Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007) (1 Viewer)

[Sean Laughter]

Haha!!! Yeah, I obviously meant Snapes, major brain fart there.

Thanks for the info. Yeah, I should at least finish out the books, but with all the books now released I figure I'll wait for a decent boxed set that's not outrageously expensive - though I suppose I could shell out for a hardcover boxed set.

I'm already horribly spoiled though on stuff happening after OotP, but stuff like that doesn't generally bother me.

 

[Malcolm R]

Finally caught up with this one today. It was a fun movie, and stands up well within the film series, but it was so damned rushed. There were a lot of scenes they cut out or combined with others that I really missed such as condensing the Occlumency with Snape and giving short shrift to his "worst memory," more Umbridge vs. McGonagall, and especially the scene with Kreacher in the kitchen of Grimmauld Place when Harry uses the Floo network from Umbridge's office to check on Sirius. I'm afraid they may have drained some of the drama and emotion from the future films by leaving that bit out.

But overall it was quite enjoyable, though I did find the director's style kind of annoying. He seemed to be in lust with the shot where all the action is tightly contained on the right margin of the screen while the rest of the screen is just background. Not that every shot has to be perfectly centered, but he repeated it so much it was becoming noticeable which made it annoying. I'm a little disappointed that he'll be back for the next film.

This also has to be one of the most perfectly cast franchises ever. Alan Rickman, Jason Isaacs, Maggie Smith, Robbie Coltrane. Could you ever imagine anyone else as Snape or Lucius Malfoy? I'm still not totally convinced that Staunton was the best Umbridge, but she did very well. And the actress cast as Luna Lovegood was just perfect! Having read the final book, I know how things end up, but I still couldn't help but wish that...
Harry and Luna ended up together. They seem almost perfect together with great chemistry, especially as protrayed by the actors in OotP.

And I have to give a special shout out for David Bradley as Argus Filch. He is so perfect...his demeanor, his expressions, his movements. Comic relief with a just a whiff of impending doom. And his scenes as he hung up all the "decrees" were hilarious, not to mention the scene where he's taking down the portraits. Good stuff!

 

[Ken Chan]

Haven't read the books, and definitely won't until after the final film. I have (inadvertently) picked up a few plot points in #6 and #7, just by not living in a cave.

Pretty good movie. My order of preference: PoA, OotP, GoF, P(S)S, CoS. Definitely a little choppy. Great battle at the end between V and D.

To those that have read the books: what is the actual value of the prophecy orb to V? Presumably it is lost once the orb was broken. We all hear the line; is there anything else?

Total, or just Harry Potter? Because that's an interesting way to put it: definitely more than one, but not quite two

 

[Qui-Gon John]

Totally agree, even adjusted to the, unfortunately necessary change in Dumbledore. Don't forget McGonnagel, of course the 3 main kids, the list goes on.

 

[Kevin Grey]

The movie bungled the prophecy stuff horribly. Hopefully it can be repaired in the next film.

Here is the text of the prophecy from the book:

"The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches… Born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies… and the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not… and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives."

Voldemort only got part of the information before his initial defeat when Harry was a baby, mainly the final part about how there is a child that will grow up to be his enemy and one of them must die so that the other can survive. He also got the bit about who the child would be and was able to narrow it down to two applicable children- Harry Potter and Neville Longbottom. Voldemort "chose" Harry.

So Voldemort knew there is a boy who will be a threat to him and decides to take preemptive action and kill him while he is still a baby and presumably powerless. However he didn't know a significant portion of the prophecy- that he would mark the boy as his equal and in the process give the boy the ultimate power to defeat Voldemort.

In effect, had Voldemort never heard any part of the prophecy then never would have gone after Harry, he wouldn't have been destroyed back then, Harry would not have any additional power conferred onto him, and Voldemort would ultimately have been much harder to defeat. Voldemort made the prophecy self-fulfilling. By going after Harry at all, he set up his own defeat.

This comes into play in OotP because the reborn Voldemort knows that he somehow screwed up fourteen years previously by acting on only the partial prophecy and he doesn't want to make the same mistake twice so he stages the events at the Ministry in an attempt to hear the full prophecy.

