Harry Potter and The Goblet of Confusion

Just when I protect good ‘ole Harry from the jowls of bloodthirsty Pharisees and legalists I go and watch Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire and come away wondering how this movie made any money. :-) I know the unsavory Puritans’ penchant for book burnings and the failing of a silver screen boy hero sequel to captivate are two completely unrelated phenomena… so instead of loquacious babble allow me to retreat into meaningful discourse.

With the marketing industry being at the top of its game, and the wild popularity of J.K.Rowling‘s books to begin with, and with the relative enjoyability of the first three movies… OF COURSE this one was going to make the mad duckets (lots of money). But, although I enjoyed the first three Potter films I had some trouble with this one.

It wasn’t the darkness by any means… I rather enjoyed the small departure from pure sugar candy. It wasn’t the lack of good special effects, because they were excellent… the dragon climbing on the castle looked really good to me. What it was, in my best estimation, was trying to squeeze a huge book into a little 2-hour movie.

The plots were many, varied, and unrelated. At several points during the movie… even as far as two thirds of the way through, I’m wondering when the main plot of the movie is going to start! A couple times… just when I thought things were gettin’ a move on… a completely unrelated subplot would take full-reins of the film for 15 to 20 minutes. I was sitting their bewildered. I was confused that three of the six characters on the cover of the DVD (the ones besides Harry, Ron, and Hermione) had they been put in a ranking by plot-importance and/or screentime would have ranked more like 12th, 17th, and 20th. I was confused that Harry never smiled or acted with any male impetus… and in fact I was beginning to get sick of his whining.

Now, was it a fun movie? Sure. But, unlike my esteemed Pixar flicks, this one will leave adults’ common sense nerve hurting a bit. It may still be good fun for the kiddies (and indeed some of you may wonder why I have not left it as such)… but for the so-called grown-ups… instead of this DVD, I’d throw one of Tolkien’s in my DVD player if I were you. ;-)

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  1. Posted March 19, 2006 at 9:15 pm | Permalink

    03 19 06

    Interesting read. I didn’t see the last movie, although I want to. I have read the books and they stimulate the imagination. Usually movies are pale comparisons. And the book was like seven hundred pages long, so no wonder why the plots were difficult to follow. A lot happened in those seven hundred pages! To be sure, I always felt like JK Rowlings writing, although I am a fan, is a bit of a mixture of watered down Tolkien, CS Lewis and Roald Dahl. Harry’s living situation reeks of James and the Giant Peach’s and his wretched aunties. But one good thing about Ms, Rowling is her ability to simplifiy things and the fact that she had made an epic for many generations to come. And I had to disable anonymous comments because of trolls, but if you set up a Blogger acct, you can comment on whatever you wish.

    My last post was kind of weird and I disabled comments on that for, well obvious reasons. Have a nice night:)

  2. Posted March 20, 2006 at 4:34 pm | Permalink

    Some good analysis! I’m sure the books are deservedly as good as their popularity indicates… perhaps I’ll have to break my golden rule and read them instead of seeing the movie.

    I registered with Blogger and haved commented on your blog. It has begun! :-)

  3. Posted May 22, 2011 at 11:10 am | Permalink

    ITS NOT LETING ME PLAY <3

  4. Jeffrey Goblets
    Posted August 17, 2011 at 12:32 pm | Permalink

    The only thing I realy like is the special affects in Harry Potter and the Goblets of fire. Otherwise its all fantisy and just reminds me of magic trics I learned as a kid. Its hard for me to sit through the whole movie. Its a movie I wish had come out when I was a kid and still beleaved in magic.

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