Silver screen Sunday

[sigma7]

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince bothers me. I haven't read the book -- really, none of the books save for the finalé -- but still, I got the idea that I was watching half of a really good movie. Even in a three-hour movie, how do you walk out wanting more? And worse, how do you walk out wanting less of the plot and more of the characters milling about in their natural environment? Weird, isn't it? There was no sense of wonder or intrigue in the plot, really, and maybe just a little sense of danger, heightened by one of the scenes (I understand) shoehorned in, not even in the original text. I don't know if Rowling or Yates fails here -- I'm putting more probability in the latter, though. Of all the scenes to omit, though, the end? Where's the closure, the curtain call for one of the mythology's iconic characters? Baffling. But by all means, let's see more Slughorn dinner parties. (Broadbent does a great job, even if I find his scenes a bit repetitive.) Maybe it's just me, but I walked out more than a little bit disappointed, despite the Hedwig content.

Speaking of disappointment, which sticks in your craw more: the idiot who brings his hyperactive and restless three-year-old to the movie, the child asking constant questions of the film's narrative in his outdoor voice and proceeds to run up and down the theater aisles when he gets restless -- or the idiot adult who, whenever he hears a funny line, while laughing, repeats what he thought he found funny to his companion? At least there was no instance of the obnoxious loud-talking frat boy with cell phone; thank God for summer matinees.

Upon reflection, I think I like Shaolin Soccer more than Kung Fu Hustle for just one reason: pacing. Soccer builds gradually, dialing up the, well, cinematic aspects slowly until reaching its peak in the film's climatic showdown with the Evil Team. I'm not sure Hustle has the same pace -- if Soccer dials up from 0 to 11, Hustle hits 11 at least an hour in, and keeps the throttle flooded for the rest of the film. And both films are fun -- it's just that Hustle's narrative arc doesn't keep pace with its audacity, and maybe that's what throws me off about it. Not that either film's worth missing -- they're live-action cartoons in the best way, ambitious and insane, and they know what they are and revel in it. Time well-spent.

Comments

[aardy.livejournal.com]

And here I thought the "Empire Strikes Back" moment was Cedric not getting his taco in #4. (And everything since then has just been more piling on of misery. Despite being good stories, books/movies 5 & 6 could be largely removed if the plot seeds of #7 were sprinkled throughout #1-4 rather than leaving half of them for the infodump that was #6 and not revealing the other half until #7 itself.)

I don't think either of Columbus' films are the best in the series, but I also think that, with five films establishing certain standard elements of the basic setting--such as even animating the cat plates in Umbridge's office--that, even though the movie was shot in such a way that such scenes were largely not needed (and I say that in admiration of the craft of the cinematographer who pulled off that trick), the points where they were needed--such as the pan shots across Dumbledore's wall o' headmasters paintings--seemed, well, threadbare for the lack.

Whosshisname as Malfoy is also looking to have a decent acting career ahead of him. He had what-- four lines in the whole film? And yet still made me start to care for the traitorous, ungrateful little git much more than Rowling's prose ever did.

And the less said about Dobby, the better; though unless they make some pretty significant story changes, he'll unfortunately have to appear in at least one of the next two films.