PoA MOVIE DISCUSSION.

[eggplant107]

Carol wrote a very interesting post:

> having Harry cry when he hears about
> Sirius Black's supposed betrayal [
]
> is completely out of character. 

Yea that's true, Harry doesn't cry a lot, but on the other hand sadness and anger are similar emotions and for me the scene is salvaged when Harry says "I hope he finds me because when he does I'm going to kill him". That is in character. 

> toy trains, shrunken heads, or Tom the Barman. 

I had no problem with any of that. I think you need to distinguish between stuff that isn't in the book from stuff that couldn't be
in the book. For example, there isn't a Hogwarts Clock tower
in the book, but there should have been. 

By the way, in CoS I thought it was a great line when Ron said "Spiders, why did it have to spiders? Why couldn't it have been follow the butterflies?" JKR didn't write that but I'll bet she wishes she had.  

> exactly, was Snape doing while Harry 
> was running after Sirius? Still protecting 
> Ron and Hermione when Harry was in danger?

In a word yes. Snape knew that Sirius had protected people 
from Lupin in the past and no reason to think he couldn't
do it again. Anyway, did you expect Snape to abandon 
Ron and Hermione with a werewolf running around who knows where?

> They never explain how Lupin knew that 
> the Marauder's Map was a map or how to
> work it, for one. 

I agree, the very important Marauder's subplot was given
very little time.

> I have absolutely no idea why they included 
> the scene with the cleaning witch being 
> nearly blown away and saying, "I'll come back later," 

I loved that scene and it got a big laugh in the theater I was in. It's not in the book but no reason it couldn't be; I don't know
what she saw but I'll bet a lot of weird stuff was going on 
in that place and that cleaning witch had seen it all. 

> Ron's dream of tap dancing spiders, a poor 
> substitution indeed for Sirius Black slashing
> the bed curtains. 

I agree.

> it's uncanonical, and we have the altered Flitwick 

At no point does JKR say that Flitwick is not interested in music
and it makes no contradictions to the story if he was. 

The problem I have with Azkaban is not what is on the screen,
in that regard I think it is the most skillful of all the movies;
my problem is in what they decided not to put on screen and in
that they were the most incompetent. If the movie was 20 minutes longer it would have been great, and if they then just cut out
the closing credits the total running time could have been the same.

 Eggplant