My mum is a fanatical fan. I'll probably watch her DVD before I give it to her as a present

Right - The Deathly Hallows.


First of all, I found a not unpleasant way to pass 2 hrs and 45 mins. It was good fun in parts.
Now I've had some time from it, though, it's actually distinctly average.
As usual, there's some great SFX.
More fundamentally, the storyline, however, lets the piece down. It's an already long film which, personally, could've used some tightening up and slightly more disclosure for those of us who've not read the books.
We sort of plod from one piece to another, without much in the way of narrative drive to get us there. I'd have gladly traded the time spent on loving shots of the British country side to a little more dialogue by way of advancing the story.
Which sort of brings up the next issue - one that's not unique to this film.
Daniel Radcliffe isn't a great screen actor. He might be great on the stage, and it may be a limitation of the script, but there is no emotional range for him to explore with this film. Harry is moody. Harry has a dance. Harry is moody again. That's about it. I've always felt that putting him on the screen alongside the great and the good was a risk, and you can hide so much in a SFX fight scene, but outside that you've got problems.

So there we are, as usual, another mediocre Potter outing.

I wasn't too keen on the last book so not really bothered about watching it. I'll wait for it to come on TV I think.

I was afraid of this.

Still desperate to see it. But having done Azkaban last night, I'm reminded that what I like most are Gambon and the rest of the massive giving it large for their characters. Harry has almost always wound me up tbh. But I still go, because I love the big themes. IMO the stories are massively derivative. I've said that coming out of Goblet and Phoenix. Prince really upped it a notch for me, but I'll continue with the recaps this week and hopefully get to go soon to add more qualified comments.

RE: The 'Harry is moody' thing.. That was kind of why I gave up with the books, although I do have some sympathy for the author over it. The fact is the three main characters were growing up, I assume to keep some level of association with the core readership as they grew up. But... teenagers as a rule aren't very likeable. The pretty much are stroppy, moody, introverted and uncommunicative. If you write teenagers accurately, they're pretty rubbish main characters for a novel. Rowling, unfortunately, was stuck with that. Either Harry & etc grew up with their audience, in which case for at least a few books they would be pretty rubbish dramatically, or they didn't, in which case the core audience would drift away as their ability to associate with the characters dropped - and there's nothing a teenager finds less palatable than a book 'written for children'.

So she was kind of stuck between a rock and a hard place. To be fair to her she took the hard option but as a result the books were less entertaining for those of her readers who weren't teenagers.

Jon

I noticed in the later Harry Potter books that Harry was always moody. Every other sentence ended "...said Harry angrily."

Looking forward to seeing the film, though; I've enjoyed the previous instalments.

I'm going to see it on Friday now.

Prof, meant to ask, did the end leave you wanting Pt. 2? Will you be able to retain all of the info proffered until July?

Uhm, it ends in a good place, but it's not really a cliff hanger.
Frankly, it's not as if the story line is so complicated I won't be able to pick it up again!

You know what I mean! Just finished Goblet last night and the stuff I'm talking about is the mythology that is often glossed over at breakneck speed in the movies. Priori incantatem for example, the history of the Death Eaters, Tom Riddle etc. It's not difficult to follow, but I have plenty of friends who forget things post-movie, like from Dumbledore's pensieve etc. Then you get to the next one and they're like "What? How does that work?"....

It's the mythology and detail that make it worthwhile for me. I can remember it all, but I've done a recap prior to every previous move, just to be sure and keep it fresh. Of course with the short release window, I probably won't be able to rewatch Pt. 1 before July.

Glad it's not a cliffhanger, that would be annoying.