Miscellaneous impressions and a few plot problems

[Barb]

--- In HPFGU-Movie at y..., jsteinb103 at a... wrote:

> I'm not quite sure how to put this: the movie had the 
> right "feel".  Except for the one time that Hagrid 
> said "Voldemort" instead of "You-know-who" or "He who cannot be 
> named" I didn't feel that any of the lines were out of character 
> or that anything was anacronistic.  It felt like JKR's universe.

IIRC, in the book, only Harry and Dumbledore say Voldemort 
consistently.  Even Muggle-born Hermione doesn't dare do that very 
often, as she's done her research and learned that it's not 
considered polite in wizarding society.  (Why she doesn't know about 
the term "Mudblood" is therefore something of a mystery, but we'll 
get that in CoS.)  In general, there were several lost opportunities 
for both accuracy and humor when people around Harry were appalled 
by his use of Voldemort's name.

> Minor quibble:  In the Quiddich match after Wood fell off his 
> broom, we never saw him remount and continue playing.  Why didn't 
> Slytherin's score go up drastically after that if the Keeper was 
> no longer guarding the goals?

Some of the other players can work at taking the Quaffle from the 
Slytherin Chasers, and Beaters also would become more important at 
this point in the game.  Quidditch Through the Ages says that no 
substitutions are allowed during a game for any reason.  I think 
Wood lying unconscious on the pitch is far more realistic than what 
JKR had in her books; I don't think she originally considered what 
the results of some of the things described during the games would 
be.  It fits better with Fred's and George's description of the 
brutality of the game, not to mention Wood's anecdote about his 
first time playing.  OTOH, I was very sad that that was the last we 
saw of Wood. <g>

> When Hermione finds Flamel in a book, she notes that he discoved 
> the secret of the Philospher's (Sorcerer's) Stone and that he is 
> 665 years old.  But again, no reference to Dumbledore.  So why 
> does Dumbledore have the stone?  Why is it in the Hogwarts' vault 
> at Grigotts?

I don't see why they couldn't have kept Harry's recitation of the 
information on Dumbledore's wizard card from the Chocolate Frog 
package.  IMO, it painted a very succinct picture of Dumbledore 
(Kloves savaged Dumbledore's character) as well as establishing his 
link with Flamel.  The whole point of Harry recalling this was that 
it wasn't something one could just find in a book unless you knew 
specifically to research alchemists.  Hermione stumbling on this was 
very annoying.  Harry was was supposed to pick up on it.
 
I too was alarmed by Harry killing Quirrell, although it was 
technically self-defense.  In the book, Dumbledore implies that 
Quirrell was weakened after playing host to Voldemort for as long as 
he did.  Perhaps that was too complex for a film supposedly aimed at 
children (but really aimed at people of any age who've read the 
books, rather than Potter novices).  I think they wanted to use a 
cool special effect and make it clear that Quirrell was no longer a 
threat.  The other odd thing about Quirrell's character was that it 
was implied that he'd been teaching at Hogwarts for years, rather 
than being new.  Someone had the line, "Snape's been after 
Quirrell's job for years."  Am I just imagining this?

--Barb