So this weekend as my Harry PotterMarathonWeekend. ON Saturday we watch the first four film and on Sunday my Friends, Sweetie-wife, and I finished by watching the final four films. Each day it was about a ten hour journey watching the movies and each day presented its own unique challenges and disruptions.
Saturday after three films we took a short dinner break as my sweetie-wife had prepared a lovely batch of chili for us. I paused the blu-ray disc for Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire on the WB shield logo and we had dinner. When, about thirty minutes later we started up again, to my horror there was a mild afterimage of the shield logo centered in the screen. It was faint and only visible during darkened scenes, which were numerous during Goblet of Fire. I have a 42” LCD HDTV and I knew that LCD did not have burn in like plasma and CRT screens, so this was a bit of a surprise to me. Turns about there is a process known as pixel sticking, and that was what caused the afterimage, leaving the monitor off for about twice as long as the static image was displayed will generally cure the issue and did so here for viewing on Sunday.
The first four films contain the weakest and most poor plotted of the stories. Harry Potter and The Prisoner Of Azkaban introduces Time Travel into the plot and then promptly forgets such a devices even exist. The idea that a professor would had such a devastatingly powerful tool to an eleven year old girl, it’s said that Herminie gt it during her first term, simply so she can carry a heavier class load is ludicrous. Worse however is what time travel can do to your plot. The best tie travel stories use the device once and the forever after make the ability inaccessible to the characters. (Think the first Terminator movie.) J.K. Rowling performs no such exorcism of the device and simply ignores it, leaving us to wonder hey the characters don’t use it to alter the disasters and reversal that befall them as they attempt the save the wizarding world.
Goblet of Fire has no plot destroying artifacts such as time travel, but it suffers from a seriously passive main character. Harry doesn’t want to enter the tri-wizard competition, his name is forced into the contest without his knowledge and for the entire film Harry reacts to what happens. The plot is driven by events befalling the character and not by the characters choices. Harry is an observer to the plot and not fully a participant.
Tomorrow, the conclusion of the marathon.
We don’t know the limitations, only that 3 turns sends you backwards a number of hours. (looked like about 6 I’d guess from the my memory of the film.) We have no idea what would happen if you spun it like a top.
My impression, which might be entirely unjustified, was that the range of the time-turner was very limited. It would still be useful, and it would be better if it hadn’t simply disappeared, but I don’t think it’s the huge world-changer less limited time travel is.
Well, some stories, such as the Terminator or Star Trek IV cannot be done with Time Travel, but if it is the solution to your plot complications, yeah that’s generally weak.
Your point about the time travel device is well taken. I have come to the conclusion that if ever an author feels the need to introduce time travel, s/he should just chuck the story until s/he figures out how to do the story without time travel.
Regarding movie four. – The book has one of my favorite scenes and it did not play well in the movie (Professor Moody bouncing the ferret that used to be Malfoy!!! Brilliant!! There is not a teacher in exisitance that hasn’t wanted to turn at least one student into a ferret!!). That saddened me. In addition to that, there is simply too much going on in the whole book and too many times when Harry is suddenly able to compete because of the intervention of others. How boring!! If you have to have that much help, why wouldn’t you just withdraw from the competition? Oh, right, you can’t because you are the principle character and the book doesn’t go on without you. I enjoyed it but it was a weak book and the movie needed to be handled differently. (Too much of the book was left out due to time constraints for film. This is the first book where you look at it and say to yourself, “You know, this might make a better mini-series.” )
I can’t help it, though. It is still my favorite because of the bouncing ferret!