Harry Potter: Order of the Phoenix

[Danny White]

Nerd Alert! :

Anyone going to catch the midnight screening of this tonight?

I have tickets for Thursday to catch an IMAX screening of it with my wife, so I'm looking forward to that. But I figured there had to be some uber-nerds here who were going to catch the first showings tonight.

 

[Hostile]

We're going, but not tonight. We're probably going to go tomorrow afternoon.

 

[Mavs Man]

My wife is really excited about the movie, but I find them more disappointing than anything. The books have been getting longer and longer yet the movies are progressively getting shorter. LotR and Chronicles of Narnia were both well made adaptations, but they were using shorter written material.

So as you may have guessed, I'm really waiting for book seven's release in a few weeks.

 

[Yeagermeister]

I don't know if we'll go see it but I will watch it eventually.

 

[Hostile]

My wife is really excited about the movie, but I find them more disappointing than anything. The books have been getting longer and longer yet the movies are progressively getting shorter. LotR and Chronicles of Narnia were both well made adaptations, but they were using shorter written material.

So as you may have guessed, I'm really waiting for book seven's release in a few weeks.

I'm more excited to read book 7 than I am to see the new movie.

 

[Danny White]

I'm more excited to read book 7 than I am to see the new movie.

Yeah, absolutely... the movie's just the appetizer. Good timing with the marketing, that's for sure!

 

[Kevinicus]

Nerd Alert! :

Anyone going to catch the midnight screening of this tonight?

I have tickets for Thursday to catch an IMAX screening of it with my wife, so I'm looking forward to that. But I figured there had to be some uber-nerds here who were going to catch the first showings tonight.

I would if I wasn't working in the morning.
Definately more interested in book 7. Order of the Phoenix was easily my least favorite book in the series as I still fail to see what the fuss about the prophecy was. Reminded me of Ocean's 12. All that running around and in the end it meant nothing.

 

[Crown Royal]

It's an appetizer to the Hallows for me. I have been rereading each of the books since the middle of may, I am in the middle of half blood prince right now. The 21st can't possible get here fast enough.

I'll see the movie, but the movies have all been hollow comparitively. They look great, but they just don't do it like the books do it.

 

[Crown Royal]

Any reviews?

 

[Danny White]

Any reviews?

I saw it tonight and liked it quite a bit.

My one big complaint, and it's been this way with all the movies, is that they short-change Snape's character.

He's a major character, and they treat him like just another teacher in the movies. If you're only exposure to the story was the movies then you'd probably be shocked by his actions in the 6th installment.

But all in all, it was a very entertaining movie. Umbridge was very well portrayed, and the girl playing Luna was spot-on.

 

[Kevinicus]

Saw it tonight myself. Like the book I thought it was the worst in the series. It has some good parts, but really the story fails, just like the book. They also left a lot of the interesting parts out or barely touched on them. Snape's private lessons with Harry probably total about 2 minutes of screen time.

Basically it's just filler until the final 2.

 

[Crown Royal]

Saw it tonight myself. Like the book I thought it was the worst in the series. It has some good parts, but really the story fails, just like the book. They also left a lot of the interesting parts out or barely touched on them. Snape's private lessons with Harry probably total about 2 minutes of screen time.

Basically it's just filler until the final 2.

I agree that it was the worst movie of the series and failed dreadfully on so many points. One of the worst big-budget movies I have ever seen, as far as pacing. The Ron/Hermione part was so unimportant in this movie, when those two should be two of the largest roles. Ron has hardly been important since the third movie. Quite aggravating. And the girl who plays Hermione is perhaps the worst actress ever.

While I agree that this is probably the worst book of the series, I still enjoyed the book quite a bit. But the movie was dreadful.

More complaints -

I'm with Danny White - Snape is probably the best all around, deepest character in the book series next to Potter, yet in the movies he is just a morose guy with a great actor.

Which brings me to the next point - these movies severely underutilize the acting talent they have. Maggie Smith, Robbie Coltrane, Emma Thompson, Alan Rickman, etc. Just because it's called 'Harry Potter and...." doesn't mean that these roles aren't important. It just so happens that the book is from Potter's POV.

Umbridge was OK - but I don't think she was quite as evil, at least not the same way, as the book form.

Some good parts in the movie:

The Ministry of Magic scenes at the end were splended. I quite enjoyed them - not just the magic/SFX, but that emotional scene right beside the Veil.

