Harry Potter!

[Aki]

saw the movie this morning!
my review:
special effects were awesome!
didn't think the acting was totally unbelievably great..but just normal
loved the story line (fantasy)
TOTALLY recommend everyone to go see it
i want it on dvd when it comes out AND i want to read all the books!
one thing that i didn't get was that they never told what the philosopher stone could do..it was just like "a rock" and i think they skipped out a lot of shit from the book..
oh well
go see it nOWWW

[KrAzYRiCeBoY]

Yeah I heard it's a awsome movie for young kids & adults...:) Personally I wanna read up more about the whole Harry Potter thing first cause I have no clue about the story/history of it...*hehe* So knowing some info and stuff prior to seeing it would be a good idea...

[kiMMie]

Harry Potter Info:

Did you know that they sold over 280,000 advance tickets for this show???

Did you know that the original Harry Potter character originated from a character named "Christopher Chant"???

Um... what else???

Did you know that they are planning to make it a series of movies like the books???

Shit, why wouldn't they??? 280,000 times $13 a ticket (for an opening across just Canada)... you do the math :284:

[manik]

The character of Harry Potter is based on the character of Christopher Chant? Christopher Chant as in "The Hidden Lives of Christopher Chant" by... oh... who's it by... I own it too... hrm... I didn't know that, where did you hear it? I'd always read that J.K. Rowling based the character on a school friend of hers. *muses*

Why did you get sucked into the hype if you haven't read the book(s)? I'm just wondering.

[acidic_liquid]

I loved it.
It wasn't SUPER GREAT.
But it was, good.

I want to see it again. It got sappy at times, and has some loopholes. But it's still very charming, and I just LOVE the Quidditch adaptation!

[vesperstina]

Originally posted by Aki

didn't think the acting was totally unbelievably great..but just normal
i want to read all the books!
one thing that i didn't get was that they never told what the philosopher stone could do..it was just like "a rock" and i think they skipped out a lot of shit from the book..

The acting in my opinion is unbelievable if you read the books and do a comparison in characters and actors they match like a key in a lock.

It was explained in the film by Dumbledore and Haggrid that the Philosophers stone effect was eternal life.

Only very minor details were cut or done differently from the novel, not anything majour was skipped. Like the first chapter where Uncle Vernon and aunt Petunia establish the destain towards wizards and magical creatures when they see owls flying around in day light and people in cloaks. Which this scene is appropriately cut to add suspense to the following films and is not entirely neccesary because this information is reitterated in following scenes.

There's maybe a few more minor scenes and information which was done differently, but nothing majour or too important.

The film was way more magical then the book! It's terrific.
stinabear

[kandy kid]

Didja know that Harry Potter has made 90.3 million dollars?! Craaazay shit. Anyways, I thought the movie was really good. I had read the book beforehand, and thought the movie did justice to it for sure. I went with a friend who hadn't read the book, and he enjoyed it just as much as me. Yes there are lots of differences between the book and movie, but that's not important. It would be impossible to recreate the book word for word, obviously some things need to be left out. I enjoyed watching this movie, and would highly recommend it. I heard that there's gonna be a movie made for each book, so I can't wait for the next one. I found this review on www.mybc.com I thought it was pretty narrow minded, but I'll let you judge that for yourself.

WHAT WE SAY
As wonderful as this movie is – and wonderful is the right sponsor-friendly, mainstream adjective – it is bound to disappoint almost everyone.

Those unfamiliar with Harry Potter's life at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry – and surely there are two or three such people out there – may be forgiven for thinking that director Chris Columbus and screenwriter Steven Kloves knelt at J.K. Rowling's altar a bit too long and reverently.

For the several hundred million expectant fans, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone may be too short, even at 152 minutes. And it is these fans who are most pertinent in our discussion of disappointment, because it is they who cannot help but attend with a set of rich and unique expectations.

For a worldwide generation of young readers, this movie may provide their most instructive illustration yet of the permanently defining power of the visual image. (Yeah, yeah, it's great that J.K. Rowling got kids reading again.) Like a music video that forever imposes a filmmaker's stamp onto a listener's interpretation of a song, Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone will take how kids have imagined what the Sorting Hat looks and sounds like, or how the invisibility cloak works, or what it would be like to walk through Diagon Alley, and will replace those images with ones invented by Columbus and his special effects team. In experiencing this permanent, irrevocable substitution, a certain disappointment and attendant resentment may be felt, almost immediately.

In any event, Harry Potter fans will depart the theatre raving about favourite characters and scenes and grumbling about others. They will think that some elements of the book were given short shrift – humour, perhaps, and maybe Hagrid's dragon, or how the feasts were shown – only to realize later that some things were missing entirely. If the movie has a make-or-break set piece for everyone, it is probably the Quidditch match, but every young reader will have some other intimate expectation that will either be met or be dashed.

As moviemakers, Columbus and crew have tried to be scrupulously faithful to their source. The movie is a masterpiece of condensation, telescoping 223 pages into two-and-a-half hours. To their credit, few elements have been added that Rowling didn't write, the most obvious (and unnecessary, a fan might say) being the moving staircases so prominently shown in TV trailers.

Perhaps one of the nicest gratifications for an adult moviegoer is to see special effects employed to serve a writer's story, as opposed to being the story, or covering up the fact that there is no story.

Another is the chance to watch great old stars like Maggie Smith and Richard Harris work with rising stars like Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter), Emma Watson (Hermione Granger) and acting novice Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley). It would be gilding the lily to suggest that what we are watching here is the passing of a thespian torch, but it is a pleasure on many levels, as is the movie itself.

Review by John TD Keyes