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37 thoughts on “John Reviews Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”

  3. I saw it not long ago- over all, I was pretty happy. I hadn’t read the book in so long, so I went in almost neutral. I was able to watch it with a decent amount of happiness, some of the special effects were really great, even if there wasn’t much action. The last scene of the movie in the Ministry of Magic- It was great. My favorite part of the movie.

    I understand WHY the cut out so much- not only would it make the movie far longer, but there’s the fact that an extra half out can add thousands to a production cost.

    I still love to hate Umbridge. She is more unlikable than the unlikely baby of lord Voldemort and Professor Snape. (Really bad joke I use sometimes.)

  5. I LOVED this movie. It gave me just enough info to get through it, without bogging me down in too many details. They’ve certainly won over this 42 year old mom.

  6. I was disappointed. I hated them bringing in some girl we’d never seen before, so late in the game. Luna just made me suspicious through out the whole movie. I kept thinking she was a Malfoy, and would turn on the group at any moment. She was just so creepy.

    Not one of my favorite HP movies, even with the Weasley twins stealing the show.

  11. I saw it today(in IMAX 3D BOOYA!) as a treat from a friend, and WOW was I impressed. Damn, I was surprised at how intense it got at the end. I was near tears….at a damn HARRY POTTER MOVIE! YEah, it’s not as action packed as the others, but the emotional content more than makes up for it. I’ll go so far as to say Order of the Phoenix is this series’ Empire Strikes Back. It’s that good. Bravo!

  13. being completely honest, i thought the movie sucked.

    i havent read any of the book,s but ive seen all the movies. why i continue to see them can probably only be answered by the fact that they are such big movies.

    but overall, i think they all blend together and are not memorable at all. i was bored most of the time, being interested by the story at very few small parts of the film. they just dont really do it for me, but they make tons of money, and they get my money too, so whatever

  14. One word: disappointed.

    It’s the same response I gave after watching Pirates 2: Dead Man’s Chest. I asked whether that film was necessary at all.

    It seemed like it was a waste of time and budget and they could’ve gone straight to Pirates 3 or they should’ve just mixed together the stories from film 2 and film 3 without separately having film 2 at all.

    I hope I’m not confusing you…

    this latest installment of Harry Potter films loses the very charm of the previous Harry Potter films. As a matter of fact, this one is rather dark, gloomy, and surprisingly slow.

    Those of you who’ve read the book probably are more knowledgeable when it comes to the storyline, basically it presents a new teacher in Hogwarts that takes over the school and comes up with many regulations, so Harry and his friends start their own secret after-school magic lessons, all the while Lord Voldemort is building his army and Sirius, who is the only family Harry’s got left, is faced with the responsibility of protecting Harry if it means he would have to lose his life.

    It’s pretty cool to see how the kids are growing up into these rebellious adolescents, but I guess the changes come with consequences.

    For example, Ron Weasley has grown mature and more calm, which is an okay thing, but he’s not entertaining anymore like he used to be when he was more of a scared, nervous, clumsy kid. Harry Potter is so serious because he’s overwhelmed by the mysteries of the past that seem to keep haunting him. And there are hints of attraction between Ron and Hermione.
    I guess all those things are necessary for the story to… evolve.

    David Yates’ direction is nothing special, and the cinematography works the same old way. If you’re looking for a Harry Potter film that is more lively and has more thrills, this isn’t it.

    It has been said that for the famous kissing scene in this movie, it took them many takes just to get the scene right. If you ask me, I think Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliff) messed up on purpose.

    I don’t know if you’ve noticed. But having seen all of Harry Potter films so far, it’s interesting to see how almost every great British actor has taken part or has been featured as either the professors or the bad guys.
    (Gary Oldman, Emma Thompson, Imelda Staunton, Maggie Smith, Alan Rickman, Ralph Fiennes)

    But maybe that’s the problem, we’ve seen so many Harry Potter movies in such short range of time (Harry Potter films are usually released every other year) that we compare one with the other,
    or that we’ve become so familiar with the looks and the feel of the films and what to expect so much so that we don’t think of it as anything extraordinary anymore. Who knows?!

    o and one more thing.. the previews that were shown before the movie started were a bunch movies that are narnia-like, it’s as though everyone of the previews were the same movie.

    for more, visit http://www.ramasscreen.com

  17. Hey Rupert,

    No, I’m on WB’s mailing list… but 90% of advanced screenings are in Toronto, which is a bit of a pain in the ass for me to go to (about a 45 minute drive). Therefore, I only generally go to advanced screenings when I’m in LA, on the RARE occasion there is one here in Hamilton (like Transformers) or if it’s a movie I REALLY REALLY REALLY want to see. HP5 wasn’t one of those.

