MOVIE: Comparisons

[Geoff]

No: HPFGUIDX 191019

May I start in case it seems otherwise, by saying that I am not biased in 
favour either medium: book or film. I have said in previous posts that 
my route to meeting Harry was via a film – COS, which I saw just after 
release at the end of 2002. This rapidly led me into the books and I 
shall celebrate eight years as a member of HPFGU next month. So, I 
have no axe to grind.

"Deathly Hallows Part 2" was released in UK cinemas last Friday. 
Unfortunately, no one from Warners bothered to check with me for 
my approval because I was just coming to the end of a week's holiday 
on the Isles of Scilly, which are just off the far south-west English 
coast and have no cinema. 
:-(

Because of family commitments, I wasn't able to see it until Wednesday 
evening and then had to drive 25 miles to the nearest town with a cinema.

Before I went, I had read a dozen or so reviews, seen about every trailer 
I could get my hands on, plus a British ITV1 programme "Behind the 
Scenes of Deathly Hallows Part 2". Having looked at all this, I went with 
a sense of foreboding and trepidation that what I called in a recent post 
the "David Yates Syndrome" might appear – in that the story would be 
altered and spurious scenes inserted. After the film, I drove home through 
sometimes rain-lashed Somerset roads mulling over the evening.

My general reaction was that I had enjoyed the film and although there 
were some tweaks which had been made, it followed the story line well, 
except
.  
for the final confrontation between Harry and Voldemort, 
which I think moved disastrously away from the canon story. But why?

I have maintained on a number of occasions that, to me, chapters 33-36 
of DH represent JKR's finest writing. I will often sit and read just those 
chapters. In the film, I though the first three were good- especially the 
forest scenes and King's Cross; the story then gets slightly altered up 
to Voldemort producing Harry's "body". But the crunch comes when 
Harry revealed himself to be still alive, there is this chase through the 
halls up to on of the higher levels of Hogwarts when they come face to 
face and Harry pulls Voldemort off the top with him. There appears to be 
some sort of Apparition; I'm not sure who is doing it and the smoke trails 
which represent this in the films seem to be going all over the place with 
a crash landing in the courtyard. We have this long wand battle, 
reminiscent of GOF with Voldemort finally being defeated and his body 
disintegrating. It almost seems to be just one more scene in the slam-bang 
battle we have watched for the previous hour.

What a comparison to the book. Here, Harry reveals that he is alive 
whereupon, the crowd falls silent and forms a circle. My imagination 
sees something like a Roman gladiatorial contest. They circle, waiting to 
pounce, audience holding their collective breath as Harry prods Voldemort 
towards doubt and uncertainty with revelations about the Horcruxes and 
the Elder Wand and then, there is for me that stunning and ecstatic moment 
when the rising sun comes across the window sill, and the spells are fired 
which end the duel. I think, for me, the link of sunrise and the end of evil 
reminds me strongly  my Christian faith which may be why that scene moves 
me so much. It is so much more a fitting closure than the rather 
hidden-away and downbeat closing crafted by the David Yates.

Just as an aside, I was puzzled by the spells used by Voldemort, which 
rebounded on him and that used by Molly Weasley to literally demolish 
Bellatrix. they did not seem to be the normal sort. I was reminded of the 
death of Quirrell long ago in PS when he appeared to become dust, which 
had a curious familiarity with a scene at the beginning of Star Trek: Nemesis.

I wonder how many of you share my thoughts that our canon was poorly 
served in that particular ending to what, in parallel to the books, has been 
for me a usually pleasurable experience.