Thursday, July 14, 2011 was as awesome as I had hoped and planned for it to be.
I got up, had a great swim at the pool, concluded a camp session at work, and had a great night at Tae Kwon Do. I got picked up at 9:00 to go to the premiere.
My costume consisted of a white button-down shirt, my high school uniform skirt, my Gryffindor tie, the wand my friend gave me at her Harry Potter themed birthday party (Poplar (should be Ash, but I think they're related?), 14 inches, Unicorn core), and a red schoolbag. It is the most complete costume I have ever put together myself, and I'm really proud of it. Plus, I looked quite good as a Hogwarts student :)
Before heading to the theater, we went to Giant Eagle to buy an ice cream cake, which we smuggled into the theater and ate in the hour before the movie >.<
When we got to the cinema, it was so busy!! There were lines inside and outside to get into the various theaters, but our auditorium was already seating, so we went straight there. In the hour between getting seats and the start of the movie, we, as a group, got many compliments on our costumes: 2 Gryffindors, a Slytherin, Luna, Dobby, Kreacher, Fred, George, and Draco Malfoy. It was awesome!! I particularly loved dueling with Malfoy and our friend who brought her sonic screwdriver. Mixing fandoms for the win!
So, the film...
I am content. They moved the action along and showed the passages in Gringotts, Hogsmeade, and The Battle of Hogwarts. The horcruxes were done satisfactorily, and Snape was redeemed. I loved Neville, the escape from Gringotts was epic, and the visualizations of magic were really cool.
BUT:
I was dissatisfied with the way time moved in this film. The entire seventh book of the series demonstrates that fighting evil takes time, and it seemed like Harry just said, "Hey guys, let's break into Gringotts," and they did it immediately. In the book, every event except the battle takes at least a day, often weeks and months of planning, before it is executed. Everything moved so continuously and fast that the waiting and planning was lost.
There was nothing about the Dumbledore/Grindelwald/Ariana stuff. The filmmakers shifted the focus to be exclusively in Harry's story, but I always felt that Deathly Hallows is much more about Dumbledore than it is about Harry/Voldemort, and the story of Dumbledore's youth is very important in the book.
I really wanted them to spend more time on "The Prince's Tale" (and not just because of the amazing wrock album). As a character in the books, Snape is quite dynamic, and this chapter adds to his roundness while filling in the details of his motivations for every action he takes. In the films, Snape is portrayed rather flatly, which makes me sad because Alan Rickman is such an amazing actor. I wanted all of the memories to be there, particularly the happy memories of his friendship with Lily and the way he brought about his own downfall by ruining that relationship. He is a much more sympathetic character in the book, and I really hoped for him to be similarly redeemed in the film.
"NOT MY DAUGHTER, YOU BITCH" should have been bigger. I appreciated Molly's contained rage, but when Rowling writes in all caps, the line needs to be outwardly, wildly passionate. And shouted. It was okay but not great.
Harry never mended the Phoenix wand. It is a very important moment in the book when he uses the Elder wand to repair the broken Phoenix wand before destroying the Hallow, and that was entirely ignored. Essentially, Harry broke his wand without having a new one, and he would never continue to use Malfoy's Hawthorne wand. It may seem like a detail, but it should have been there because it shows Harry's growth as a person for him to be able to discard a powerful object in favor of his own belonging.
The Epilogue made me want brain bleach. I couldn't stand it in the book, and it was just horrible to see them age the actors just so Harry could call Snape the bravest man he ever knew. The film would have had a fine ending if it had stopped when the characters were still 17.
Overall, it was good. I don't feel the need to watch it again, and it certainly wasn't as good at Part 1, but it was satisfying in its own way.
I must reiterate that the final film does not mean this series/phenomenon/fandom is going to end. There is too much for it to be over already, and I plan on sticking around to see what comes next. Whether it is a con, a new wrock album, or the legendary Pottermore, fans will never have to miss this world we have grown to love so much. Plus, I can relate anything to Harry Potter (test me on this; I've succeeded in such topics as religious theory and Tae Kwon Do), so it will always be fresh in my mind for there to be a metaphor/analogy for things to make sense.
Today is awesome because I threw battle axes at the Medieval Faire.
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