[Avada_Kedavra]

Hi all,

Just wanted to ask which HP film was your favorite?

Mine is the 3rd one POA, I really like the first 2 as well as they have a certain nostalgia about them.

[skunkboy69]

Only the first one.The rest were awful.

[Avada_Kedavra]

Originally Posted by skunkboy69

Only the first one.The rest were awful.

I also really like the first one, What for you made the rest so bad then?

[treefr0g]

My favourites were the two by 'Chris Columbus'. The third was ok but from then on my enjoyment diminished more with each one until the last which I thought was quite good.

Although I like Michael Gambon as an actor, I never took to him playing Dumbledore.

[Avada_Kedavra]

Originally Posted by treefr0g

My favourites were the two by 'Chris Columbus'. The third was ok but from then on my enjoyment diminished more with each one until the last which I thought was quite good.

I also agree with that, my enjoyment did diminish also slightly, but the POA (3rd) was great I have not watched the last one yet, which I'm glad for in someways as I don't want it to end but all good things come to an end.

[ROWLING2010]

I LOVE them all but if I had to choose, then it would be Deathly Hallows Parts 1 and 2

[MissDexter]

Can't see what all the fuss is about, but each to their own I suppose.
Never been a fan of wizards and magic etc.

I did try with HP, but it just leaves me cold. I fell asleep in the cinema to the one I saw there.

[Sifter22]

The first one was the only one that really captured the 'magic' of Harry Potter I thought. With the rest I get annoyed with thing missing from the book. Even worse when they change things from the books. Order Of The Phoenix is terrible for it, and don't get me started on The Half Blood Prince. Seeing my favourite book of the series murdered on-sceen wasn't a pleasant experience.

[lordOfTime]

Originally Posted by ROWLING2010

I LOVE them all but if I had to choose, then it would be Deathly Hallows Parts 1 and 2

Correct. I think Hallows was like a coming of age for everybody. Hogwarts is great but it was good to see us get away from Hogwarts for a little while and its absense makes the films stronger. There's definately something different when compared with the other ones.

[lordOfTime]

Originally Posted by Sifter22

The first one was the only one that really captured the 'magic' of Harry Potter I thought. With the rest I get annoyed with thing missing from the book. Even worse when they change things from the books. Order Of The Phoenix is terrible for it, and don't get me started on The Half Blood Prince. Seeing my favourite book of the series murdered on-sceen wasn't a pleasant experience.

What would you rather have been different then? What would you have put in and sacrifised from the book knowing that like all screen adaptions you can't include everything from the original material?

[samcains90]

Deathly Hallows - Parts 1 & 2 - I class it as 1 movie.

But Half Blood Prince is the best book.

I hate Michael Gambon as Dumbledore he was too harsh.

David Yates is my favourite director but Goblet of Fire should have been filmed in 2 parts as should Order of the Phoenix and Half Blood Prince.

Goblet of Fire is the worst film out of the lot.

[Sifter22]

Originally Posted by lordOfTime

What would you rather have been different then? What would you have put in and sacrifised from the book knowing that like all screen adaptions you can't include everything from the original material?

Off to the top of my head in the Deathly Hallows Part 2, I would've got rid of Neville's speech and replaced it with Harry's speech that was in the book at the end. Also would've had McGonegal screaming like in the book, not just them all standing there looking vacant.

They also changed it so Voldermort said "You've got to really mean it Potter, you have to really want to hurt them" or something like that in OOTP which annoyed me. Bellatrix wasn't hardly in it at all so they could've let her say it. ALSO they changed the way Sirius died, it was much better in the book, don't see why they couldn't have had that in the film too.

[performingmonk]

The best films were Philosopher's Stone, Prisoner of Azkaban and Goblet of Fire. The others just didn't hit the mark for me.

It's not all about what was left out of the book etc. cause there was a ton cut from Prisoner and Goblet, it's the whole tone of the film and entering that magical world. I don't agree with the way David Yates (director of them from Order onwards) handled the series.

There wasn't an ounce of wonder in his films and he definitley didn't get the best performances out of the cast he had. People like Alan Rickman, Gary Oldman and Maggie Smith are great in anything but plenty of other actors need a kick up the backside not to come across as lazy.

