Potterdom Film/Score Series Thread

[Ray Barnsbury 8]

To be honest I actually cared more about Oldman's Sirius than my own. I just couldn't connect with the character in the book for some reason, but seeing him on films was totally the opposite. Strange, but true.

It's kinda the same for me. I wasn't too broken up about his death in the book...at the time, I was just glad it wasn't one of the kids who bit it. Also, it might be because PoA had such a radical, abrupt shift in how we viewed Sirius (this is not a complaint), that he was harder to care about so much later on. I remember Jo saying that the fans most upset over Sirius' death seemed to be preteen girls...she may be on to something there!

Ray Barnsbury

[Morlock 11]

I just want to say, I disagree about Snape. I think he is perfect in every way, in every movie. In OotP, his first scene was one of my favorites, and it was a 15 second snippet in which the only words he said were 'Yes' and 'Obviously'.

[fommes 153]

I mostly have hybrid or purely original mental images of the characters in the books. Dumbledore is always one part Harris, one part Gambon, and one part my own imagination. While I prefer Gambon's performance in PoA and GoF, I've always thought Harris looked the part a lot better than Gambon. (Well, not as much in CoS, but that's a given.) So my Dumbledore is a slightly modified semblance of Harris, but with a tweaked version of Gambon's performance that uses a different voice altogether.

Gambon's performance and taking over from Harris in PoA is excellent. But his performance in GoF - what with that jumping up and down - is terrible. I'm thinking it's the actor directing that's wrong in that film. It's better again in Ootp.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Voldemort was doing a lot of jumping up and down too in GoF, so we can probably blame the director. (again)

[Docteur Qui 1,544]

Haha, yes, I found Voldemort ridiculous in GoF. Far too melodramatic, with all that prancing around and silly banter. he was quite menacing in OotP, which was a much needed character change. Same with Dumbledore. One can only hope for a continuation in H-BP.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

The big problem I have with Voldemort right now is that he's not in the films enough, he only appears in the last part, has a duel with one of the characters and loses.

The first 3 films made a huge fuss over Voldemort and how powerfull he was and how terrible it's gonna be if he ever came back.

Right now he has not lived up to the hype. (mind you I'm only talking about the film version, since I have not yet read the books)

[Ray Barnsbury 8]

The big problem I have with Voldemort right now is that he's not in the films enough, he only appears in the last part, has a duel with one of the characters and loses.

The first 3 films made a huge fuss over Voldemort and how powerfull he was and how terrible it's gonna be if he ever came back.

I agree to an extent; the films have difficulty portraying the great threat his return poses to the world.

The books are better in that we hear and see a lot about what's going on outside Hogwarts in the fourth, fifth, and sixth books, though there isn't a whole lot of face-to-face time with Voldemort (especially in HBP). But in Book 7,

I was extremely glad to see Voldemort take it upon himself to carry out his various plots. His previous reluctance to do so made him much more chilling a character when he finally does (I still can't get the image of his ghoulish face flying through the dark sky out of my head)!

Oh, and I agree about his characterization in GoF. Backflipping across the cemetary toward Harry was completely out of character. I half-expected to see a triple-axle jump.

Right now he has not lived up to the hype. (mind you I'm only talking about the film version, since I have not yet read the books)

Does this mean you're planning on reading them at some point? (hint: do it before the next films come out!)

Ray Barnsbury

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Someone gave me the audiobooks read by the most erudite Mr. Stephen Fry as a gift recently.

Seems like a shame not to use them.

[Ray Barnsbury 8]

Changing topics for a moment, is there anyone here who subscribes to FSM and would like to share the recent article about Hedwig's Theme, and/or the interview with Hooper?

Ray Barnsbury

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

I downloaded the interview, have not yet listened to it.

[John Crichton 4]

Haha, yes, I found Voldemort ridiculous in GoF. Far too melodramatic, with all that prancing around and silly banter. he was quite menacing in OotP, which was a much needed character change. Same with Dumbledore. One can only hope for a continuation in H-BP.

I have to say I have not been impressed with Ralph Finnes' Voldemort at all, in either film. It just doesn't feel...right.

[standbyfax 0]

Changing topics for a moment, is there anyone here who subscribes to FSM and would like to share the recent article about Hedwig's Theme, and/or the interview with Hooper?

Ray Barnsbury

One of the interesting things he mentions is that a lot of the action music is actually based off the Possession theme. I don't hear it, but I don't pretend to have exceptional musical ears.

[Ray Barnsbury 8]

I still can't discern Hooper's supposed Possession theme, after two viewings of the film and several more listens to the score.

Ray Barnsbury

[standbyfax 0]

Yeah, by the way he talks, it's developed throughout the score. I very much like the Possession cue at the end, but I don't hear it anywhere else.