Even in the little screen time he had, Ralph Fiennes played Voldemort exceedingly well.

Luna Lovegood, although her lines were not so great (the screenwriter in this movie is new from the other ones - and he is God awful), is possibly the best cast character in all the movies.

However, all in all, I sat through this movie shaking my head at things like the script (major cheese, especially at the end), the editing (at one point, when harry was in his occlumency lesson, the camara zoomed out of Hogwarts and into the night for about 10 seconds, and then went to the next scene - completely useless time filling take), and the lack of any real presence other than Daniel Radcliffe (who, all in all, is finally starting to improve his acting).

 

[Crown Royal]

My one big complaint, and it's been this way with all the movies, is that they short-change Snape's character.

He's a major character, and they treat him like just another teacher in the movies. If you're only exposure to the story was the movies then you'd probably be shocked by his actions in the 6th installment.

All in all I agree with this. I sat through this movie, like all the others, wondering when snape will become important to the movies. They made a very half hearted attempt in this one when Harry delved into his memory in the Occlumency lessons, but that one little memory is not going to be nearly enough to sustain the sixth installment. They have had 5 movies in which they should have properly been cultivating their disdain for each other, not in 45 seconds in the 5th movie.

Oh - and was David Thewlis even IN this movie? One of my favorite parts of the book was that Lupin was again involved.

 

[BrAinPaiNt]

To me the only movies that truly followed the books were the first two ones.

Order of the phoenix was not my least favorite book out of the series...I think that last one (half blood prince) was but I also realized it was a build up to the final battle so I was ok with that.

The last two movies (POA and GOF) movies were bad in the sense that they left out very important parts of the book that could have been added in a few minutes time while instead adding in parts that were never in the book. Silly IMO. However one must also remember that JKR has a great deal of control over what goes into the movies from my understanding.

I think we always have to remember that 99% of the time a book is always better than a movie.

I wish I could have seen all of the movies before ever reading the books. You see the movies and when you read the books you get so much more and an added bonus with the extra information where as if you read the book it is hard for the movie to live up to it.

The acting in these movies by most of the young actors thus far have been terrible but they all did start as young actors. Heck I think the guy playing Harry Potter was not even a child actor prior to that. Don't know about the other characters.

I too think they short change snape in the movies as he is one of the more interesting characters in the books. I also like the comedy roles of Fred and George in the books where i think they mostly ignore them in the movies. However I was glad to see in the previews that they decided to add in the part of them with the fireworks and such in the movie. I was honestly thinking they would skip that part all together. That part in the book had gave me a good laugh.

I was just really upset with POA when they did not even go into the whole mauraders map and it being made by harry's father, lupin, wormtail and Sirius. That whole connection was wasted because they did not take 1-2 minutes to cover it better.

Now I just look forward to the last books. I am also hoping that when she starts writing other books that she does not lose her magic and go for something that would just totally bore me like some long winded romance novel or something.

Oh and as sort of a side note. Jason Isaacs does such a great job, in a limited role, as L. Malfoy. That guy just looks like a bad guy, just as he did as the British officer in The Patriot.

 

[Danny White]

I disagree that this was the worst movie of the 5. I think the first two were much worse in terms of acting, f/x, and cheese factor.

I think expectations are so high for them, it's easy to be upset when they don't live up to the books. And they clearly can't since they'd have to do a mini-series to live up to them.

 

[BrAinPaiNt]

I disagree that this was the worst movie of the 5. I think the first two were much worse in terms of acting, f/x, and cheese factor.

I think expectations are so high for them, it's easy to be upset when they don't live up to the books. And they clearly can't since they'd have to do a mini-series to live up to them.

From the previews I have seen..saw some behind the scene show, this one looks pretty good.

But I have seen others say they thought the book was not as good as the others where I enjoyed it.

 

[carphalen5150]

Going to see it tonight...I really have not seen an entire Harry Potter movie, but this one does look good.

Besides, the theater is in a casino...so I hope to hit the tables right after.

 

[Crown Royal]

I went with another book fan and someone who has seenthe movies but not read the books. The book fan and I agreed that the movie was awful, but the one who has not read them said that she thought this was probably the most entertaining.

 

[Hostile]

I saw it last night and really enjoyed it. book 5 was my favorite book because I think it is the most realistic. Harry is 15 and angry. That just seems right.

I agree with a previous remark that Lunie is very good.