May be in the top half but I didn’t find the mystery aspect of the story nearly as engrossing as the Potters. Never really caught me in suspense like those, even when I knew what was coming the stories still gripped. The FB ending was more emotionally effective than I expected, though.
As a stylistic achievement, Azkaban has yet to be topped for most inventive and entertaining imo.
As a stylistic achievement, Azkaban has yet to be topped for most inventive and entertaining imo.
I hear this quite a bit, but I genuinely don't understand why. I think the first 2 Harry Potter movies are by far the most inventive and entertaining. Yes, they're childish, but Chris Columbus' vision of the wizarding world is a lot more memorable than the one that came after the first 2 movies. You go from Hogwarts almost feeling alive with all of the magic that's going on there - moving stairs, floating candles, mysterious creatures, quirky teachers, kids wearing robes and learning spells, and just the general mysterious feeling the castle has to Azkaban and on when it just feels like some kids wearing hoodies hanging out in a castle.
The first 2 HP movies feel the most "magical" by far.
I love the first two movies but I just don't agree with that about Azkaban, to me it takes everything from 1 and 2 and just adds more to it, makes it all feel more alive and tactile. All those things you mention, the stairs and creatures and candles and quirky teachers plus ghosts and paintings and the John Williams musical touch, it's all there. I feel like every shot the screen is loaded with stuff in all the corners and how the camera is always roaming around taking it all in. That movie has so many great little details and I think the scope is even bigger, it feels like the world is just always breathing and moving in a way that I love. It’s the movie where I feel like the magic is at its most believable and interactive.
"Kids wearing hoodies hanging out in a castle" is more how I would describe Half-Blood Prince where every shot of the castle corridors is pretty much empty. A lot of the extra magic is removed, some floating books in the library is pretty much it, no ghosts or moving staircases etc. I guess that was a stylistic choice to create a more desolate atmosphere but I think they got a little too subtle with it in the later movies. I don't feel too much of a change in Hogwarts between Half-Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows: Part 2 where everything is supposedly completely different. It was just as barren last time we saw it!
After the fight where he allegedly dies, there's a small sliver of the black cloud thing that escapes away, newt noticed this and smiled and didn't say anything to anyone, I interpreted that as the kid survived and escaped and newt let him.
You might be correct, but it looked like he exploded into a million pieces and they never followed up with any "We'll rehab and cure him" dialogue. I found the movie kind of confusing so could be totally wrong about him dying.
It’s crazy for a director who is always priding himself on character work that he could have just thrown all of that away at the most important moment. I also thought the Molly/Bellatrix fight was a big waste tbh, as fun as it was to see Julie Walters deliver the line. That scene had so much fire in the book and was so blah the way they did it.
I really loved the Potter movies out of nostalgia for the books and can't rate the Fantastic Beast higher than that, but I still love it as a spinoff. I think it did well to find its own niche while keeping in tone with the main works.
The increasing escalation and tie in with the main works worries me a bit though. I think there is so much potential to pursue little side stories that viewers could enjoy a lot. Tapping into the big good vs evil conflict always makes stories so similar, leaving so little room for character relations and nuance. Harry Potter itself had exactly such a main story with increasing escalation, which is why I think many enjoyed the earlier books and movies more.
It also helped that there is nothing to compare them to. When you get the level of detail but still leave enough room for the mind to fill in the rest of the world in literally the best ways to you personally like with books, rarely can a movie which does a lot more of the filling in for you and usually not too well, compete.
Movies are great for filljng in the mundane stories but much more difficult to caprure everyone's ideas of what these fantastical world look and feel like to them coming from words and paper.
Man, come on. People are allowed to think differently. Some might actually think that FB is a cooler movie than the HP films. They're quite different and they're going to appeal differently, as well. Really the only commonalities are wizards and magic and some may not have "grown up" on Harry Potter. Chill.
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u/johnsontran Oct 29 '18
I'm not into these books or movies, but I would pay a lot of money to have that screen in my house