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silly 
"That rabbit's DYNAMITE."
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 Posted - 07/14/2007 : 02:43:01
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quote:
Originally posted by MisterBadIdea
Attempts to read direct allegories of any current government will not really fit; whatever else you want to say about the Bush administration, it is not walking around with its hands over its eyes, pretending that everything is hunky-dory in the world. Personally, I like to think the political themes in this movie are too timeless to read as direct metaphor, although the parallels, as Rockgolf pointed out, are quite numerous.
But there's no such thing as global warming! Abstinance will cure AIDS! And any scientist that tells you otherwise will lose his federal funding.
The stifling of dissent and removal of any persons that don't agree with you from positions of authority is still going on, and has been especially bad in the last six years, though perhaps it has changed in the few years since the novel was written.
And for those of you monitoring this at the DHS? I love my country, I'm just playing devil's advocate.
Wait, is that a knock at the door?
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Downtown 
"Welcome back, Billy Buck"
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Posted - 07/14/2007 : 13:52:57
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quote:
Originally posted by silly
quote:
Originally posted by MisterBadIdea
Attempts to read direct allegories of any current government will not really fit; whatever else you want to say about the Bush administration, it is not walking around with its hands over its eyes, pretending that everything is hunky-dory in the world. Personally, I like to think the political themes in this movie are too timeless to read as direct metaphor, although the parallels, as Rockgolf pointed out, are quite numerous.
But there's no such thing as global warming! Abstinance will cure AIDS! And any scientist that tells you otherwise will lose his federal funding.
The stifling of dissent and removal of any persons that don't agree with you from positions of authority is still going on, and has been especially bad in the last six years, though perhaps it has changed in the few years since the novel was written.
And for those of you monitoring this at the DHS? I love my country, I'm just playing devil's advocate.
Wait, is that a knock at the door?
Yeah, I'm just wondering if we're talking about the same Administration that said four years ago that the "insurgency" was in it's final death throes, and that said the full scale rioting and looting in Baghdad was the Iraqi people "experiencing their freedom," and not simply the predictable result of invading a country without a ground force large enough to occupy it afterwards...which, by the way, was a complaint that got much of the senior military personnel at the Pentagon reassigned, because they weren't telling the senior civilian personnel what they wanted to hear when they said "don't do this, it's a mistake." |
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MisterBadIdea 
"PLZ GET MILK, KTHXBYE"
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Posted - 07/14/2007 : 16:33:40
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All I'm saying is, whatever other parallels there may be, Fudge's main characteristic is trying to keep the populace complacent and unaware of the threat posed by Voldemort, which I don't think has much to do with George W. "Terror Alert! Evildoers, evildoers! Duct tape your windows!" Bush.
That said, if you thought that guy was supposed to be Bush, wait til you see his replacement from Book 6.
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BaftaBaby 
"Always entranced by cinema."
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Posted - 07/14/2007 : 16:45:16
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To any British viewer of HP Phoenix the most trenchant parallels are to the Blair administration's education policies: state interference, micro-managing, etc.
Umbridge is an obvious amalgam of Thatcher and Mary Whitehouse, whom many in the UK say were influences on Blair's various cabinets, particularly in his latter years as PM.
Some of the other political points noted above can equally apply to the UK, especially post-London bombings.
It ain't always about Bush. Well, not directly anyway 
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silly
"That rabbit's DYNAMITE."
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Posted - 07/14/2007 : 17:17:22
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quote:
Originally posted by MisterBadIdea
That said, if you thought that guy was supposed to be Bush, wait til you see his replacement from Book 6.
I didn't think Bush as much as Murdoch (Faux News). Control the news and you'll control the people.
And isn't it funny how superstitious (and dependent on newspapers) the magical people are? Interesting feature of this particular universe.
Kinda like how Vader didn't know how many kids he had, when he was some kind of master of the force (and also couldn't find the one kid named "Skywalker" on his old home planet, apparently)
As the Church Lady would say: "How conveeeeenient." |
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MisterBadIdea
"PLZ GET MILK, KTHXBYE"
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Posted - 07/14/2007 : 17:38:10
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quote:
Originally posted by BaftaBabe
It ain't always about Bush. Well, not directly anyway
Well, to show that I am not totally ignorant of this "United Kingship" or whatever you call it, the connection I made from this movie was Voldemort as Hitler, Dumbledore as Churchill, and Fudge as history's favorite whipping boy Neville Chamberlain.
