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Harry Potter 4: The Goblet of Fire |
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saw Harry Potter 4 in a 1/5th full theater on Saturday afternoon of
opening weekend. There were lots of kids, but aside from a few slight
crying jags, they were well-behaved, and none of the little grubs ruined
the film with noisy antics -- always
a risk at any kid's movie, especially during the weekend, and double
especially during the daytime. As for the film, here's a quick review.Looking back, I see that I gave HP3 a 7.5, though I have no idea why. I haven't seen it since and have no desire to see it again, and there's nothing that sticks in my mind about it. I remember thinking it would have made no sense if I hadn't read the book first, and I remember thinking they did a far better job explaining all of the time travel confusion and overlap in the film than Rowling did in the book. I think it was just such an improvement over the boring first two HP films that I was overly-generous. That being said, here are my quick scores for HP4, with a few comments afterwards. I'm torn about most of these scores, since I don't know if I should review just the film, or incorporate the changes they made from the book to movie, or what. The film's plot is much streamlined from the novel (From what I remember of it; I recently reread book 5 and book 6, but it's been more than a year since I read book 4.) and that's mostly for the good. Yet I'm giving the story a 4 since it's so straight forward and simple. We see an opening sequence of Voldemort coming back to life and scheming, and the film ends with a battle against him. In between we've got virtually nothing but the straight forward presentation of the Triwizard tournament. Most of the subplots are gone, and we see little or nothing about Hagrid and the Countessa, Hermoine's house elf emancipation efforts, Malfoy and Harry's other school enemies, anything of the classes, anything of Quidditch, etc. I'm not really criticizing; the film runs 2.5 hours and it's got zero fat to trim. This is just what happens when you turn a 750 page book into a single movie. All of the little details and subplots are history, though the film did have small moments and hints at the topics the book explored in much more depth, though it lacked the payoffs of those subplots. The annoying reporter lady never got any sort of comeuppance, for instance. I found the casting odd too, for very superficial reasons. Neither Fleur whatever her name is of the Beauxbaton chippies, nor Cho Chang, Harry's would-be fling, were pretty. They weren't ugly or anything, but they were just relatively average girls, and Fleur was pretty much a useless little victim throughout. In the book, much was made of her being a beauty, and there were scenes of Harry and Ron growing dizzy after her pecks of gratitude, but since she wasn't really very pretty, it seemed forced. Plus she was completely worthless in every bit of onscreen challenge. Cho being a relatively common Asian girl was a bigger surprise, (though seeing a Chinese woman speaking with a Scottish accent was a close second) since she's gorgeous in the book. Harry's smitten by her, but she's got something going that makes the 17 y/o BMoC Cedric ask her to the ball, and you know a 17 y/o asking a 14 y/o out like that would be quite a scandal. So if she's not a great beauty, and she's not outstanding with her magic or anything, why would he notice her? On the other hand, Hermoine is getting prettier with each movie, and she was damn near the hottest woman in the room once she was dolled up for the ball. Victor asking her out made some sense, though the simple fact she was the only girl in the school not chasing after him was a decent reason as well. Cho looked gorgeous at the ball too, but that just made her ordinariness the rest of the time seem more pronounced. Conversely, I thought Hermoine was supposed to be plain in the book, and yet the actress playing her is turning beautiful, which seems to change the dynamic of her being "just a friend" to Harry and Ron. Cedric looked hunky enough, and Harry is a cutie for the girls (long topless scene with him in the bath and he clearly worked out to get ready for it, since he had some pecs and abs going, without looking overly-muscle-y for his young age/hairless frame), and Ron might be, though I can't see past his head-devouring shaggy mop of hair. Victor Krum, the super German dude though, was another surprise, since he wasn't all Aryan and gorgeous either. He was just a meaty looking guy, sort of David Blain-esque, while I thought the book portrayed him as this uber-male that every woman in Hogwarts would kill for. I was puzzled by the Tiger Beat aspects of the casting, is my point. I guess. I wasn't entirely sold on the Voldemort casting either. Ralph Fiennes is fine in theory, but I didn't really like his noseless-makeup, and as he emoted and snarled and looked scary, I kept seeing him as Dolarhyde, the serial killer he played in Red Dragon. Those heavy brows are just too distinctive, and the similarly-awful dentures didn't help me keep them separate either. I wasn't a big fan of the whole Voldemort scene either; the graveyard looked too neat and maintained, I thought. Too much like a stage, and the mist was too conveniently-thick. I did love the Death-Eater costumes and masks though. Voldemort wasn't quite what I wanted either. Too monologue-y, and he seemed whiny and bitchy and full of explanations, rather than just being commanding and fearsome. It's hard to equal the dread and power of words with images though, since fear is so much harder to give to the audience with images than by activating their own imagination. I'm nitpicking though, and I liked all of the acting in the film, and thought the action sequences were handled well. The dragon battle wasn't great, but I liked the chase a lot, and loved the sequence with Harry hanging atop the tower while the dragon crawled ponderously and destructively around the wooden roof. Nice graphics and nice characterization of the dragon; making it powerful and nasty, but not smart enough to just flame Harry, or to kick off and fly around to him. I wouldn't really recommend the film to people who haven't read the book, but if you've seen the previous films and pretty well know what's going on in the series, you won't be disappointed. |
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All site content copyright "Flux" (Eric Bruce), 2002-2007. |