[Docteur Qui 1,544]

It's in a few places, very subtly done. Don't remember exactly which cues but it's there.

[King Mark 3,631]

That's even a crapier motif than Williams least noteworthy motifs like the AotC separatist motif

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Interestingly enough, Hooper started out playing classical guitar before going into film music.

I guess Santaollalalala is not the only one.....

[King Mark 3,631]

I was more afraid Doyle would get an Oscar nom...this score has no chance.

[JoeinAR 1,949]

I was more afraid Doyle would get an Oscar nom...this score has no chance.

this score has a better chance, since its by far a superior score on every level.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

I'm surprised you actually like it Joe.

What did you think of the film BTW?

[JoeinAR 1,949]

I thoroughly enjoyed it, it wasn't a great movie(much better than Transformers 2 me), I still think the first is the best most complete film, but they all serve their purpose ok. I don't think there is a bad film in the bunch, but there is an order to them for each to decide on their own. I can't imagine a more perfect cast by the way, at least among the trio.

Im trying to figure out how to make an 80 min cd of the best of the 5 scores. Doyle would get 2 tracks, thats all I can stand of his score, but this latest would get several(4 at least), but they are all very short.

[Marian Schedenig 8,199]

Interestingly enough, Hooper started out playing classical guitar before going into film music.

How dare he!

[John Crichton 4]

I was more afraid Doyle would get an Oscar nom...this score has no chance.

this score has a better chance, since its by far a superior score on every level.

Which means it probably has no chance, unfortunately.

[Ray Barnsbury 8]

I just re-watched GoF, and the score really stood out like a sore thumb throughout most of the film. A lot of it is just poorly spotted, and/or vastly inappropriate. Made me appreciate Hooper even more.

Ray Barnsbury

[Henry B 50]

I thought the score worked really well in the film. Doyle knows what he's doing, and his veteran approach to scoring is the greatest strength of Goblet of Fire. Hooper's score, on the other hand... I watched the film again yesterday, and there were so many times that I wanted the music to just shut the hell up. There's so much of it, and besides the fact that Hooper was clearly pressed for time on some of the dullest cues, the wall-to-wall approach seriously harms the film. This would have been a much better score had it been only 30-40 minutes long.

[Morlock 11]

I thought Doyle's score worked fine in that terrible, terrible film.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Oh here we go again!

I thought I established that the film was merely average, not terrible.

[Morlock 11]

It was terrible in it's average-ness. It is the kind of film that if it is not good, it is bad.

[Ray Barnsbury 8]

I thought the score worked really well in the film. Doyle knows what he's doing, and his veteran approach to scoring is the greatest strength of Goblet of Fire. Hooper's score, on the other hand... I watched the film again yesterday, and there were so many times that I wanted the music to just shut the hell up. There's so much of it, and besides the fact that Hooper was clearly pressed for time on some of the dullest cues, the wall-to-wall approach seriously harms the film. This would have been a much better score had it been only 30-40 minutes long.

I have to strongly disagree, especially about Doyle's score. There are lots of areas, particularly from the third task on, where the music is just ridiculous, in its placement and quality. Throughout the maze, every little bit of action (people falling, being blasted away, etc) has a distracting and completely useless brass blare to accompany it. And as they're running to the Cup, the music is just sustained notes being absolutely screamed by the orchestra, with nothing else to it. It's just not musical, or intelligent. The realization of Cedric's death after the return from the graveyard should've been unscored; the music there is shamelessly manipulative, almost laughably so. Earlier in the film, the music for Harry and Cho is shockingly unsuitable for the film; why on earth does Doyle depict it as a tragic love story? And the Hogwarts Hymn portion of the end credits makes no sense and destroys the tone of the film's finale. Moreover, it's even starker and less interesting than the album version. I can't help but picture Doyle as a bumbling idiot as the composer of this score, with many of his choices incomprehensible to me.

Ray Barnsbury

[robthehand 3]

I disagree, in the film I find the score at worst dull and uninteresting, nothing really sticks out as bad scoring to me.

[Elmo Lewis 6]

I can't help but picture Doyle as a bumbling idiot as the composer of this score, with many of his choices incomprehensible to me.

If that's really the case then you should please consider getting his other scores, so as to prevent that unfair image.

[robthehand 3]

Indeed.

[Henry B 50]

I have to strongly disagree, especially about Doyle's score. There are lots of areas, particularly from the third task on, where the music is just ridiculous, in its placement and quality. Throughout the maze, every little bit of action (people falling, being blasted away, etc) has a distracting and completely useless brass blare to accompany it. And as they're running to the Cup, the music is just sustained notes being absolutely screamed by the orchestra, with nothing else to it. It's just not musical, or intelligent. The realization of Cedric's death after the return from the graveyard should've been unscored; the music there is shamelessly manipulative, almost laughably so. Earlier in the film, the music for Harry and Cho is shockingly unsuitable for the film; why on earth does Doyle depict it as a tragic love story? And the Hogwarts Hymn portion of the end credits makes no sense and destroys the tone of the film's finale. Moreover, it's even starker and less interesting than the album version. I can't help but picture Doyle as a bumbling idiot as the composer of this score, with many of his choices incomprehensible to me.

