SDB gets sick, and spends a week bringing us up to speed on his intense dislike of all things Gallic. Then he gets some antibiotics (and he's amazed at how big the pills are), and discovers Harry Potter.
I pretty much agree with his synopsis of the first Potter movie, right down to its odd short-changing of Professor Snape (and if you've read the subsequent books in the series, you know how odd a decision that was on the part of the filmmakers, who would have been better served short-changing some of the "Life with the Dursleys" stuff at the beginning). What struck me was that where the first two books really creak in spots (they were, after all, Rowling's maiden efforts), the first film is a lot more confident. (I haven't seen the second one yet.) I'm looking forward to the films of Prisoner of Azkaban and Goblet of Fire, although the latter is going to present some serious problems, from a length standpoint. Goblet is twice as long as any of the preceding novels, and with those books resulting in two-and-a-half hour films, it thus seems that Goblet would require a five-hour movie.
Oh, and SDB's right about John Hurt. That guy is golden. I especially love his billionaire industrialist in Contact and his Scottish nobleman in Rob Roy.
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