Last Seen Movie - The Latest Movie You Have Seen; ratings

Sabin
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Post by Sabin »

What if you're not lazy but just enjoy books for grown-ups? :)



Edited By Sabin on 1247703693
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Post by OscarGuy »

There. I've added a spoiler warning.
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Post by Sabin »

WHOA! SPOILERS, BRO!
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Post by OscarGuy »

Here there be SPOILERS...if you haven't read the book (you lazy bums)



There was a climactic battle with the death eaters as they were escaping in the book that was left out of the movie. There was a funeral for D at the very end of the book that was ignored and the funeral had some dramatic moments in it.

There were at least three or four more segments of Tom Riddle character development that were excised from the book. The entire subplot with the attack on London was pretty much neutered from the book. Minster Scrimgeour, who had a modest impact on the actions in the book, was left out entirely. There was more to the story of Severus as the put-upon when he was younger, his excellence at potions and the namesake of the potions book that was entirely neglected. Believe me, the book was far more robust than this movie lets on.

I will admit that the relationship-building, awkward teenager stuff was outstandingly well done. However, I felt no emotion whatever when D died. It was not nearly as climactic as the book read.




Edited By OscarGuy on 1247703285
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Post by Sabin »

Sorry. I wrote that without knowing that 'The Half-Blood Prince' wasn't the one that was divided in two.

I'm pretty astonished at the choice to do this movie like they did. For all its meandering, and it does that quite a bit, I have to stand firmly and say that this was the first movie to actually make me care about the characters. I want to clarify what I did say that you responded to:

but really the fact that it's so overlong and inexplicably faithful to source material BEGGING for a looser adaptation is unforgivable.

Faithful to the book? I would say quite the contrary.

I have no way of knowing that it's faithful to the book. In fact, I know so little about that that I assumed this was the first half of it. What I will say is that no matter how much was left out, clearly not enough was changed. So that it became a movie. My chief criticism derives from the lack of alteration, not too much adherence to source material, which, now that I know the back story of which I'd made a conscious decision to avoid all year, makes more sense.
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Post by OscarGuy »

Faithful to the book? I would say quite the contrary. It left out a large number of character developing stories, include some rather silly segments that don't further the story.
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Post by Sabin »

I did. And there's only one reason: it's the longest first act I've ever seen. I actually I enjoyed this film once I got past a certain stretch of introduction, but really the fact that it's so overlong and inexplicably faithful to source material BEGGING for a looser adaptation is unforgivable. On the other hand, I like this one enough to go see The Order of the Phoenix so...yeah, can't give it a 6.5. More like a very pleasantly surprised B- because the typical Harry Potter nonsense plot is barely existent.
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Post by Zahveed »

Sabin wrote:Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (David Yates) - 6
Haha, did you drop the .5?
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Post by OscarGuy »

HP & The HBP

More in my review, but this is the weakest entry since Sorcerer's Stone, IMO. Not nearly as atmospheric as I was hoping, had a lot of completely superfluous scenes and took 2 and a half hours of good pacing to give you about 1 hour's worth of story.
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Post by Sabin »

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (David Yates) - 6

Yup. I actually enjoyed it. But far too violent and dark for children! I don't think they'll mind that this doesn't make a lot of sense. They're just enjoy watching their favorite characters on the screen appear to talk about things that matter.




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Post by Reza »

Damien wrote:
Reza wrote:Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Michael Bay, 2009) 1/10

Never ending noise......a terrible film!!
You expected something else?
Actually not......but I went because of the company. So apart from the film it was a great evening.
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Post by Damien »

Reza wrote:Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Michael Bay, 2009) 1/10

Never ending noise......a terrible film!!
You expected something else?
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Post by Reza »

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (Michael Bay, 2009) 1/10

Never ending noise......a terrible film!!
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Post by Precious Doll »

Cloud 9 (2008) Andreas Dresen 7/10

Captain Caution (1940) Richard Wallace 4/10

The Midnight Meat Train (2008) Ryuhei Kitamura 1/10

Righteous Kill (2008) Jon Avnet 2/10

Mother (2009) Joon-ho Bong 8/10




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Post by Sabin »

Dead Again (Branagh) - 8.5/10

Wow. What a triumph. I watched this on hulu on a whim and was totally engrossed from frame one. This is textbook screenwriting proficiency and a director who knows exactly the nature of this hokum. Every performance seems perfectly calibrated of the Hitchcock era, especially the performances by Jacobi and the hilariously poker-faced Branagh. Wisely, nobody really asks too many questions about why any of this is happening. Excellent score, cinematography, editing, et al. The movie doesn't seem to know what to do with itself at the very end but it's a hugely entertaining piece of work.
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