    Cheers.

    ~John

  19. I stopped reading the Potter books after book 3 but the movie made perfect sense to me.

    At first I was expecting more action but when it dawned on me that this is more of a character piece than an action piece I started to enjoy it even more.

    You’re right – the characters are richer and I feel like I know them better. Order of the Phoenix wasn’t high on my anticipation list but having watched it, I’d go see it again.

  20. “Because I’ve read many reviews from fans who read the books saying if you’re a non-reader this movie wouldn’t make sense.”
    I havent read the books and I completely understood.

    I heard some fans of the books dont like how some things got cut. Well I dont want to sit through an even more rushed movie or a 4-5 hour version of the book. Sorry. I mean when I saw “midnight in the garden of good and evil” people said i was crazy for liking the movie since the book is so much more full and theres so much cut.

    which is true. but i dont know better, and again. i dont want a 4-5 hour movie. so i imagine what was true for me then is true for me here – i dont know what i’m missing, and even if i did know, i dont think i’d care, because a movie is not a book. period.

    I think I understand some of the readers who assume a non-reader wouldnt understand what was happening. I mean I watched the Outsiders right after reading the book (lol grade 8) and I figured noone would be able to follow along.. yet the film was and still sort of is popular.

    Anyways I liked Harry Potter 5. I did a 10 minute audio talk about it linked above.

  21. I thought the movie was great, we watched it on opening night. I had read the book ages back and tried to read it again before the movie opened and didn’t finish it. But I thought it was great and I have found that people who didn’t like it just finished the book and had all of it fresh in their mind and were upset by so much left out. But I agree with what Bret said the book is HUGE there is no way to get all the information into a 2 hour movie.

  22. As I remember it Hagrids brother was unnessesary in the book as well, and that leads many of the fans to believe that he is part of the setup for the final book. Maybe they needed to introduce him in this movie?

    Just my two cents.

  25. I loved the movie. The book was so slow that I didn’t care what they cut out of it. I don’t even remember the book. The only way I got thru it was to listed to it on my computer while I was playing games! The movie was MUCH better, I don’t care how they changed it.

  26. And I just wanted to say that I saw Emma Watson on Conan last night…..WHOA! That girl is gonna have crazy perverts coming after her, she looked STUNNING.

  27. I will be honest…I never finished this book. I was in the middle of reading it by the time the movie came out and just couldnt wait to see it. The trailers looked so amazing. The sad thing is that the scenes in the trailers are the only things that are good about this movie.

    I was horribly disapointed with this film to where I would actually compare it on my radar along side Fantastic Four 2: Rise of the Silver Surfer. The effects in the movie were great along with most of the acting but the movie just didnt do it for me. The 4th film was my favorite by on the scale of the Potter movies this one is rated down there at the bottom right under 3. Atleast the 3rd one goes by pretty quick. I dont think I would ever sit through this thing again.

  28. I have to say that when I saw the movie I was very disappointed. VERY! And I thought SO MUCH was left out it was ridiculous. And I too, thought that for the people that didn’t the books… they wouldn’t understand a lot but after talking to my husband… I realize that if you don’t know the information that was supposed to be given, then you won’t be confused. There was so much information in the book that was essential as far as setting up the next one that it won’t make sense and instead of taking the extra half an hour to explain things in this movie, they’re going to have to in the next. They totally changed some of the storyline… Neville is not the one who showed them the “Room of Requirement” (The room they held the DA meetings) The Twins did. And the way they assembled the DA is so important to know for the next movie! The scene at the end was down played. And they totally KILLED Sirius with the Avada Kadavra curse… and they weren’t supposed to! It was a spell that pished him through the veiled archway but not THAT one! They didn’t say anything about “Mad Eye” and Tonks love thing. And the whole group didn’t get their hands burned… just Harry and Seamus! And in Snape’s flash back… that wasn’t even half of it! AND KREACHER… don’t even get me started! There was SO MUCH that was left out! This movie was a bomb for the fans. But again, I see why people that didn’t read the books DIDN’T get confused. It still had loose ties but if you didn’t read the book, you wouldn’t have known.

  30. John, I agree from a movie stand point that Hagrids brother could of easily been cut out. But from the book perspective I think they left him in to satisfy the book fans. People really wanted to see that character translated from the page. I think he looked kind of down syndrome…but thats me. He is definitely the weakest of the CG in this movie. although I enjoyed Hermione yelling at him.

    PS. I dont give a shit about your spelling mistakes…the movie blog owns.

  36. Ok now I’m totally confused. Do you read the books John? Because I’ve read many reviews from fans who read the books saying if you’re a non-reader this movie wouldn’t make sense.

    Personally I just don’t want my bf to snore in the cinema :/

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