[bbclassics]

I like all of them. My fav's are Harry Potter and the Philosophers Stone, Prisoner Of Azkaban and Goblet of Fire.
The one I liked least was Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince to me it had lots of boring teeny romance scenes and felt a bit like a teen drama, I thought there needed to be more magic. Also the execution of Dumbledores death was a bit disappointing
If I had to narrow it down to one favourite it would probably be Prisoner Of Azkaban, I just really liked the imagery used and I felt it was the most engaging.

[asyousay]

I loath Michael Gambon for ruining Dumbledore. One of the worst character assassination ever.

[PhoenixRises]

Originally Posted by lordOfTime

What would you rather have been different then? What would you have put in and sacrifised from the book knowing that like all screen adaptions you can't include everything from the original material?

But to be fair for some people (I include myself here - who was a fan of the books from the beginning) when they take the book and twist things around remove exciting parts and leave out entire plot points it does annoy slightly.

We are all aware that book adaptations can rarely include everything in the books, but in some cases they change things so completely you wonder what they are doing.

I mean they completely removed the battle of the Half-Blood Prince, their reasoning being that they didn't want to make the battle of the final film less spectacular. Now this annoys me for two reasons one its lazy - they didn't do a battle because they didn't think the would be able to top it next go round, and two the final battle of the final film was quite deflating.

So yes I know that adaptations do have to miss things but sometimes it still does annoy me

By the way I prefer the films that kept truest to the books as it gave me less to grumble about hehe. Also disliked the third film and sixth film the most, third because it was the beginning of the messing of the plot and sixth because I had to defend myself to friends when they all came out of the cinema going is that it!?!

[Vashetti]

From best to worst:

Deathly Hallows (both parts as 1 film)
Order Of The Phoenix
Prisoner Of Azkaban/Half-Blood Prince
Philosopher's Stone
Chamber Of Secrets








Goblet Of Fire

[samcains90]

Originally Posted by Vashetti

From best to worst:

Deathly Hallows (both parts as 1 film)
Order Of The Phoenix
Prisoner Of Azkaban/Half-Blood Prince
Philosopher's Stone
Chamber Of Secrets








Goblet Of Fire

Agreed, great list! lol

[DariaM]

Originally Posted by Avada_Kedavra

Hi all,

Just wanted to ask which HP film was your favorite?

Mine is the 3rd one POA, I really like the first 2 as well as they have a certain nostalgia about them.

The first one..... it was basically mediocre, but could have been good, great or even excellent, if only the audience had not grown out of B movies decades ago, and only if the source book had been written by a Qualified and Professional Author. But, I suppose in the scheme of things, it was the best that some unsklilled waitress could produce.

[((((Dingo))))]

I think it's hard for potter fans, just because the books are so intricate and almost everything is important to the plot, so we want to see it all. And then the movies come out and changes are made because you can't have a 4 hour film and it still be good.

So considering they're are adaptions, my best to worst rating goes:

POA: has to be my favorite, visually it looked great & Gary Oldman was epic as always. I also liked Michael Gambon in this, he wasn't going to do what Richard Harris did, But i would've been more than happy if Dumbledore stayed like this throughout the rest of the series.

PS: mainly because it's the beginning and a fun film. and i thought pretty great performances from the Dan, Emma and Rupert. Richard Harris was also very epic as Dumbledore.

Halfblood Prince: As a movie it's great, i love the haunting feeling and how the tension just keeps building. The problem is that they changed and cut so much from the book which is just amazing, that you just feel disappointed in the final outcome. it is my favorite book, but it's such a fun movie i can watch it whenever, i just try not to think about how awesome the book was.

DH1: Great movie but you've got to be in the mood for it. And it's quite long. The trio's acting was the best it was throught the series, Dan did amazing in the 2nd half of DH2

DH2: Felt like a checklist being ticked off, it went too fast. I honestly think the messed up pacing wise with the deathly Hallows. There was some amazing performances in it, Mainly Alan Rickman, but i loved all the older actors in this, they really made the most of the time they were given.

COS: It was fine, it just had no oomph.

OOTP: Badly paced, it got so boring sometimes, the only reason i watch this is for Gary, from Sirius's battle with Bellatrix onward, its gold, but before that, my god it's boring.

GOF: All i can say is, I get a headache just thinking about it. I hate it, I hate angry Dumbledore, just so bad and over the top.

