By Graham Osborne
You guys know the drill by now, so let’s get on with the fixing!
Dumbledore’s arrival at the station at the beginning of the film is, surprising to say the least. Though not that surprising to the other people who happen to using the station at that time of night. Dumbledore is an eccentrically dressed man, even at the most sober of times. It seems strange that he wouldn’t draw a couple of incredulous stares from passers-bys, or possibly a comment from Harry’s waitress as she looks out the window. It would help to reinforce the dissonance between the muggle and wizarding worlds; something that is constantly mentioned, but rarely ever shown.
You guys know the drill by now, so let’s get on with the fixing!
Dumbledore’s arrival at the station at the beginning of the film is, surprising to say the least. Though not that surprising to the other people who happen to using the station at that time of night. Dumbledore is an eccentrically dressed man, even at the most sober of times. It seems strange that he wouldn’t draw a couple of incredulous stares from passers-bys, or possibly a comment from Harry’s waitress as she looks out the window. It would help to reinforce the dissonance between the muggle and wizarding worlds; something that is constantly mentioned, but rarely ever shown.
When Harry’s luggage arrives at the Burrow, we see the Weasley family getting very confused about “which” Harry has left his belongings lying around their home. This entire exchange makes no sense, and appears to be a poor attempt at comedy. The film could have taken a different line by having the rest of the family telling Ginny not to be stupid. You could even put the twins in, to foreshadow Harry and Ginny’s relationship by needling her about missing her “boyfriend”. It helps cement the characters’ feelings and allows the audience a glimpse into Ginny’s life (something we catch snippets of throughout the books, but not as much as the main trio (the reason might/may be fairly obvious in retrospect)).
Moving to Hogwarts now; Harry’s (incredibly annoying) obsession with Malfoy lead to him getting paralysed and left on the Hogwarts Express to make the return trip to London, (where Harry will be so upset he missed the start of term feast he won’t send his owl with a letter saying what happened? I didn’t really get what the motive was in the book). Harry is trapped under the invisibility cloak, when he is discovered by Luna. In the book, he is found by Tonks, who has been asked “by the Ministry” to look after the school and its students. This makes more sense for her to be looking through the train. She could have seen Ron and Hermione heading up to the castle without Harry and become concerned, or you could have had her checking the carriages for traces of Dark Magic, as one would assume an Auror is required to do. Either way allows for a bit of reassurance that someone is thinking about the large group of witches and wizards who are probably of an impressionable age and may think that turning evil would solve all their problems against their bullies. Or at the very least, get them a date with that girl who really likes bad guys, because she thinks that she can change them! (apologies, I really don’t know what happened there, but I can say that, without a shadow of a doubt, that was not in the least bit autobiographical. No sir. Not in any way. Nope, moving swiftly on to the next fix).
Moving to Hogwarts now; Harry’s (incredibly annoying) obsession with Malfoy lead to him getting paralysed and left on the Hogwarts Express to make the return trip to London, (where Harry will be so upset he missed the start of term feast he won’t send his owl with a letter saying what happened? I didn’t really get what the motive was in the book). Harry is trapped under the invisibility cloak, when he is discovered by Luna. In the book, he is found by Tonks, who has been asked “by the Ministry” to look after the school and its students. This makes more sense for her to be looking through the train. She could have seen Ron and Hermione heading up to the castle without Harry and become concerned, or you could have had her checking the carriages for traces of Dark Magic, as one would assume an Auror is required to do. Either way allows for a bit of reassurance that someone is thinking about the large group of witches and wizards who are probably of an impressionable age and may think that turning evil would solve all their problems against their bullies. Or at the very least, get them a date with that girl who really likes bad guys, because she thinks that she can change them! (apologies, I really don’t know what happened there, but I can say that, without a shadow of a doubt, that was not in the least bit autobiographical. No sir. Not in any way. Nope, moving swiftly on to the next fix).