 

[Ken Chan]

Thanks Kevin. But if the text that you quoted is the whole prophecy, there isn't anything more for Voldemort, is there? (Aside from maybe "he will have power the Dark Lord knows not" which isn't much help.) But of course he doesn't know that, so it makes sense he would go after it.

 

[Kevin Grey]

The key things he was missing was about the power "he knows not" and that "he would mark him as his equal." Yeah, knowledge of those elements doesn't do him any good after the fact since it's too late but if he had the full prophecy initially then he might have been able to figure out that he shouldn't have gone after Harry or Neville.

 

[Chris Atkins]

Non book reader who who absolutely loved this movie. I was very surprised by how much I liked it, actually. Of course I was riveted by the spectacle of the last 30 minutes, but also by the quieter moments and the "training scenes" earlier in the film.

9/10

 

[Chris Atkins]

Actually, Dave, OotP is the first Potter film in which I enjoyed Gambon in the role.

 

[Simon Massey]

Saw this at the IMAX for the second time and got to see the final sequence in the Ministry of Magic in 3D. I assume this is the process they are talking about for other films like Lord Of The Rings, Star Wars and Avatar and this is the first chance I have had to see this 3D effect. On the basis of this 20 minute sequence I am looking forward to future films though with some reservations as some shots dont work as well as others. The novelty also often distracted from just concentrating on what was happening - probably not a problem for films like LOTR and SW where people have already seen it but with Avatar this could be a problem.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Avatar is being shot in 3D, with a camera for each "eye". All of the other movies digitally create the second "eye" from the original 2D image.

I definitely want to check out OOTP IMAX. That said, the only other live action film I've experienced that underwent this process, Superman Returns, completely underwhelmed me; things were blurry and too difficult to interpret. The plane scene, soaring in 2D, was a garbled mess for me in 3D. On the other hand, the 3D version of Nightmare Before Christmas is very subtle and involving.
Actual 3D photography takes the cake though.

 

[Craig P]

Having read through book four at this point, one enduring impression I have is that Snape has always been less unsympathetic in the movies than in the books. Particularly after movie 1, with the relative disappearance of the house cup and details of classes, you lose sight of his day-to-day favoritism for Slytherin and hostility to Harry that remains a running subplot in the books.

Coming into OOTP without having read the book (but having read through Goblet), I felt like the scene with Snape's memory played well, although I reserve the right to question the adaptation when I finally get around to reading the book.

 

[Kevin Grey]

Very true. One of the hazards of adapting the films is that adapting just for plot (which is understandably how most of the films have been approached) misses out on a lot of the growing character dynamics. In the films other than maybe a scene or two of Snape sneering, he's really only brought in when he serves a key plot function which was really only in the first, third, and fifth movies and even then he doesn't necessarilly get a lot of screen time.

Again, it's a perfectly understandable approach, but a hazard is that it will nerf some of the character moments and revelations to come in the final two movies and this applies to quite a bit of the supporting cast, not just Snape.

 

[Holadem]

Thank you for saying that. That remains one of my biggest issues with the films at this point.

Right now, people who have not read the books perceive Snape as a merely a proponent of "tough love" -- a coworker told me as much. They don't understand that he truly hates the kid, and vice versa. For much of the books, Potter has solid reasons to believe that Snape is not only a hateful ass, but remains a genuine and unreformed bad guy and is baffled by Dumbledore's unwearing trust in him. (Complely missing from the films is that Snape is double agent for the Order. Dumbledore has ordered him to "rejoin" Death Eaters since the end of the book 4 when Voldemore returned).

Going into film 6, the Harry-Dumbledore-Snape triangle should be firmly established, but it is not.

Still, all is not lost. The Spinner's End chapter of book 6, adapted correctly, could set things right, and even jerk unsuspecting viewers back to an unpleasant reality they had no considered since the first film.

--
H

 

[Claire Panke]

How can you say Snape "truly hates" Harry? Book 7 makes it clear that while he's conflicted in his feelings, he does not hate Harry. He's mainly reacting to aspects of James that he thinks he sees in him.

Snape doesn't love Harry and will never like him, but he doesn't hate him. Not at all.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Claire, it is likely that not everyone in this thread has read Book 7. The revelations contained within should probably be kept behind spoiler tags.