For a number of reasons, we first tried to see the Two Towers yesterday - but it was sold out. So we went home and watched the extended version of the Fellowship on DVD. Today we went to see it again, but it was sold out again. Feh.
So we decided to see Harry Potter 2. Feh.
Harry Potter is running out of steam as a cinema franchise already, and I think it's because, no matter how good the casting can be (Alan Rickman and Kenneth Branagh, for instance, are superb), the source material is fundamentally limited and is not suited to a 7-film sequence. What may work fine in a children's book - and I enjoyed the four books when I read them - does not work on film. (See, for instance, Cleodhna's analysis - not a permalink, unfortunately.)
All the Harry Potter books are, fundamentally, set at Hogwarts. But Hogwarts is not rich enough an environment to cope with this. We know about a number of locations in Hogwarts, but a) we don't particularly know how they relate to each other (which buildings do you have to go through to get from the Gryffindor Common Room to the Quidditch Arena?), and b) there isn't much of an impression that there's anything we've missed. In both films so far the secret, hidden evil places have been underground; there are plenty of aerial shots in the current film to show you that Hogwarts is actually a fairly small collection of buildings, conceivably small enough that you've seen most of it already.
This is a fatal flaw if it's supposed to be the setting for 7 entire films. Yes, there's the haunted forest, and a few other extraneous places, but Hogwarts itself already feels full. It's already been mapped, it's known. It doesn't have the feeling you'd have with Gormenghast that the place is so old, decrepit, sprawling and subtle that, for all you know, there could be a hidden Shinto temple somewhere in the grounds.
(Lord of the Rings leads you across all of Middle Earth - the Shire, Rivendell, Moria and Lothlórien in book one, Fangorn, Moria, Isengard, Minas Tirith and the outskirts of Mordor in book two; Moria and big huge battle scenes, oh and other outskirts of Mordor in book three. I may have missed some parts of the world that LotR visits - that's like missing a scullery in Harry Potter.)
My other problem with the series is that the magic system in Harry Potter is possibly the least well thought-out magic system in the history of fantasy. There is no clear indication of how magic works, other than a) it relies on magic wands, and the wands must be tuned to the nature of the wizard; b) magic spells work by saying latin words (4-5 syllables seems to be the norm) and pointing; c) there appears to be some degree of manual dexterity involved, although this is never really explored. As an aside, this means that you cannot point a wand at someone as you would point any kind of ranged weapon, because by the time you've finished chanting your spell they have time to either break, divert or grab your magic wand from you.
There does not appear to be much thought involved into how some spells can be more difficult than others. As a result, spells appear to be tossed into the mix as and when they would be appropriate. So first-year students can paralyse people (Hermione to some random student); second-year students can make people puke up slugs (Ron Weasley), chuck spiders around (pretty much everyone), or brew potions to take the appearance of someone else (Hermione again). Yet Harry, as a second-year student, is unable to repair his glasses with a simple mending spell - something, you'd have thought, which he would have learned to do fairly quickly.
A final flaw, I think, is that J.K.Rowling never considers the consequences of having a magic society live alongside a normal, "Muggle" society. This, I think, is how she envisages it:
- Some people can do magic, some people can't. This doesn't necessarily follow blood lines, so Muggle-born can be magicians.
- A thousand years ago or more, clearly, being able to do magic would have brought great benefits. Those who could do magic separated themselves from non-magic-users (Muggles) and kept the benefits of magic to themselves.
- To this day, the separation continues. Muggles are unaware of magic-users (possibly because of forgetfulness spells), and magic-users tend to disdain (and be unaware of, or not understand) Muggles.
Now, this clearly can't work. The Muggles must have satellite photos of Hogwarts by now, and the ancient train that goes to it, unless the wizards have amazing powers of concealment - which nonetheless they happen to not teach to their students in the first four years of their studies. And if the wizards have stayed unnoticed so long, it must be because they're aware of the new technology being developed by the Muggles and have developed spells to counter-act it - except, whoops, they know almost nothing about the Muggles.
Frankly, if I was setting up a world where ancient wizards coexisted with modern technology, I'd have to find a reason why they're still using quill pens rather than, say, word-processors, given that they can, presumably, just go and get one from a shop. Say that electricity is the anti-magic (no lightning bolts from these mages, then), say that you need a personal touch, have people make quill pens that are animate and intelligent so you dictate to them and they write, whatever, but at least think about it.
Frankly, if you're a bunch of wizards hiding from the rest of society, explain to me why you're not the Templars, or the Illuminati, or any other juicy secret society.
