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We watched the first Harry Potter movie with friends on Wednesday night and it was very enjoyable, although now that I've thought about it, the book was much better. Some of the characters didn't jive with my mental picture of them (as often happens) - when I think of Mrs. Dursley, for example, I think of a more angry Mrs. Bucket (Boo-kay) from Keeping Up Appearances. There was one thing bothering me about the movie though, and I finally pinned down what it is. Since the first few HP books are essentially mysteries, there was little suspense built up and I thought the movie lacked that quality from the book. I'm itching to read the 6th HP book, which is still 'in transit' from Amazon. I traded in my big Icewind Dale tome (I couldn't finish it) for the 7th book at the used bookstore.
We caught the late showing of The Golden Compass last night and I was surprised how many small children were there, because it was way past most small children's bedtimes. Although it may be positioned as a children's movie, so much was left out of the movie from the book that they probably should have bumped things up a bit to make it more aimed at an older audience. The CGI was wonderful, and Daniel Craig made a perfect Lord Asriel. Nicole Kidman could have been a little more creepy. Well, the creepy made up for that anyway! A few parts of the book were simplified, combined, moved around or left out to fit in a movie...honestly though, the movie should have been longer as there were several parts that were sort of "bang bang bang" with little continuity between them and there really needed to be more room for character development. They really glossed over what happens at the Experimental Station as that would be frightening for children. The last few chapters of the book were also left off, so the ending is a happier one than in the book. I'm not so sure that the series would make a good series of movies as some of the ideas are so complex. If they do film the third one, a lot is going to be left out. In some respects it was a good movie, very enjoyable, but it wasn't also a great movie either. Overall it just felt too rushed.
We caught the late showing of The Golden Compass last night and I was surprised how many small children were there, because it was way past most small children's bedtimes. Although it may be positioned as a children's movie, so much was left out of the movie from the book that they probably should have bumped things up a bit to make it more aimed at an older audience. The CGI was wonderful, and Daniel Craig made a perfect Lord Asriel. Nicole Kidman could have been a little more creepy. Well, the creepy made up for that anyway! A few parts of the book were simplified, combined, moved around or left out to fit in a movie...honestly though, the movie should have been longer as there were several parts that were sort of "bang bang bang" with little continuity between them and there really needed to be more room for character development. They really glossed over what happens at the Experimental Station as that would be frightening for children. The last few chapters of the book were also left off, so the ending is a happier one than in the book. I'm not so sure that the series would make a good series of movies as some of the ideas are so complex. If they do film the third one, a lot is going to be left out. In some respects it was a good movie, very enjoyable, but it wasn't also a great movie either. Overall it just felt too rushed.