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BaftaBaby
"Always entranced by cinema."
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MguyXXV 
"X marks the spot"
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Posted - 07/15/2007 : 03:25:16
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quote:
Originally posted by MisterBadIdea
This is by far the best film of the franchise. It's also by far the darkest, so that should tell you a bit about me.
OK, MBI, I now see that we simply have different tastes in movies.
I have never read any of the Potter books, though I have seen the movies thus far. Because I have not read the books, nothing I say here is intended toward Ms. Rowling's works. But I wonder if the charity given to this film comes more from loyalty to the books than evaluation of what's taking place on screen. I thought this film was tedious, disjointed, choppy, and boring. I have great confidence that the book was far better, but the editing in this film was stupid.
Why did Harry kiss that girl anyway? There was no real lead up, it came out of nowhere, and it added absolutely nothing to the story. There was quite apparently a LOT more subplot going on in the book, because the film tries to touch on quite a few but suffers as it fails to develop any of them successfully.
Further, the ministry's efforts to disarm the children and dumb-down the magic populace made no sense when there was no connection made between that effort and Voldemort. IT JUST MAKES NO SENSE (though the series readers probably have the benefit of much better information and rationale).
I rate this one very low.  |
Edited by - MguyXXV on 07/15/2007 03:31:29 |
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Sean 
"Necrosphenisciform anthropophagist."
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Posted - 07/15/2007 : 05:45:56
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quote:
Originally posted by MguyX
...There was quite apparently a LOT more subplot going on in the book...
A basic rule of thumb I use is 100 pages of book = 1 hour of film.* So your basic 300-page novel will need some editing for a 2-hour movie, but perhaps not too drastic. But 870 pages for HP/OOTP down to 2 hours would have required massive editing.
*That rule worked nicely for LOTR; 1100 pages = 11.5 hours of movie which would have been about 12.5 hours with the whole book included.
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MisterBadIdea
"PLZ GET MILK, KTHXBYE"
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Posted - 07/15/2007 : 07:45:45
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quote:
Further, the ministry's efforts to disarm the children and dumb-down the magic populace made no sense when there was no connection made between that effort and Voldemort. IT JUST MAKES NO SENSE
You're free to your opinion, but I have to believe you weren't paying attention. Both the kiss and the ministry's denial were adequately set up. The Cho thing was set up not only in the last film but in several instances before it. Fudge denies Voldemort's existence out of powerful sense of denial of a problem of that magnitude, coupled with paranoia about his job security.
If you want to argue that subplots were set up that weren't followed upon, you certainly can, but those aren't it.
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MguyXXV
"X marks the spot"
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Posted - 07/15/2007 : 10:02:51
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As I said before, we just have different taste in films, and there's nothing wrong with that.
And, yes, I do recall the slight set up for Cho in the last film. But given that she has virtually no part in the story development in this film, the kiss came off as completely haphazard. The film could have left it out altogether and suffered nothing in the way of story development (mistletoe out of nowhere???). It came off as gratuitous, especially in light of all the hype given to "Harry's first kiss." In fact, I'd have preferred if it were a brief smacker instead -- more befitting its superflous occurrence.
I'm glad you clarified Fudge's paranoia for me, because it didn't come across in the film, and here's why. One has to be fairly idiotic not only to ignore an impending menace, but also to begin dismantling one's lines of defense against it. This left the impression that Voldemort has infiltrated the ministry or was perhaps controlling Fudge. Since that turned out not to be the case, and Fudge did not appear to be a complete dunce, it left Fudge's actions sorely under-explained.
Also -- a side note -- the pun implied in Ms. Umbridge's name proved another distraction to me. Umbrage is the feeling of being insulted by the slight of another. Umbridge was simply a one-woman Inquisition, which clashed for me with the implied pun in her name.
