Um, yeah. The title pretty much explains my angst. When I saw this movie with my good friend, Scott, (and another co-worker, Deb) we almost cried. Upon arriving, we would have expected those tears to be tears of ecstatic joy at finally seeing this fourth movie.... we were sadly mistaken. As fierce Harry Potter fans, I am sure that we were difficult to please. However, the list of what we liked about the movie has only a few aspects to it. Our list of why it was an AWFUL travesty to the HP world - this list could go on for pages and pages....
First, let me say how much it truly does sadden me to even feel the need to compile a list of this kind in the first place. My deepest condolences to my amazing role model, Jo Rowling. I can only imagine the sadness you must have felt to see one of your life's works so very altered and ruined.
And so, the list begins. Please feel free to comment and add to this list... I will edit this post with your additions as long as they keep coming in. (And, truthfully, as long as I see fit.)
TOP REASONS WHY WARNER BROS SHOULD LOSE ALL RIGHTS TO FURTHER PRODUCTIONS OF J.K. ROWLING'S INCREDIBLE SERIES.....
1.) It became quite clear, not 10 minutes into this film, that this rendition of the novel was not to be what fans expected it to be. After a promising computer-animated shot of the stadium for the Quidditch World Cup, everything went downhill. While the cheap seats at normal sporting events are in the nosebleed section, a game in which ALL of the action is in the AIR require the excellent seats to be the highest up... yet the Malfoy family makes fun of the Weasley family's seats being so high that they must keep climbing. Also, the Weasleys and Harry were not sitting with the Malfoys as in the novel. It became clear at this point that Winky would not exist in this movie, since she would have been an important part of the Quidditch World Cup scene.
2.) What happened to the ENTIRE world cup game??? None of the action was shown... quite a disappointment.
3.) When Death Eaters show up at the after-game celebration (wearing garb mysteriously similar to the KKK robes and hoods, which is actually quite accurate), Harry is nowhere near a forest, and is knocked unconscious in the excitement. He awakens to actually SEE Barty Crouch Jr make the Dark Mark in the sky. For those of you who are not fans, this is NOT how the action of this book takes place.
4.) Ummmm..... Barty Jr. is portrayed as a snake-like, cocky, arrogant bastard in the pensieve memories of Dumbledore. Rowling purposefully described him as begging his father to believe that he was innocent of his charges. In this movie he is angry and spiteful toward his father who angrily, and apparently rightfully disowns an unworthy son. Rowling's entire storyline with Crouch having to make a difficult decision for the sake of his career was destroyed. Details of Crouch's wife and his son making a switch in Azkaban using Polyjuice potion for transformation - all deleted.... I'm shocked that Hollywood did not capitalize on such an amazing, dramatic storyline.
5.) In the very first scenes of this movie, Barty Crouch Jr is added to the scene in which Wormtail and Voldemort plot to find Harry and use him to their advantage. Crouch, Jr was NOT a part of this storyline.... and there was no need to make him a part of it. As Scott so thoughtfully pointed out, these directors feel the need to make all villains blatantly evil. Evil people wear black, and good people wear white. They don't understand the concept (nor do they trust the viewing audience to be intelligent enough to realize) that not all villains are clearly evil. Especially in Rowling, it is important (as a moral to her stories) that they do not be obvious. There was no need to make Barty Jr so clearly evil. A young boy caught up in the excitement of evil behavior is something that people understand. Warner Brothers apparently thinks we are all stupid.
6.) There were several words in this movie which were mispronounced. Rowling and her publicity people deliberately provided Scholastic (their American publishers) with pronunciation keys for their website.... one can click on various Harry Potter words to hear their correct pronunciations. Apparently the directors did not bother to do any research into this aspect of production.
Accio is NOT pronounced Akkkkio. (Sorry for the stress on the Ks, but it was painful to hear it said this way on film....) It is pronounced AH-see-oh. Also, I'm fairly positive that a French school such as Beauxbatons would not pronounce it Bo-BAT-ons. How very American. BO-ba-tone. Or something like it. Jeez.
7.) As Scott and I also discussed, Minerva McGonagall is a VERY important character in this series. It was awful to see the director ADD a very rude gesture on part of Mad-eye Moody in the Malfoy-ferret scene (which we did enjoy, just for the sake of seeing Malfoy as a bouncy little ferret). What, I ask you, was the point of having Moody pull a face at McGonagall's back once she chastises him for using Transfiguration as punishment on students???? Something like this may seem harmless for the sake of a laugh, HOWEVER this should never have been done to the McGonagall character. It is of utmost importance for her to be treated with respect, since she is meant to be treated as a close confidante of Dumbledore. Seeing the director add this aspect to an already amusing scene was shameful... he might as well have had teachers make rude faces at Dumbledore......
