f13.net

Just got done seeing this with the family.   There's still too god damned much camping and they cut a lot of it out.   It's followed the book pretty faithfully from what I remember of it, with only a few changes that will bug only hardcore fans.  
The tone of the movie is as abrupt a "wha.." as the book was.  Sure, it's going to be darker and there's folks dropping like flies because that's what the book was like.  However, the nature of movies underscores the ineloquent transition from childhood fairy tale in the first few to a more mature teen flick even more than Rowling's lack of writing skills did.  The movie also felt like it dragged on and suffered some pacing that could have been fixed or at least tweaked a bit.  The climax being a shaky-cam chase scene really drove me up a wall as well.

The ending is pretty abrupt, too.  Not that there's a really good place to end it but I think the final scene with Vold and the final scene with Harry being swapped in the order they're presented would have ended it better.

I didnt find the shaky cam chase scene all that bad.  Shaky-cam worked well with the setup for the scene.   What did bother me was the completely random and totally out of place shaky-cam bit as he enters that one room in the House of Black.  It just struck me as wrong, like the camera man was drunk or something.

Personally, the most telling bit for me was that what I consider probably the best sequence from the movie (the telling of the Tale of Three Brothers), didnt even have any live actors in it!

All in all, I think it was a fairly decent movie, but it suffers from what I think is the fact that all the really cool shit is going to happen in the next movie, and everyone knows it.

Overall, loved it.

What worked best for me:
The opening. I heard the Dudleys weren't going to get as much screen time, and was sad. Then I saw why, with the juxtaposition with Hermione and Ron, and...just perfect.

Tale of the Three Brothers. That alone was worth the price of admission.

The Silver Doe. They showed exactly what happened in the book, and still made it fresh. Ron rocked that scene. Loved the reveal of Ron as the person who saved Harry.

Neville Fucking Longbottom. They gave Matt Lewis one scene, and one line in that scene, and he easily came across as the baddest mo-fo in the whole move. One fucking scene. Bad-ass.

The cafe. It brought back home the fish-out-of-water feel, then was exciting, and just the ending when they secured the place, putting out the lights with the deluminator and dropping the shades, just really really worked. They'd come a long way, and are definitely experienced fighters now, but still human as well, as Hermione had to remember obliviating her parents as she did so with the snatchers.

Emma Watson. I did not think she could pull off a torture scene. Holy fucking god. Shiver.

The Ministry of Magic. I went in wanting to see the Ministry in an uproar, "Harry Potter?!" "Harry Potter's here!" "IT'S HARRY POTTER GET HIM!" And hell yeah, they delivered. "Public Enemy #1" posters flying fucking everywhere.

What didn't work for me:
The Ministry of Magic. I wish it was bigger. I wanted them to rescue all the half-bloods and muggle-borns. Totally wanted to hear Harry say "Okay who all has wands? Right, follow me!"

Ginny. Eh. I wanted to see her fighting a bit, just a half second, throwing maybe one spell, before Harry went after her during the wedding. She was too much of an afterthought. I also wish Bonnie Wright had done more outside Potter to actually grow as an actor, so they could have given her more to do.

Ron's return to camp. I just read it as a lot funnier. I think they took it too seriously.

Weird thoughts:
The camping trip was long and drugery, but it was supposed to be, and I remember thinking that while reading. It was so meta.

Harry and Hermione dancing in the tent. I was expecting more screenwrighter Kloves' Harry/Hermione shipping, but it made sense. The scene worked. Harry was trying to cheer up an old friend, but couldn't. But it was still in the back of my mind, Kloves going "FINALLY Ron's out, let's make Harry and Hermione dance!" Which is odd, because he totally nails the Harry /Ron buddy relationship, and the Harry/Hermione surragate brother/sister thing.

Is there going to be a part 2 to this thread or a part 2 to the movie?

There's a part 2 to the movie, but the forum will probably be better served by combining both parts into the same one, true.  I'll mod the title.