Ray Barnsbury

"Death of Cedric" is a very manipulative cue, but sometimes the best film music is. I think it manipulated emotions in a good way to make Cedric's death (or deadness, rather) very, very sad. Harry and Cho is sort of scored as a tragic love story, but I can see some humor in it. After all, teenage "love" often feels like a tale of Romeo and Juliet until one realizes the stupidity of it. As for the end credits, I agree that the Hogwarts Hymn shouldn't be there, but it does unfortunately complement the tone of the film's finale, which I found very light and tentatively hopeful. The film's greatest weakness, actually. It's absurd to think that Dumbledore could casually talk to Harry about lighting dormitory curtains on fire without even asking him what happened with Voldemort in the graveyard.

The score is melodramatic, but with enough guts to pull it off.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Mr. Buck makes some strong points.

I still think most people here who dislike it, dislike it because it was not scored by JW, they were ready to dislike it before even hearing it. They bought the CD so they could dislike that.

[Ray Barnsbury 8]

If that's really the case then you should please consider getting his other scores, so as to prevent that unfair image.

I have Great Expectations, which has several nice bits and the amazing highlight "Kissing in the Rain" (the track that first turned me on to Doyle), but it doesn't work very well as a cohesive listening experience. And I've listened to parts of Eragon, which reminded me of GoF in bad way. I'm willing to try other, more widely lauded scores of his, but I won't be spending money on any others without having been impressed first. Live and learn!

Ray Barnsbury

[robthehand 3]

Try Henry V.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

Dead Again is pretty damn good.

[Marian Schedenig 8,199]

Much Ado About Nothing - brilliant.

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

I like the short samples I heard a few weeks ago from The Last Legion and As You Like It.

Though I can't really remember a single detail of it.

[Morlock 11]

Great Expectations may not be a cohesive listenign experience, but it's got one fo the best love themes ever. Dead Again is fun, as is Needful Things. Henry V and Much Ado About Nothing are great. My personal favorite of his is A Little Princess. Great themes, very cohesive, one of the best finales ever.Last score of his that I really liked was Gosford Park. Everything since struck me as very overblown. Although Wah-Wah is growing on me a bit.

[Ray Barnsbury 8]

"Death of Cedric" is a very manipulative cue, but sometimes the best film music is. I think it manipulated emotions in a good way to make Cedric's death (or deadness, rather) very, very sad.

The image of Amos Diggory and Dumbledore clutching one another on the ground is completely heartbreaking to me, and quite effective without the over-the-top strings.

Harry and Cho is sort of scored as a tragic love story, but I can see some humor in it. After all, teenage "love" often feels like a tale of Romeo and Juliet until one realizes the stupidity of it.

Perhaps, but I don't think this applies to its portrayal in the film.

As for the end credits, I agree that the Hogwarts Hymn shouldn't be there, but it does unfortunately complement the tone of the film's finale, which I found very light and tentatively hopeful. The film's greatest weakness, actually. It's absurd to think that Dumbledore could casually talk to Harry about lighting dormitory curtains on fire without even asking him what happened with Voldemort in the graveyard.

This is true, and something I noticed throughout the film, in that Newell treated magic much like Columbus did in the first film, with a sense of wonder and enchantment. Except that this is the fourth film, not our introduction to the world, which makes this presentation pretty excessive. Doyle's score thus follows suit.

I still think most people here who dislike it, dislike it because it was not scored by JW, they were ready to dislike it before even hearing it. They bought the CD so they could dislike that.

I really hope you're not referring to me with that statement, which is the stale fallback of people who like the score trying to explain away any legitimate problems someone may have with it. I have reiterated time and time again on the board that I do enjoy several parts of Doyle's score, most notably the three source cues, the opening track, and the finale. Re-watching the film made me more aware of why a lot of the rest of the score doesn't work for me, so I gave several reasons for that without just saying "Williams didn't score this, so Doyle's is automatically crap!" I was really excited when I heard the opening track from GoF in advance, and expected Doyle to do a great job. So don't lump me into the blind fanboy group, because that's not the case here at all.

Ray Barnsbury

[#SnowyVernalSpringsEternal 10,265]

The image of Amos Diggory and Dumbledore clutching one another on the ground is completely heartbreaking to me, and quite effective without the over-the-top strings.

I disagree, since Cedric is such an underdevelopped character, that scene needs all the help it can get.