8.) Ooooooh wait..... they DID DESTROY THE DUMBLEDORE CHARACTER AS WELL. I'm so mad about this one, I don't know if I should even discuss it. When, I ask you..... did Albus Dumbledore become an angry ("SILENCE!!!" was a line shouted by this character several times in this film) wizard???? Since when has Dumbledore ever needed to be angry in order to quiet his students? Why was he portrayed as royally pissed off and convinced that Harry had put his name in the Goblet of Fire???? In the film, he actually SHOOK Harry in anger. What happened to the fatherly, concerned figure of the novels? And WHAT WAS UP WITH THE PENSIEVE SCENE??? Am I the only one who noticed that he is portrayed as a bumbling idiot who "doesn't know how to handle" all the thoughts in his head? He sits down and pours his confused heart out to a fourteen year old boy. Ahem. NOT EVEN CLOSE to the novel. Of all characters.... they had to destroy Dumbledore??
9.) I can understand deleting scenes and characters for the sake of time constraints. I cannot understand ADDING a completely useless and contrived scene such as the Gryffindor dancing lessons with McGonagall. I do believe that her explanation for the lessons in the film was that she did not want her students shaming the name of Goddric Gryffindor with their lack of culture.... Um... As Scott pointed out, since when has dancing ability been added to the list of a Gryffindor's traits??? Perhaps the Sorting Hat omitted that part in its first song in the Philosopher's Stone.... the song actually went like this:
You might belong in Gryffindor, Where dwell the brave at heart, Their daring, nerve, and chivalry Set Gryffindors apart; But if you cannot dance the dance You'll seek another spot. Those Gryffindors can cut a rug Without a second thought.Clearly the directors knew something about the requirements for this house that we didn't. Yikes. Dancing indeed.
10.) Um... Neville and his dancing around the dormitory?? Whatever man. At this point we are all so numb to the changes that have been made that we don't even care... Well, we do - but this is only minor compared to the damage they've done in various other areas.
11.) The Beauxbatons ladies doing the Macarena?!?!?!?? This is TOTALLY going too far. We went from a quite excellent Yule Ball dancing scene in which students open the night with a very Elizabethan dance in which the male partners lift up their female partners... to the Beauxbatons girls doing a Latin, Americanized Macarena party dance. At this point I wanted to be shot in the foot. I actually hid my face in poor Scott's shoulder. It was more than we could bear. I know that there are many more things which I will remember, and any further things I recall will be edited and added at the end of this post... along with reader comments and additions....
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Edit Numero Uno:After Bathroom Reading's comment, regarding pronunciation questions, I've decided to provide the link to the
Scholastic website I was discussing earlier.... click on the link and at the bottom left of the page is a pronunciation key. If you click on it, there is a list of all of the words with questionable pronunciations.... this list includes both Accio and Beauxbatons.
Accio is, as I thought, pronounced AH-see-oh. Not ACK-ee-oh as they made Daniel Radcliffe say it in HP4. Also, most laughably... Beauxbatons is pronounced the French way: BO-bat-ons. NOT AT ALL Bo-BAT-ons. Yikes.
Edit Numero Dos:MORE REASONS, A LA SARAH (copied and pasted from her actual comment), WHY THIS MOVIE WAS A HORRIBLE RENDITION OF THE HP4 NOVEL:
1. No Dobby. What are they going to do about him in the next movie?
2. No Winky. No SPEW, therefore, there's no reason for Herminone to appreciate Kreacher in the fifth book. He's horrible!
3. Crappy Wannabe Dumbledore. He would not yell at the students.
4. No Ludo Bagman; everything Bagman did they made Crouch do. How silly. Next movie maybe they'll replace Dobby with Professor Flitwick, and he can collect Hermione's knitted hats and scarves!
5. Too much dancing, and too much of the Yule Ball in general, with no explanation as to WHY Ron "Ruined everything" for Hermione.
6. Not enough Hogwarts. THey were in one class for 5 minutes.
7. Useless shots of things like: the beaubatons girls' butts; a crow; the ceiling of the Great Hall; etcetera.
8. No storyline behind Hermione's hatred of Rita Skeeter.
9. No reason for Hermione to blackmail Rita in the next movie since... apparently she is NOT an unregistered animagus.
10. Dumbledore's touching speech at the end about the "really terrible loss" of Cedric. It's a tear-jerker.
11. Harry woke up at the burrow... not Number 4 Privet Drive. Was he there all summer? no! Apparently the Weasley family didn't emerge from uncle Vernon's fireplace.
12. Everyone hates Harry for... thirty seconds of the movie instead of half the book.
13. Cedric was a ponce in the movie! He was supposed to be noble, and fair. Instead he was the typical teenager.
14. Large screen cuts that left out important plot detail, and left the movie feeling unfinished and unexplained.
15. Moaning Myrtle is a perve. There was no need for her to stare at Harry's crotch and go under the bubbles while in the Prefect's bathroom.
16. People cared about Cedric's death for about, 5 minutes, if that, and then everyone was smiling and happy again. It's craziness, I tell you!
