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Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince - Grading and Discussion

So?

  • Dumbledore - Excellent

    Votes: 36 33.3%
  • Hermione -Above Average

    Votes: 38 35.2%
  • Muggle - Average

    Votes: 24 22.2%
  • Draco - Below Average

    Votes: 5 4.6%
  • Crabbe and Goyle - Poor

    Votes: 5 4.6%

  • Total voters
    108
Rowling is a good "world builder", and her writing style is very evocative. But her plot logic is paper thin at best, and her sense of character dynamics is utter crap. HBP is the first book where Rowling's pluses no longer total more than her minuses.

In other words you want a story where all the characters make logical choices that are in their own self interest.

In other words, the opposite of real life, a.k.a Star Trek Voyager, a.k.a. dullsville.

No thanks.
 
If anyone's curious about the box office results, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince earned a total of $58,175,412 domestically yesterday. At the foreign box office, it made about $45,850,000, for a worldwide total of $104,025,412 after one day in release.
Heh, looking at boxofficemojo:

1. Harry Potter 6 - $58 million
2. Ice Age 3 - $3 million
3. Transformers 2 - $2 million

Something of a gap there.
 
-Speaking of bad decisions...why the hell did they cut the DD funeral out of the movie?
I've seen some speculation that they're planning to use that instead of Bill and Fleur's wedding as the opening of the next one, since Bill/Fleur doesn't exist in the movie continuity.
 
Rowling is a good "world builder", and her writing style is very evocative. But her plot logic is paper thin at best, and her sense of character dynamics is utter crap. HBP is the first book where Rowling's pluses no longer total more than her minuses.

In other words you want a story where all the characters make logical choices that are in their own self interest.

In other words, the opposite of real life, a.k.a Star Trek Voyager, a.k.a. dullsville.

No thanks.

what the frak are you talking about?
 
The biggest and most pleasant surprise of the movie, for me, was the soundtrack. Hooper's score for OoTP made absolutely no impression on me. But I went out and bought the HBP soundtrack today and can't stop listening to it. It's easily the best score of the series, outside of Azkaban.
 
I think it would be ridiculous to put DD's funeral in the next film. That belonged in HBP...period. There was no reason whatsoever for it not to be in HBP. What the hell was the justification for that anyway?
 
I think it would be ridiculous to put DD's funeral in the next film. That belonged in HBP...period. There was no reason whatsoever for it not to be in HBP. What the hell was the justification for that anyway?

Probably to put into the beginning of the next movie.
 
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If time constraints were an issue, the funeral could have been done as a brief montage. The problem there, though, is that I imagine the costs of setting up the funeral scene would be prohibitive for just a few seconds of screen time.

Not that I necessarily agree with that kind of decision-making, but I'm speculating that it might be a contributing factor. Ditto for the battle at Hogwarts. The thing is, though, there was just too much cut from the final moments of the film.

It feels like when I used to write stories as a kid -- I'd do pretty well until the end, and then I was so concerned about finishing, I'd rush through just to finish it.
 
Average. Jim Broadbent was pretty good but Smith didn't seem to be putting effort and I didn't like that Hagrid and Neville had so little meaningful time. Gambon didn't have the sense of urgency he had in GoF. I didn't like Hermione or Ron in this book and this film made it worse, especially Ron's cluelessness. Luna was disappointing after the 5th film, here she felt kind of repetitive/predictable.
Draco felt like a weak antagonist, with little motivation (the dialogueless scenes certainly didn't establish one).
I was especially disappointed that Harry's attraction to Ginny felt non-existent (their get-together was protracted, although I guess a quick kiss would've been repetitive after Ron's) and that Evil! Snape wasn't here, instead he was overly remorseful.
Including that Tom Riddle was the result of a love potion could have welded the two plots together better.
Isn't it kind of :wtf: for Dumbledore to have essentially been hunting Horcruxes (to have the ring and know about the goblet-locket) before he knew that's what Voldemort had made (also, why does Slughorn feel such guilt for telling Riddle, couldn't he have just come to the details from someone else or from a book)?
 
I was especially disappointed that Harry's attraction to Ginny felt non-existent (their get-together was protracted, although I guess a quick kiss would've been repetitive after Ron's)

Can't fault the movie for following the book's entirely ILlogical Harry/Ginny pairing.
 
I was especially disappointed that Harry's attraction to Ginny felt non-existent (their get-together was protracted, although I guess a quick kiss would've been repetitive after Ron's)

Can't fault the movie for following the book's entirely ILlogical Harry/Ginny pairing.

Well, in the movies at least, Ginny has had a crush on Harry for a while. I'm not sure when Harry decided he like her, though.
 
Aside from thinking the crush was cute in CoS, I thought that you grew to like Ginny more in the OotP book and that in HBP Harry himself was surprised but it was fairly gradual and believable; here Hermione just informing us "I know" was far too little, out of nowhere and unbelievable, leaving out how Harry felt both happy and conflicted by his feelings (it didn't help that aside from yelling quiet to the players, Ginny didn't seem to have the feisty personality this time-she tied his shoe?!?).
 
^ I can definitely see where that might not be enough. It worked for me, though. That whole element of suddenly "seeing" a close acquaintance or friend and realizing there's a lot more to your feelings than just friendship certainly is plausible. But without question it wasn't given a whole lot of screentime.
 
^ I can definitely see where that might not be enough. It worked for me, though. That whole element of suddenly "seeing" a close acquaintance or friend and realizing there's a lot more to your feelings than just friendship certainly is plausible. But without question it wasn't given a whole lot of screentime.

Wasn't given much in the books previous either...

Ginny's just the creepy little stalker/fangirl sister of the sidekick. She's a cipher. She's just kind'a there. She's certainly no match for Harry in power OR intelligence. She's a complete outsider to the group for the first 4 1/2 books and out of nowhere she becomes a serious love interest for Harry?

Bull***t!

Harry/Ginny is (along with Ron/Hermione) PURE 100% "author fiat". It isn't justfied by ANYTHING in the plot or character development.
 
She's certainly no match for Harry in power OR intelligence. She's a complete outsider to the group for the first 4 1/2 books and out of nowhere she becomes a serious love interest for Harry?
Such is the nature of love -- particularly at a young age when girls mature more quickly than boys.

Believe me, I completely understand if there isn't enough there for your tastes -- either in the book or movie. There's no debating the fact that the film, especially, doesn't devote a lot of time to the relationship. But I don't share your objection with respect to Harry/Ginny in either the book or the movie. To me, it seems perfectly plausible (even if it is irrational).
 
I saw both coming at least since book 4, if not earlier. And she'd been becoming more and more "part of the group", along with (especially) Neville, and Luna to a lesser extent.
 
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