Not Another Harry Potter Review!

I know... I know... you've read too many Harry Potter Goblet of Fire reviews already. (Read dessagirl's review here.) Stop with it already, you may be thinking. It's done. It's shown. It's 2 and a half hours long. Let us now move on.

But I can't. Not until I've said my piece. Promise this will be short. Give or take three or four comments and I'll shut up. Move on with my life... that is, until the next time I see this movie again (hopefully with Ate Abbie this time), which instance i'm sure will bring me more comments to write on this blog, hehehe. Ok ok ok... I promise to stop myself next time. But this time, please allow me to say:

1) I pity Emma Watson's (Hermione) agent. After showing such promise in the last three HP vehicles, she disappointed big time in this fourth. In the previous offerings she appeared to have the biggest potential for a wide range of feeling--she seemed the least brit among the three of them lead characters. In this movie, there were many times she overdid it. I can't help cringe at her in the last scene. I hope the next director shapes her up for HP5.

2) I missed Ralph Fiennes' nose. Where was it? Then I realize that sans nose, Ralph Fiennes does not look as handsome anymore and therefore more acceptable as the dark lord Voldemort--the dark lord will not look as dark if he were dashing. Given that I've understood and accepted within myself the absence of his aquiline appendage (did I say this correctly, Nats?), I still can't help but express disappointment over missing Ralph Fiennes' full profile. Oh, well... I guess I'll just watch The English Patient soon on DVD.

3) I wish everybody who's seen the movie has read the book. There were simply too many instances in the movie that took for granted that the viewer already read the book/s. Glaring example: Ron's tantrum. If you had not read the book, you'll definitely dismiss Ron's behavior as childish and even probably mistake it as out of character. If you have read the book, however, you would understand that Ron's feelings were borne out of a longer gestation period, more specifically, since the first book. Ron has always been the sidekick but it the movies have never shown how Ron really felt as the sidekick. Book 4 explained this in detail--Ron was generally ok wih being a sidekick but the possiblity of Harry putting his own name in the goblet of fire just to get more attention in spite of all the attention he already has was just too much for Ron to bear at the time.

4) I wanted to hate Rita Skeeter more. The movie didn't allow me to do that--Rita Skeeter was too cute, or pa-cute. She was actually portrayed "one-dimensionally". She was even comic in this movie (glasses askew as the dragon flew over her? what was that??!) whereas in the book she was downright ruthless--someone a perfectly reasonable person would probably have nor problem loving to loath. I've always hated or detested even how irresponsible the media can be (journalists, newscasters, writers, etc., etc.) and the book showed all the vile possibilities the media can have in Rita Skeeter's maneuverings. This movie made me kind of miss the chance to grit my teeth at yet another social cancer, tsk tsk. Oh well... in that case, I'll just watch ABS tonight. :-p

and lastly...

5) I just realized I have an imagination fit for Hollywood. Many many many scenes in the movie were very close to how I imagined it. The opening scene tops the bill: the slithering snake on the stairs and even the crookedness of the stairs and the greenish-greyish shade of the film were the same elements projected in my mind's screen as i read book 4. The maze outdid me though: I never imagined it could be that huge. The merpeople were as deceptive-looking as i imagined they would be. Mad-Eye Moody's mad-eye was too lego-like for me, though. I thought it should have looked more like it came out of a PGH Optha operating table, hehehe. But I really enjoyed the first task: the dragon chase. I wished for a moment that the dragon was darker and slicker, but if that had been the case, then the dragon would have looked more like a Formula One car than a dragon.

Other comments: both Victor Krum and Cedric Diggory were cuter than I thought... but what girl in her right mind would complain about that, right? Especially with Cedric Diggory: who can complain? That actor is a cutie, I have to say. The producers' casting for Cedric plus a friend's insight upon watching the movie made it clear to me now why Cedric Diggory had to die: finally, someone better-looking and better-magicking than Harry has surfaced in Hogwarts--and he's not even in Griffindor! Of course, he had to die.

Anyway, on that note (of death? how gory) I end my comments. On to another double-phased waiting game: phase 1 for the 5th movie, and phase 2 for the 7th book. But as that's not gonna happen in the next two years probably, maybe it's better if I flex my critic's muscles first for this holiday's two most awaited movies: Chicken Little (in Manila on November 30) and The Chronicles of Narnia (in Manila on January 6, I think). Till then moviebuffs!