The final movie in this epic series was amazing, obviously, and I need not go into details on just how and why it was so kickass (hello-Battle of Hogwarts, anyone?)----all HP fans know these facts. I want to write about the things that made me curl up my toes in anguish because they were not dealt with properly: ahem..
1. Voldy Biting the Dust: This is the moment the books and movies have spent years building up to and it is so fitting and gripping in the book that they are in the Great Hall, surrounded by Harry's closest friends as well as his enemies and everyone is witness to the end of You-Know-Who. What is with the random flying and falling that is in the movie?! This final battle is intended to be like a to-the-death sword fight on solid ground, not an airborne tour of the devastated castle.
On a side note: I found Voldemort's vaporization (what would you call this??) very fascinating. The way that he flakes apart in the film and disperses with the wind in a very Holocaust-esque way was an interesting albeit disturbing way to make him very clearly dead, so as not to frighten the small children, rather than in the book where he just, well...drops dead and they put his lifeless body in a chamber removed from everyone else in the Great Hall. I'm sure if he just dropped dead in the movie people would have been on the edge of their seat waiting for him to pop up again or some crackpot director would have had him open his red eyes one last time or something else lame and cliche, which, thank goodness, they didn't even go for.
This sounds morbid and I'm a bit disturbed I'm writing this, but whatever--I prefer his physical corpse in the books because it emphasizes the fact that he is mortal and Harry defeated him, just like any other normal human can be killed, no matter how evil they are.
An addendum to my side note: What did they do with his body?! I'll bet they cremated it because if not there would be some stoned wannabe Death Eaters drinking Firewhysky going "dude, lets go dig up Voldemort's body!! Yeah man" and then trying to re-animate it or something. Does anyone else wonder about this??
2. Our friend Severus Snape: The back story with Severus and Lily was vague and rushed (watching this with non-readers is particularly tricky because they have no idea who the hell these random children are). Snape's death was quite different than in the book, though more visibly understandable due to the change in setting and that particularly brilliant though gory bit with the glass, but in the book it is far more poignant and heartbreaking than the movie scene which is used as a bridge to ending the movie and showing how Harry realizes he must die. Understandably they spent so much time villainizing Snape in the movies that they couldn't dedicate an hour to showing "he was good in the end, see?!" but it just didn't do his mighty complex and heroic character justice.
3. Fred: They did not show him being killed! I know this is probably because some producer though the movie too dark already, but this is a turning point for Harry, Ron, and Hermione because they've seen some pretty awful things before, but for one of their own siblings to be killed in front of them shows how perilous this fight is (we're not in The Sorcerer's Stone anymore) and brings everything teetering to an edge of "this is it." When Fred was killed in the book I was stunned and set the book down, saying "holy shit." And that it when I realized how real this was, and makes me wonder if Rowling put it in to prepare her readers for Harry's death by showing that all bets are off and no one is safe now.
In the film seeing Fred dead with his family around him is tragic, but not so much as the book where they're all fighting together and Fred is smiling at Percy and then.... oh Fred. You were cheated in the movie.
4. Neville's Big Moment: lost. Washed over. Lame.
In the book he pulls the sword out of the hat and just freakin kills the snake in front of everyone!! Reading this I was cheering because we all knew Neville was growing up and becoming awesome, but this unexpected move was straight Bad-Ass-Manship in the First Degree. In the movie with the entire chase scene with the snake I was yawning a bit and wondering where Neville had got to. Can't say I was all that impressed with his speech to Voldemort either. Book Neville will always be more hardcore.
Well those are the main problems I had with the movie and just wanted to document them and get this rant off my chest. I know I've discussed it briefly with my other HP freak friends, but here I wasn't drinking G&Ts and incoherently shouting "I know!! What the hell?!! Oh Fred...and Neville! Holy shit! I know! Totally!"
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