The destruction of the Burrow by Bellatrix is a (Le)strange choice for a scene to be added into the series continuity. Aside from giving Ginny a (barely) larger role and it shows that she cares about Harry (a problem that could have been solved by the earlier scene in the Burrow above). I understand the reason behind it was to inject a bit of activity into a relatively quiet moment of the film, but I’m quite happy to have a bit of a reprieve from all the excitement of the goings on at Hogwarts. Especially when the whole universe knows what happens in the rest of the story. (I’m not kidding here. The Noorinarians from Quix-Vexel Delta know what happens in Harry Potter.) The destruction of the Burrow doesn’t get mentioned again during this film, or the next. As a matter of fact, the Burrow is completely rebuilt at the beginning of the next film so there’s no real reason for it to even happen.
During Harry’s extra-curricular activities with Dumbledore (is there a way to say that without sounding dirty?) we are treated to Slughorn’s memory in which we see a young Tom Riddle asking about Horcruxes. In the book, it is shown that the memory is tampered with, by having the ‘picture’ fade out and Slughorn’s voice suddenly become much louder. It would be great to see in the film something similar. In many ways, it would be easier to do this in a film. You could have the audio slip out of synchronisation with their lip movements, play with the colour correction of the scene, or using random jump cuts could show something is amiss. The downside is, there may be some members of the audience who do not see this as an aesthetic choice by the director, and instead believe that it is the cinema or DVD’s fault, such is the problem we face nowadays.
During Harry’s extra-curricular activities with Dumbledore (is there a way to say that without sounding dirty?) we are treated to Slughorn’s memory in which we see a young Tom Riddle asking about Horcruxes. In the book, it is shown that the memory is tampered with, by having the ‘picture’ fade out and Slughorn’s voice suddenly become much louder. It would be great to see in the film something similar. In many ways, it would be easier to do this in a film. You could have the audio slip out of synchronisation with their lip movements, play with the colour correction of the scene, or using random jump cuts could show something is amiss. The downside is, there may be some members of the audience who do not see this as an aesthetic choice by the director, and instead believe that it is the cinema or DVD’s fault, such is the problem we face nowadays.
Sticking with Harry’s lessons with Dumbledore (it’s still slightly dirty, but decidedly less so,) Voldemort’s origins are barely touched upon, much less his ancestors. We get a bit of backstory as to why Voldemort became the way he did (well, one of the reasons anyway). The addition of the Gaunts could also show off one of the Deathly Hallows, the Stone of Resurrection, which doesn’t appear during the course of the film, or, to be more precise, is not referenced in the story. We are just shown that Dumbledore has discovered and destroyed it. Admittedly, the director was unaware of the relevance of the ring at the time of filming (Harry was meant to get Dumbledore’s wand at the end of this film until Rowling stepped in). It has also been pointed out to me that during the cave scene, Dumbledore technically possesses all three Horcruxes, possibly as a final attempt to protect against the perils of the cave.
Traveling back in time to an earlier event now; the tussle between Harry and Draco in the bathroom, (what is wrong with me? everything is laced with subtext today). Snape is able to appear on the scene very quickly, despite having no idea what was going on. It is not impossible that he happened to be nearby when he overheard the scuffle, but it would be more interesting to stay true to the source material, Malfoy is unhappy about his attempts with the Vanishing Cabinet and confides in Moaning Myrtle, who raises the alarm when the two start fighting.
The results of the fight lead to Harry hiding his potions book. The reason given in the book is Snape has asked to see it; we’re given no reasons for that here in the film, just a general consensus that it should be hidden for some reason or other. We don’t even have Hermione arguing vociferously for Harry to get rid of it. The lack of emphasis on the reason for hiding the book just makes it feel like a randomly dangling plot thread.
And that is it for this week’s We’ll Fix it in Post. Next time, I’ll be wrapping up the series and making plans to start on the next film. See you then.
Check out the previous Harry Potter Entries: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, and Part 5.
The results of the fight lead to Harry hiding his potions book. The reason given in the book is Snape has asked to see it; we’re given no reasons for that here in the film, just a general consensus that it should be hidden for some reason or other. We don’t even have Hermione arguing vociferously for Harry to get rid of it. The lack of emphasis on the reason for hiding the book just makes it feel like a randomly dangling plot thread.
And that is it for this week’s We’ll Fix it in Post. Next time, I’ll be wrapping up the series and making plans to start on the next film. See you then.
Check out the previous Harry Potter Entries: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, and Part 5.
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