And here's another thing: Rickman's Snape appears to walk around in a trance this entire film. Did he say more than 15 words? On the one hand, also, it was interesting to learn that Harry's dad was a bully/jerk when he was a kid and that Snape was a geek, but again, and on the other hand, it really didn't seem to move the story along very much. Actually, it just raised more unanswered questions.
Sean raised a good point in that there was a considerable amount to pare down to fit into one movie. Unfortunately, I don't think the screenwiter was as successful as I would have liked.
Maybe I just need to watch it again. But that's not going to happen anytime soon, as I'd rather take bamboo splinters and pierce the skin where my fingernails break free than sit through that bumpy ride on my own dime.
I'm not saying that my opinion is gospel: everyone is entitled to their own opinion. But I'm glad you enjoyed it. |
Edited by - MguyXXV on 07/15/2007 10:04:49 |
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MisterBadIdea
"PLZ GET MILK, KTHXBYE"
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Posted - 07/15/2007 : 16:18:25
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quote:
On the one hand, also, it was interesting to learn that Harry's dad was a bully/jerk when he was a kid and that Snape was a geek, but again, and on the other hand, it really didn't seem to move the story along very much. Actually, it just raised more unanswered questions.
Not all scenes have to move along the story, I would argue. It adds texture. Unanswered questions are not necessarily a bad thing either.
quote:
I'm glad you clarified Fudge's paranoia for me, because it didn't come across in the film, and here's why.
I'm not just drawing conclusions about Fudge's motivations; they said it outright right in the movie. Couple times, in fact.
quote:
Rickman's Snape appears to walk around in a trance this entire film. Did he say more than 15 words?
Alan Rickman is great at all times and I will not hear a word otherwise!
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The film could have left it out altogether and suffered nothing in the way of story development (mistletoe out of nowhere???).
The fact that Harry kisses a girl is on its own major character development, I think. Plus, it sets up Cho's perceived betrayal later in the film, which gives it more punch. Also, mistletoe appears out of nowhere because that magic room "provides everything you need"; that's the joke. |
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BaftaBaby
"Always entranced by cinema."
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Posted - 07/15/2007 : 16:48:03
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For those who may be interested 
my HP review is now online at
The Morning Star
Jeff Sawtell's review of Taxidermia is also up ... sounds appalling and fascinating ... great photo, though!
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thefoxboy
"Four your eyes only."
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Posted - 07/19/2007 : 00:55:02
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Watched this yesterday.
The battle sequence was a bit Star Warish.
Obi/Vader.....Dumbledore/Voldemort.
Could Voldemort be Harry's real dad?  
Don't answer that, if you have read all the books.
No future spoilers please.
My wife would agree with MguyX about "the impression that Voldemort has infiltrated the ministry or was perhaps controlling Fudge".
She asked me at the end if Fudge and Umbridge were on the Dark Side.
I agree with MBI on "Alan Rickman is great at all times and I will not hear a word otherwise!"
I too, have not read any of the books, we do have them for future reading.
Did I like the movie? My thumb is sideways at the moment.
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Edited by - thefoxboy on 07/19/2007 00:57:47 |
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Demisemicenturian
"Four ever European"
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Posted - 10/14/2007 : 16:11:05
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quote:
Originally posted by Randall
SIDE NOTE: About :10 in, just after the Dementor attack, the sound went off for about :05, but the picture kept rolling [bad form by the exhibitor; I sent them a sniffy letter] for Harry's suspension and Dursley slapstick. Since these were heavy dialogue scenes and the Dursley stuff was visual, no Potter fan lost his place -- because they'd already read the book! Almost uniquely in movies, the fans are ahead of the story: what they want to see is the execution.
Yep, I almost watched it dubbed into Polish for this reason, as I had just read the book. I have now just read the sixth and disagree with C.L.'s son that it is better - I slightly preferred the fifth one.
It is indeed strange, as B.B. says, that this film is shorter than others despite the book being so massive. I found that the Grawp/centaurs story was overly abridged/changed - it really would have been better to squeeze Firenze in. There were also pointless changes to Umbridge's rule (far more educational decrees/students being interrogated than in the book) and I was disappointed that the subversion by the students/teachers after Dumbledore's departure seemed played down. |
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Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix/spoilers
