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Post by Philosacratic on May 16, 2004 5:45:00 GMT -5
----------Is Seriously Upset at the Coming News---------- I can't believe the day has come. For months I have come and visited this great and wonderful site. It brought joy to my heart to find so many people who were as obsessed with Harry Potter as myself. When I first picked up the book - I did it half jokingly, half 'in the closet' (curious as to if it would really be a good book, even though it was one of those fantasies ). I was the type of person who went around in life making fun of Harry Potter - but it was really the inner Chi in me screaming out "I WANT TO READ THAT BOOK!" But, I didn't realize it at the time. So, like I said, half jokingly, I picked up the book. I expected to read the first chapter, put the book down and piss my pants laughing about how sad it was people actually read that stuff... When I finally read the first few pages, I was done with the first book a few hours later ... the second the next day ... the third (which I had to buy, because my little sister didn't have it) the day after -- and yes, the 4th, which I also had to buy -- in hard cover, which is a mortal sin in my bargain hunting family -- two days later. Then I saw the movie. Then I found sites like this -- and I got devoured up in them. Now, here's the point I've so poorly arrived: I was a poster-champ. For a long time, one of the highest posters on this here website. For about two months I wrote dozens of messages a day it seems -- a stranger welcomed to the site -- then I dissapeared for months, writing perhaps a message here and there. But, I've been around in the large part for months now -- which is why I'm shocked such a tragedy could occur. I can't write anymore _____________________
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Post by Philosacratic on May 16, 2004 15:21:43 GMT -5
... than what I've been writing ;D
I'm utterly shocked that people have more time to write more than a couple posts a day -- someone has passed me up by hundreds on the top 20 posters! LOL
**is hoping he tricked someone**
I promise my next column will be HP related =)
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Post by elysium on May 16, 2004 15:30:54 GMT -5
What a jerk. I almost had a heart attack...I was like "OMG, what happened to my beloved site in the past 12 hours since I've been here??"
Think they have a patch for this sort of thing?
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Post by Philosacratic on May 16, 2004 17:17:41 GMT -5
If there's a patch to suddenly write me 400 posts, there's a patch to fix everything else ;P
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Post by elysium on May 18, 2004 22:19:47 GMT -5
Inner chi? You DO know that's a Buddhist nun, right?
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Post by Philosacratic on Jun 2, 2004 7:20:42 GMT -5
Or a type of tea Although, I don't know if the spelling's right there. But, in fact, I was not aware that a Buddhist nun was a Chi. I was talking about the spiritual inner self in I want to say Buddhism, though it could be a term from the Dao. I'd have to ask my friend on that, she's the expert on eastern religions.
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Post by Philosacratic on Jun 2, 2004 7:29:36 GMT -5
I've been back home from college for about 2 weeks and in case no one's noticed I have about the same amount of posts as I have been back. Sorry for this. At home I don't spend the kind of time I do on the computer as I do at school. One of the reasons is we only have 1 phone line at my home and I don't like to take it up as much as I do. So consequently I only really go online late at night for an hour or to check my giant cache of emails (mostly spam ). However, I'm getting a cable modem soon so this should no longer be a problem. But, I still probably won't write as much as I do during the school year because I'll be busier with all my old friends and working and such. ________________________ However, I promise to write up a review on HP for Saturday. I'm sure most of you will have already seen it, but then at least we can compare and contrast hehe. I have high expectations for this film -- which usually works against a movie. Movies that I expect to be good and are merely okay or pretty good I subsequently view as being terrible or below average. Movies that I expect the worse that end up so-so I tend to view as being pretty good. Some examples are Lord of the Rings: the Return of the King. I had HIGH expectations for that and was VERY dissapointed. It was the worst of the trilogy. On the other hand, Daredevil seemed like a lousy movie and I only watched it because my friend kept hounding me to -- and that actually wasn't all that terrible at all. Its probably only an 'okay' movie, but like I said, because of the surprise that it wasn't terrible I ended up thinking it was quite good. Best Ben Affleck movie in a LONG time. LOL. Anyway, so catch me if I write a terrible review and it isn't a terrible movie.
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Post by Philosacratic on Jun 8, 2004 13:49:44 GMT -5
The first two movies were huge dissapointments. Okay, so the first was only a minor dissapointment. I was actually quite pleased with it after I went to see it for the first, of several, times. I really don't blame the movie on the movie's sake for being bad -- and fans shouldn't have noticed it at first. The movie was bad precisely because it was the first. Just like if you look at all the books stacked one against the other, many people would argue the first isn't all that great. The point is, people were fooled into thinking it wasn't all that bad because it was the first movie. The second movie shouldn't have fooled anyone. It didn't take any hindsight to realize that it was nothing special. Sure, there were brightspots, but they were few and far between. There was no Harry Potter magic in them at all.
