Anyway, that’s from where my opinion comes from and having said that - I really liked the movie.
I just wrote down things as I they came to me and somehow my thoughts seem to have progressed from stupid grips to legitimate grips and then onto things I liked to things I really loved. I guess that’s how my mind works.
Stupid gripes that probably only I have
1. Kingsley was not hot. In my interpretation of the novels, Kingsley is in the top three most attractive males we’ve met in canon and movie!Kinglsey does not cut it.
2. Where the heck was Amelia Bones’ monocle? I demand the monocle!
I think I’ve worked out what’s so wrong about EW’s performance. She’s trying seem like she talks to fast without actually talking too fast (because then we wouldn’t understand her?). I think that explains the weird breathing pauses when she reads her lines. Someone should do her a favour and give her a copy of The West Wing or Gilmore Girls and illustrate who fast talking can be done.
Rupert Grint is still the by far the best of the trio. I just think either he’s so Ron already he doesn’t need to act or he’s just has more natural talent than the other two, since he’s the only one who doesn’t seem to be noticeably trying to pull of a performance. Most of the child actors were really good, though I have serious doubts about the kid playing Dudley, though that could be put down to the editing of the scene where he was taunting Harry. The way it was cut just seemed to be a bit odd.
TPTB should really give some of the adult actors more to do. They had Maggie Smith and Emma Thompson and they had, what, somewhere in the realms of 10 lines between them. That’s 2.5 lines per Oscar. I was really disappointed by the general lack McGonagall. Some of her best moments in canon were in OotP and they pretty much all got cut. Though I do think the McGonagall being taken out by Aurors scene was filmed but cut, since there were on set photos of Maggie Smith being filmed in a wheelchair with Hagrid. I’m hoping we get deleted scenes.
Didn’t miss the Quiddich so much in the end and I think I was just so glad that Julie Walters was back to really miss Mrs Weasley’s boggart.
Imelda Shanton was amazing. Umbridge is one of my favourite characters because she is so evil and horrible and Imelda Shanton even managed to make her physically scary in her scenes, particularly in the detention scene with Harry, without losing the pink.
Movie Tonks was really good. Very few lines, but I liked how she always seemed to be doing something regardless, whether it was grinning at Harry from her broom, or tripping over the umbrella stand or pulling Ginny and Luna to safety. It got the character across nicely despite the little screen time.
Movie Luna was excellent. I adored the scenes between her and Harry and she really seemed to pull off Luna’s etherealness.
Wasn’t so sold by HBC as Bellatrix, but I think that’s just because we really didn’t have any work up to her showing up, which is due to the lack of her in GoF.
The actor who played Mr Weasley was really good, some really great comic moments. And I have maintained since GoF that it’s not Michael Gambon, it was the writing and direction that was responsible GoF!Dumbledore and I think my opinion was vindicated. He was really good in this movie.
Speaking of Dumbledore, the Dumbledore vs. Voldemort fight was amazing. Possibly the best magical fight scene I’ve seen in a movie. It was only watch that when I realised that it is the only time we really get to see those two duel, which is really a shame.
And random things that I adored
1. Flashbacks to the earlier movies, particularly the moment when Snape would show up. I though those were brilliant
2. The Umbridge taking power montage was hilarious.
3. The DA. That was done really well.
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no subject
Date: 2007-07-17 12:26 pm (UTC)You didn't mention Moody stealing TWO of Remus's lines! Well, sort of. I wasn't too happy with him being the person Harry said "Professor ___?" to, nor did I like that he got to call Tonks Nymphadora, but that is just the Remus fangirl in me.
I loved Luna too. It showed a girl who was both a little odd (okay, very odd) and yet a sweet person at the heart of the matter.
Also agreed about DD vs Voldemort. Terrific. Though I sort of wanted the fountain to fall apart, just because that was so significantly symbolic in the books. (One of the few things I think really was supposed to be symbolism.)
no subject
Date: 2007-07-18 12:29 am (UTC)It is a shame Remus didn't get to play his part and had lines stolen, though I'm rather glad both he and Moody got any lines. I can think of about 4 lines that Mad-Eye got in the end.
I only had two major issues
Date: 2007-07-17 02:08 pm (UTC)2. Bellatrix killed serious with the clear use of Avada Kedavra. She said it. That is not the case in the book, and if Sirius *does* come back (one of the only major rumors JKR has not squashed or outright denied), it won't make sense. In this universe, dead is dead; the books make is seem like it's possible Sirius is "dead," whereas the movie makes him Dead. If that makes sense.
I adored Neville. I love that kid. Love what they did with him in this movie. Though I wish the hospital scene could have been filmed.
Re: I only had two major issues
Date: 2007-07-18 12:35 am (UTC)And I didn't mind the upbeat ending. I actually thought it was one of the better ones, since, after all, this is the film franchise that gave us the Disney-esq Hagrid cheer that is so sweet I can't watch it and the freeze frame broomstick grin. Plus the book ending was pretty upbeat. Harry got off the train to find the Order waiting for him and who threaten the Dursleys to be nice to him, which was a lighter note that what the book began on IMO.
Re: I only had two major issues
Date: 2007-07-18 01:24 am (UTC)The upbeat ending works at Privet Drive. At the school, to me, it didn't work--it took away from the seriousness of the situation, that war is coming.