My love/hate relationship with the movie

[alina at distantplace.net]

When I first came out of the theatre, I must say I was rather 
satisfied with the movie. 

I thought the scene where Harry flies on Buckbeak was breathtaking. 
I enjoyed the way Cuaron portrayed the trio as growing more and more 
comfortable with each other despite the usual awkwardness with the 
opposite sex at their age. I was delighted with the movie's further 
exploration into time paradoxes during the time-travel scenes and 
not limiting itself just to what happened in the books. I thought 
the portrayal of Malfoy as all talk but easily frightened away when 
his bullying doesn't have the desired effect was very funny.

A few hours later, I was sitting at home and a sudden epiphany hit 
me: as a compliment to the books it was great... as a movie it was 
horrible! Cuaron decided to go for a very fast-paced movie (I 
completely agree with someone else's comment that it seems to have 
happened in three days on a year). I understand the need to cut out 
many scenes that do not further the plot in order to fit the movie 
into a reasonable time slot, but they cut out things absolutely 
neccessary to the plot too!! 

Why does Harry take two minutes to switch between hating Sirius to 
hating Peter without knowing or bothering to ask what exactly either 
of them has to do with his parents' death! Why doesn't Remus tell 
Harry that his father was an animagus too, much less mention that 
his form was a stag! Why doesn't Harry ask why his patronus, usually 
just a shield of light, suddenly took the form of an animal! Why 
doesn't Harry delve deeper into the relationship between Sirius, 
Remus and his father, all he gets are bits and pieces and I'm not 
sure I would've inferred they were my dad's best friend if it was 
me, but somehow he does. 

Cuaron leaves in key scenes and phrases but strips them of key 
explanations. And honestly, couldn't we see at least a little more 
of Hogsmeade? 

What I wouldn't give for this to be a 3 hour movie with all of the 
above included. My only hope is that the DVD will have it all in 
deleted scenes and extended versions, etc. 

It must be terribly alienating to that portion of the audience which 
hasn't read the books and only follows the movies. 

So, to be honest, I'm glad the next movie will have a new director. 
And I'm still not sure why JKR would allow all these important 
things to be cut out of the story, surely she could see what the 
movie was missing if Cuaron couldn't. 

"Alina"