Wait, so the movie that just came out is just the first half?

Yes, Part 2 is in July.

Feh.  I'll wait till there's a 2 disc combo pack out.

People that haven't read the book and were taken to the theatre by others are of course completely hating on this.

I listen to a sports radio show where one of the analysts talked about taking his daughters to this movie. He hasn't read the books and has no real idea what's going on with Harry Potter outside of the first few movies.

His main commentary? "It's just one long movie about people running away from trouble and at the end you get no resolution. Why are they camping? I have no idea what's going on but the whole feel of hopelessness just permeates this entire movie. It was like that feeling you go watching that War of the Worlds movie with Tom Cruise in it. I thought this whole Harry Potter thing was supposed to be a kids story that adults liked, but this was just dark and hopeless."

Yeah, people who haven't read the books or have no idea of what's going on in the story are going to hate this.  Of course there's no resolution, it's all build-up at this point.  The big pay-off comes in July.

Went to see it this past Saturday and enjoyed it.  It was better than I expected because I had no idea how they were going to handle all that camping out.  I didn't mind how it was done at all and while I know all about the different things that were cut (since I just reread the series this past month), none of it particularly bothered me by being missing, like all the polyjuice stuff.  Sure some of the fluff stuff might have been interesting to see, like the whole visit to the the Lovegood's tower, but in the long run, it wasn't vital to the story.  It's great information and "filler" (for lack of a better word) letting everyone know just how Luna feels about the others, but in the terms of the actual, driving storyline, it could be dropped.

Other things folks have mentioned -

Ministry of Magic - I too wish it was bigger, or at least gave the impression of more size.  The main entrance hall just felt cramped to me in any scenes I saw it. 

The "rescue" inside the MoM - definitely wished that could have been closer to the book, because that really was a good bit, but I can understand why it was left out.  The added bit of Mary kissing Ron was funny though.

Wormtail - that was a rip-off.  Come on now, there was a big issue made about how Voldemort got a servant that was beholden to Harry and then they do that?  Utter bullshit.

Malfoy family - not bad, showing how maybe they're rethinking their position in the world order.  Jason Issacs did a great job as twitchy!Lucius.

Neville - oh hell yeah!  They had better do Neville right in the second part.  I have a feeling they will, considering how his one line in the movie was just awesome.

Caught some shows on Biography channel talking about how the series started, reviewing some of the choices made and casting calls, stuff like that.  It's kind of freaky to see the actors looking so damn young and then switch to them present day talking about what it was like back then.  Plus it really shows how amazing it is that except for one major cast member change (that I know of), they've kept the same cast throughout all 7/8 movies.  That really adds to the sense of growing up along with Harry feeling through the movies.

I had to pee during the Tower visit, and missed Luna's room. :( Glad to hear that was in there though.


Shitfuckcrap yeah. Okay so when I read the Bathilda Bagshot scene in the book, I was a bit confused. I got the general gist of it, but Rowling was purposefully hazy at parts to maintain the mystery and creepiness. I was hoping the movie would spell it out but still keep it mysterious and creepy, and it did. Woooo!

So after seeing that, then I was hoping for more illustration of Wormtail's salvation, maybe show him struggle with the hand, a look in his eye---

PCHEW *thud*wtf....

Ah, maybe I was confusing - the scene with Luna's room wasn't in there.  It would have been nice to see, but they really trimmed down the whole visit to their tower.  But instead we got that totally cool illustration version of the Deathly Hallows, which made everything worth it.

For Wormtail, not only did they shortchange us, they had Dobby be the one to "knock" him out.  Cheap, cheap and lame.

...but otherwise, the Dobby parts were very well done.  I nearly cried, but luckily my 37 year-old manliness took over and I deftly avoided it.

really enjoyed this installment.  Indeed, too much "camping" and how the horcruxes (sp?) as the-one-ring(s) and the DeathlyHallows quest mcguffins were connected wasn't clear to me.  But otherwise great flick.