I've got to say though the cast is amazing and it introduced me to actors, who's films.tv shows i probably would never have gone out of my way to watch before

[PhoenixRises]

Originally Posted by DariaM

The first one..... it was basically mediocre, but could have been good, great or even excellent, if only the audience had not grown out of B movies decades ago, and only if the source book had been written by a Qualified and Professional Author. But, I suppose in the scheme of things, it was the best that some unsklilled waitress could produce.

You posted elsewhere that she was an unskilled waitress, she wasn't she wrote in cafes but that is as close as you could get to claiming she was a waitress.

She worked Amnesty International and later worked as a teacher in, I think, Portugal teaching English as a second language. She went home and was getting her qualifications to teach in Scotland after she wrote the first book I believe.

I don't mind if you don't like the books, that is fair enough, same goes if you don't find the writing or the author especially good - we all have our personal tastes and that is fine too. But making up stuff to support your argument is just silly - why do it, it is easy to look up and even easier to dispute your claims.

Also why would an author need to be qualified and professional? I am sure many good books were written by authors who didn't go on a creative writing course

[treefr0g]

Originally Posted by PhoenixRises

You posted elsewhere that she was an unskilled waitress, she wasn't she wrote in cafes but that is as close as you could get to claiming she was a waitress.

She worked Amnesty International and later worked as a teacher in, I think, Portugal teaching English as a second language. She went home and was getting her qualifications to teach in Scotland after she wrote the first book I believe.

I don't mind if you don't like the books, that is fair enough, same goes if you don't find the writing or the author especially good - we all have our personal tastes and that is fine too. But making up stuff to support your argument is just silly - why do it, it is easy to look up and even easier to dispute your claims.

Also why would an author need to be qualified and professional? I am sure many good books were written by authors who didn't go on a creative writing course

Great post.

You could be the best writer in the world but it's redundant unless you have a great idea.

[lordOfTime]

Originally Posted by PhoenixRises

But to be fair for some people (I include myself here - who was a fan of the books from the beginning) when they take the book and twist things around remove exciting parts and leave out entire plot points it does annoy slightly.

We are all aware that book adaptations can rarely include everything in the books, but in some cases they change things so completely you wonder what they are doing.

I mean they completely removed the battle of the Half-Blood Prince, their reasoning being that they didn't want to make the battle of the final film less spectacular. Now this annoys me for two reasons one its lazy - they didn't do a battle because they didn't think the would be able to top it next go round, and two the final battle of the final film was quite deflating.

So yes I know that adaptations do have to miss things but sometimes it still does annoy me

By the way I prefer the films that kept truest to the books as it gave me less to grumble about hehe. Also disliked the third film and sixth film the most, third because it was the beginning of the messing of the plot and sixth because I had to defend myself to friends when they all came out of the cinema going is that it!?!

Maybe I'm just not getting it, but I still can't see how they can not mess with scenes and certain aspects of the story and still fit it in to 2 hours or so of screen time. Obviously not everyone is going to be happy but certain liberties have to be taken. And I do think JK was happy with each screenplay or else we'd not have seen them.

I agree the 6th film was one of the weakest of the lot but still good fun to watch imo.

[performingmonk]

I recently rewatched Deathly Hallows pt.1 & 2 and, to me, they just seem like an exercise in making sure they include certain parts from the book but in a pretty mundane, plodding way. The start with the Dursleys is absolutely non-existent and awful. There was a chance to do a full callback to the series but no...Yates has no vision of his own.

The first 30 minutes of Prisoner of Azkaban show everyone how it should be done. There's so much atmosphere and you really feel like you're following Harry and getting sucked into that world. The scene with the Dementor on the train is class. After this I was so excited for the rest of the series, especially darker parts of Order of the Phoenix, but it all fell flat...still the made a ton of money so who cares, right?? -.-

[ROWLING2010]

You need to learn to be able to separate the books from the movies. I am a massive Harry Potter fan but I understand that things need to be changed or left out entirely. Sure, I have been disappointed that I haven't seen certain scenes but I understand..

For me David Yates was the best thing to happen to Harry Potter.

If i had to pick the weak movie in the series, in my opinion, it would be Prisoner of Azkaban. Unpopular opinion but there' s just something about the first part of the movie that ruins the second part.