The third movie brought a new director. Everything seemed to be new. Even the "Whomping Willow" was different. Most of the music was different, perhaps using a couple of the same bits and peices, but like the rest of the movie, the music had a different tone. This was the first of the Potter films to show the occasional anger Harry has always had. Without question, the film was a much better film. It isn't the best picture of the year, but its not a half bad movie.
Why is it better? Beyond the fact that it was completely different and much darker, there's a lot of creativeness in it that the last two carbon copies didn't have. The ending was drastically different, but it translated much better than perhaps the real ending would have. What's most important is the fact that it displayed the same feel of the books, which is all that a movie should be obliged to do when its written from a book.
But did I like it better? Better than what? I recognize it was a better movie, but there's something missing from it that I can't quite place my finger on. Watching it, I felt rushed through the entire storyline in ways that I shouldn't have. But I can't place my finger on it, other than to say that there was some lurking presence that this movie didn't catch until the very end. Yes, the ending did it for me. That's one thing that this movie did exceptionally well. The only time I felt myself absorbed into the picture was when the characters meandered their way into the Shrieking Shack towards the end. While the other two films were carbon copies, this one I felt tried too heavily to compensate for its darkness with moments of extreme lightness. While this is an important feature in darker films, the dark and light moments didn't particularly translate very well. One particular moment came in visually one of the most amazing I saw. In the very beginning when Aunt Marge is about to be blown up and we see Harry starting to get very angry -- the lights begin to flicker -- it brought a real earthy quality to the films that I always pictured in the Harry Potter world and it was extremely dark. However, then suddenly the music changes and it now has this airy quality to it -- that's just not how it would happen in the world of wizards and witches. The fact that Aunt Marge got blown up would have been lightened the scene on its own. It didn't need the music and tone changes at all. There were several other instances like that in the movie that as a viewer I couldn't accept.
That said, this was a great movie. I feel as though those who have never read PoA will enjoy it the most, however, after all -- its arguably the best book of the series. I hope everyone enjoys it!
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Post by elysium on Jun 9, 2004 5:52:10 GMT -5
Question: What about the copious amounts of plot left out? There's the whole secret-keeper thing left untouched, the audience has no idea James as an Animagus, or why, which leaves them wondering what the hell the stag was doing at the lake, OR how Lupin knew about the Marauder's Map. My brother and my dad and I have read the books, and we enjoyed the movie, but my mum and my friend Courtney hadn't read them and had only one comment: Huh?
Don't you think the movie would have been much better with more actual plot substance and less comic relief (ie, the really long Knight Bus scene, all the Hippogriff stuff)?
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Post by Philo on Jun 9, 2004 12:16:37 GMT -5
Sorry everyone, having trouble with logging in.
I wrote a big long paragraph to address your questions Ely, but I clicked "Post" without putting a name on it and it all got erased ::sighs::
Anyway, for the most part I think the movie translated the important part of the book -- its essence and emotions -- so I don't think it needed a whole lot more plot from the book added to it. However, I do agree with you about the stag. I think the audience can safely assume it was formerly Lupin's map, but he should have had a sentence or two in the film to better explain that because not everyone would get it and its an important factoid.
And I definately agree with you about the stag from an outsider's perspective. That must seem real random to people who haven't read the book. They either should have had no animal form at all and just the white lights with the bubbly effect, or they should have added these two things to the script: 1. When Lupin is teaching Harry how to do the spell he should have said its supposed to take some sort of form that's different for everyone. 2. After Harry created the stag at the end, Sirius should have somehow seen it and said to Harry something on the lines of: "Wow Harry, that was just like you're father's animagus form!" Personally, I think it would have been a better film if they let it out for those who haven't seen it.
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Post by Philo on Jun 9, 2004 12:19:00 GMT -5
Bah, can't modify either:
To quickly address the point I forgot to make, I definately agree with you about the comic relief. There needed to be less of it. I liked the Whomping Willow seasonal transitions, I would have kept those, but I probably wouldn't have had a comic moment after every single dark moment. Kids will either get scared or they won't, they're not going to start histerically crying right when they're crying because the big scarry monsters are going to get Harry. That was just stupid.
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Post by elysium on Jun 9, 2004 12:38:03 GMT -5
I sent you an email about the password thing...so don't delete it as junk lol. Oh, and you could have used the back button to go back in type in a name...poor you.
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Post by Philosacratic on Jun 9, 2004 15:47:26 GMT -5
My computer actually erases stuff written on websites when you use that button for some reason ...
Thanks for the help though, really appreciate it!
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