[HPFGU-Movie] visual depth

[GulPlum]

At 13:38 16/06/04 , Barbara D. Poland-Waters replied to my comments to 
Trevor's last post:

>At 06:09 16/06/04 , Trevor wrote:
> >I severely dislike POA the movie but I appreciate the stunning visuals and
> >stronger acting involved.  The visuals and acting however do not make the
> >movie.  They are important aspects to any movie but hopefully not the
> >definitive ones.  I felt that the plot was too weakened by lack of detail.
> >As I said before, if felt like Cliff notes made into a movie.
>
> >>>From: GulPlum [mailto:hp at plum.cream.org]
>
>I think that's an unfair assessment.<<<
>
>bd-bear:
>
>I don't think it's an unfair assessment if that's how he FEELS. I felt the
>same when watching the movie. I thought the plot was butchered and wished
>they hadn't made so many unnecessary changes.

Well, his feelings must be based on some kind of assessment. If it's a 
purely gut feeling, then there is no assessment to be made and discussing 
it is pointless. If he's thought about and come to a rational conclusion, 
then that assessment can be argued. I don't claim to be able to change the 
way he feels about the movie, but I can offer grounds for an alternative 
assessment, can't I? :-)

Errr... if it's a "Cliff Notes" version, then surely by definition it's 
nothing more than a list of the important events? Seeing as you're arguing 
that it left out a lot of significant facts and put in a lot of other 
spurious stuff, then surely that is the very antithesis of a Cliff Notes? :-)

> >>>From: GulPlum [mailto:hp at plum.cream.org]
>
>Some of the plot points are made perhaps a little *too* forcefully, such as
>e.g. constant reminders about Scabbers, but in fairness the book is even 
>worse in that respect.<<<
>
>This is a huge plot of the book. I don't think there are "constant
>reminders" so much as a whole plot surrounding the tension between Hermione
>and Ron and their pets. This was another piece mostly left out of the movie.
>The two months that H & R weren't speaking was also significant (in my mind)
>and I missed seeing that depicted in the movie.

So was the fact that Hermione was frazzled from overwork, and Harry didn't 
speak to her for ages because of the Firebolt. Those elements weren't 
present in the movie, so the increased tension over their respective pets 
was all that was left. As it happens, I think that the pets issue was 
handled just right, in movie terms.

In the book, with so many sub-plots going on, the tension needed to be 
written large. In the movie, which by necessity of the medium has fewer 
sub-plots, it was enough for this element to be part of the ongoing sniping 
between Ron and Hermione, which has been building over the series. In that 
way, whilst the Scabbers sub-plot was being returned to over and again, it 
was given an understandable context within the existing relationship, 
rather than a whole new context (in the book, Scabbers becomes increasingly 
ill).

<snip>

>As I mentioned in another post, the numbers actually indicate that fans
>aren't as impressed with this movie as the first two. Granted, there may be
>a difference between a movie released in the summer (like POA) and movies
>released around Christmas (like the first two), but I still believe if fans
>were so enamored of this movie, the numbers would not have dropped so
>drastically. I can only speak regarding the US numbers, as I don't have
>information about the second weekend in the UK. I will be interested to see
>if the numbers have dropped as drastically there as they have in the US.

There are several different factors at work here. I'm not entirely up to 
date with what's going on in North America (movie-wise or otherwise) but 
from what I've read about the numbers, the big drop-off isn't a HUGE 
surprise. As I said before, one factor is that PoA has some serious 
competition and, as I understand it, the middle of June is generally a poor 
movie-going week in the USA.

A non-negligible factor is that PoA is third in a series. The only 
third-in-a-series movie to have done better on opening was LOTR:ROTK, but 
those were *very* special circumstances.

In the UK, PoA's only movie competition last week and this are Troy and The 
Day After Tomorrow (Troy came out a week before PoA,  TDAT came out on 
three days before PoA). They're not targeted at the same audience (among 
other things, Troy is eye candy for older girls who want to ogle Brad Pitt 
and Orlando Bloom in skirts; TDAT is eye candy for teenage boys who want to 
see the - crap - SFX). PoA made an extraordinary entrance into the UK 
market, not least because it opened on a holiday Monday, followed by a week 
when the kids weren't at school. Even so, UK audience figures for its 
second week didn't drop *too* dramatically (which surprises even me), down 
only by about half on that particularly strong start.

What's going to be VERY interesting in UK and European terms is when this 
week's results come in. North Americans probably won't know about this, but 
there is a ... ahem... "small" ... ;-) sporting competition going on right 
now, namely the European Football Championships. This will have a huge 
impact on movie-going in general and may or may not have an impact on PoA.

PoA has since premiered in several other countries (including Australia) 
where, again, it broke records. Seeing as the Aussies had had two weeks of 
word-of-mouth from the UK to follow, that's a pretty good indication.

--
GulPlum AKA Richard, avoiding the football