Chatterbox: Pudding's Place

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince came out today. I've just got back from seeing it (and boy is it a long movie...)

So now y'all are going to have to suffer through my incredibly long, ranty, spoiler-filled review. Following which I shall, naturally, ask for your thoughts.

So. First things first, two amazing scenes were deleted. The entire "The Other Minister" sequence was deleted (sans bridge-breaking, which was the opening scene), as was the scene where Dumbledore shows up at Private Drive, terrorizes the Dursleys some, and then leaves with Harry. Naturally this was a big disappointment.

Next up, my favourite scene in the whole book (me? Obsessed? No, not at all); Narcissa (Helen McCroy, an odd choice IMHO), tailed by an angry Bellatrix (who was perfectly casted), visits Snape (again, excellently casted) to beg him to help her son, Draco, accomplish "the task". Snape, as you know, takes the unbreakable. Cons of the scene; Bellatrix got, like, two lines. Exceeding the vow lines, of course. There was no question-answer session between her and Snape. I was very sad, since that was after all Bellatrix's only appearance in book six. Also, WHY DID NARCISSA HAVE BLACK HAIR?! Would it *really* have been that hard to make HM wear a wig? Also also, Helen McCroy looked *older* than HBC, who was supposed to be her older sister. Sigh.

Weasley Wizard Wheezes went alright, some minor adjustments to the "let's follow Draco!" scene; mainly, Draco didn't ditch his dear old mum, and there were more Death Eaters (including Fenrir Greyback and (I think) Bellatrix's huge!hair).

Train ride was alright, too, except Luna found Harry, not Tonks, and a mysteriously de-aged Flitwick greeted them, not Snape. And I know Flitwick has been mysteriously de-aged since movie 3, but I didn't figure it out until this movie when they actually said his name.

Pleasantly, the Hogwarts students decided to wear their robes again. They didn't in the third movie, drat them.

Slughorn... I didn't picture him so very whimsical. More corpulent and stuffy, to be honest. Though, the actor (whose name escapes me) did a fantastic job.

Quidditch tryouts were AWESOME. Cormac was exactly the way I imagined him, slimy and overbearing. We also suddenly meet Lavender, who both looks and acts the part of the ditz. Hermione instantly becomes preferable. Ron, for some reason, decides it's a good idea to bounce a large, leather ball off of his head. Numerous times.

Anyway. We see Harry win the lucky potion, much to poor Draco's dismay (god, I feel so *sorry* for Draco watching this. He's got these pathetic montages at intervals trying to fix the Vanishing cabinet, and first he puts an apple through, it comes back with a chunk missing, then later he puts a bird through, it comes back dead, and you hear him sobbing off screen. Brilliant (gorgeous) actor). Harry crushes on Ginny.

Harry gives Ron placebo lucky potion. Ron wins game. Ron snogs Lavender. Hermione sobs onto Harry's shoulder, is interrupted by Ron and "Lav-Lav", and attacks Ron with magical canaries that explode on impact.

More random stuff happens. Harry & Co. sans Hermione head to Burrow for Christmas. Harry voices suspicions about Draco. Arthur Weasley exposits handily about Vanishing Cabinets.

Oh, look! An interesting scene in which Bellatrix (accompanied by a half-bare-chested Fenrir Greyback) lights a Ring of FIRE around the Burrow. She taunts Harry with her little "I killed Sirius Bla-ack" routine and he runs after her. Ginny runs after him.

Bellatrix and Fenrir attack Harry and Ginny. Harry and Ginny are joined by Arthur, Lupin, Tonks, and I think one other person. We see a close up of Bellatrix pouting, then she flies into the air and blows up the Burrow. No one is hurt, oddly enough.

Later on, at Hogwarts, Harry walks in on Ron, who has just eaten Romilda Vane's love potion. Hilarity ensues until Ron is poisoned, saved, and is unconscious in the hospital wing. "Lav-Lav" bursts in, riding high on teenage hormones ("There's only one thing more potent than my Black magic! The power of TRUE LOVE! ...Teenage hormones!"). Ron starts mumbling Hermione's name. Tears! Smug smirk on Hermione's part!

Ron wakes up and remembers nothing. Oh, yeah, Katie comes back from St. Mungo's. Harry sees Draco run off, and follows him. He finds Draco sobbing in a bathroom and shouts at him because Harry is a heartless Gary Stu. Draco immediately retaliates by cursing him, thus removing him from woobie status until Harry uses a spell that practically cuts Draco in half. Draco becomes a woobie once more. Snape saves his life, though. Harry and Ginny hide The Book. Ginny kisses Harry and it's never mentioned again. BLAM? I think so.

Moving on. Harry steals Slughorn's memory, Horcrux scene happens, blah blah blah blah... Harry and Dumbledore travel to God-Forsaken Rock in the Middle of Nowhere and Dumbledore drinks a nasty potion, following which Harry is attacked by Dead People. Lots and Lots of Dead People. Dumbledore saves Harry with massive pyrotechnics. They return to the castle with the fake!Horcrux.

Draco corners Dumbledore and begins to cry. Bellatrix and some other Death Eaters show up. Bellatrix crows that Draco has done well and kisses... either his shoulder or his ear, I'm not entirely sure. Draco, however, is beginning to lower his wand. Snape shows up, kills Dumbledore, Death Eaters run away.

Bellatrix jumps up on one of the tables in the great hall, kicks all the cups to bits, then turns around and blows up all the windows, laughing hysterically all the while. Glass flies everywhere and she laughs psychotically. She kind of dances (no, seriously, dances) ahead of her fellows, shrieking with glee, and sets Hagrid's hut on fire. And then she does some strange, tribal looking dance in front of the flames (do you understand why I love HBC, now? Do you? She is amazing.)

Harry runs up, incensed. Bella starts to attack him, but Snape stops her saying that "he's the Dark Lord's!" Bellatrix, I kid you not, pouts at him like a little kid, as if to say "sure, ruin my fun" and stomps off.

Snape reveals that he is the Half-Blood Prince. He does not, however, deliver that wonderful line, "DON'T. CALL. ME. COWARD!" line. It would have been all the more dramatic because Alan Rickman is not a screamer. Nor is Snape. Still, it was cool. Harry got thrown backwards about 20 feet twice, first by Bellatrix then by Snape.

The rest of the movie consisted of blue-eyed, long-necked Daniel Radcliffe wangsting and announcing that he's not going to Hogwarts next year. Sadly, the Dark Lord does not suddenly appear and put him out of his misery. In fact, the Dark Lord is completely absent from the movie, even though the screenwriters had no qualms about adding Bellatrix scenes (perhaps as an apology for underusing her character so terribly in OotP...?).

So. What did everyone else think?