No! Film and merchandise stuff

[catherine at cator-manor.demon.co.uk]

--- In HPFGU-OTChatter at y..., "Simon" <pigwidgeon at i...> wrote:
> Hello
> 
> 
> I was visiting the Leaky Cauldron news site
> (http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/) this morning when I ran across 
an article
> (http://www.the-leaky-cauldron.org/2001_06_10_archive.html#4046790) 
saying
> that Celine Dion had recorded a song for the film, written by the 
duo
> responsible for My Heart Will Go On. I feel I may have to go off 
and kill
> myself. I can imagine little worse than a song similar to the 
Titanic theme
> playing out as the film ends. The confidence that I was finally 
getting about
> the films production and the feeling that we may actually get a 
decent film
> has now totally evaporated. I am not at all happy.


Well, I agree with you and Scott - I'm not in a good mood about this 
either.  I have never been a fan of Celine - her voice is too whiney 
for my tastes, and some of her songs get on my nerves as much as 
nails down a blackboard.

I also don't understand the need for some soppy ballad at the end of 
this film.  It may work for a romantic comedy, but not for a film of 
this scope.  It wasn't necessary for Star Wars, Indiana Jones, ET 
(all of which are John Williams scores as well) and I can imagine it 
ruining the whole atmosphere of the film for me.  I'm hoping that a)
that this is a false rumour or b) that any song by Celine is in 
another context.  If it was CoS, I can imagine her voice coming out 
of Molly Weasley's wireless, but even that is a stretch.  I had 
another thought as well, that considering James and Lily are in the 
film, the Mirror of Erised could be adapted so Harry sees them in 
some green and pleasant Welsh/Celtic environment with Celine's not so 
dulcet tones soaring above them.  Yuck!

On merchandise - there are some things I love - I have sampled Bertie 
Botts EFBs - had great fun with the kids, although we vetoed the 
sardine flavoured one as we are trying to encourage them to eat fish 
at the moment and that particular bean could only put them off.  I'm 
also very attached to my sorting hat bookends, and my Harry at 
Platform 93/4 Desk Clock (Harry's face doesn't look too bad in this 
one).  But, I hate the way Ron and Hermione look.  With Hermione, it 
is partly because I always imagined her to look the way I did at her 
age (although I didn't have her teeth), but with both of them, they 
just look too vacuous and cartoonish - and yes, Hermione's hair is 
wrong.

I was also very disappointed with the Chocolate Frogs.  They could 
have done great collectibles here - with a little help from JKR, 
someone could have used their imaginations and started doing loads of 
wizards and witches, including the characters we know from the book.  
Instead, we get these stupid 3-D cartoon characters of Scabbers etc.  
Scabbers and Norbert just look too cute.  The latter in particular 
looks as though he wouldn't hurt a fly.

Some of the games are great - really beautiful to look at.  Ditto 
some of the jigsaw puzzles, but I have to agree that the majority of 
the stuff available is tacky and don't seem a fair representation of 
the characters/beings we know and love.  I know it is unfair to 
expect them to get it exactly as we would wish, but I think they 
could have done better than this.

OK, you set me off on a rant there, Simon!

Catherine, who is definitely not a fan of Celine Dion!