I really hope you're not referring to me with that statement, which is the stale fallback of people who like the score trying to explain away any legitimate problems someone may have with it. I have reiterated time and time again on the board that I do enjoy several parts of Doyle's score, most notably the three source cues, the opening track, and the finale. Re-watching the film made me more aware of why a lot of the rest of the score doesn't work for me, so I gave several reasons for that without just saying "Williams didn't score this, so Doyle's is automatically crap!" I was really excited when I heard the opening track from GoF in advance, and expected Doyle to do a great job. So don't lump me into the blind fanboy group, because that's not the case here at all.

I've read your arguments, and I'm not really convinced by them.

Doyle's score is very good in it's high points, a bit bland at it's lesser points, but really nothing more.

[standbyfax 0]

I thought the score worked really well in the film. Doyle knows what he's doing, and his veteran approach to scoring is the greatest strength of Goblet of Fire. Hooper's score, on the other hand... I watched the film again yesterday, and there were so many times that I wanted the music to just shut the hell up. There's so much of it, and besides the fact that Hooper was clearly pressed for time on some of the dullest cues, the wall-to-wall approach seriously harms the film. This would have been a much better score had it been only 30-40 minutes long.

I thought the spotting in Order of the Phoenix was considerably better than Goblet of Fire. I've only seen the film twice, but I remember several scenes that were left silent, and would hardly say the film was scored wall-to-wall. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe it has the least amount of music of all the films. That's one aspect that I think really hurt the first two films and Goblet of Fire -- there were many times when certain scenes should have been left unscored.

[Marian Schedenig 8,199]

The spotting in OotP was probably "better" than in the average Williams-scored movie of the last decades. He writes great music, but he has a tendency to write so much of it, it mostly supports the movie through its musical qualities, not through its spotting (which can contribute a lot, too).

Doyle also often has a tendency to overscore. Take Much Ado, which has very noticeable music through most of its dialogue scenes. But thanks to the overall operatic production, and the score's drama and cohesion, that's not a bad thing in this case.

[John Crichton 4]

I still think most people here who dislike it, dislike it because it was not scored by JW, they were ready to dislike it before even hearing it. They bought the CD so they could dislike that.

*sigh* Yes, let's drag that strawman out here again.

The realization of Cedric's death after the return from the graveyard should've been unscored; the music there is shamelessly manipulative, almost laughably so.

It's certainly rediculously over the top if nothing else. Personally I don't find GoF's score bad per se, but it takes blandness and averageness to a whole new level.

[Henry B 50]

I thought the score worked really well in the film. Doyle knows what he's doing, and his veteran approach to scoring is the greatest strength of Goblet of Fire. Hooper's score, on the other hand... I watched the film again yesterday, and there were so many times that I wanted the music to just shut the hell up. There's so much of it, and besides the fact that Hooper was clearly pressed for time on some of the dullest cues, the wall-to-wall approach seriously harms the film. This would have been a much better score had it been only 30-40 minutes long.

I thought the spotting in Order of the Phoenix was considerably better than Goblet of Fire. I've only seen the film twice, but I remember several scenes that were left silent, and would hardly say the film was scored wall-to-wall. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe it has the least amount of music of all the films. That's one aspect that I think really hurt the first two films and Goblet of Fire -- there were many times when certain scenes should have been left unscored.

I don't remember many unscored scenes of more than thirty seconds. Hooper wrote about two hours of music for the film, so that only leaves around fifteen minutes unscored.

Every time the slightest ounce of drama is introduced into a scene, dull, monotonous and somewhat pretentious musical tones signal to the audience that the underscored material is heavy and dark - because we'd just have no idea otherwise.

[Elmo Lewis 6]

I paste these few lines from the ever-worthy IMDB:

The five Harry Potter films together have now out-grossed all 22 James Bond films to become the top-grossing franchise worldwide in history, Warner Bros announced Monday. The Potter films have now earned $4.47 billion, topping the combined Bond flicks by $30 million, the studio said. (The six Star Wars movies are in third place with $4.23 billion.) The latest Potter movie, Order of the Phoenix, is continuing to play in several countries abroad, and two more are in the works, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, which is due to open in 2008 and the final film, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, set to open in 2010.

[John Crichton 4]

Another big name Brit adds Harry Potter to their resume:

Jim Broadbent to play Horace Slughorn

[BLUMENKOHL 1,068]

The five Harry Potter films together have now out-grossed all 22 James Bond films to become the top-grossing franchise worldwide in history, Warner Bros announced Monday. The Potter films have now earned $4.47 billion, topping the combined Bond flicks by $30 million, the studio said. (The six Star Wars movies are in third place with $4.23 billion.) The latest Potter movie, Order of the Phoenix, is continuing to play in several countries abroad, and two more are in the works, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, which is due to open in 2008 and the final film, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, set to open in 2010.

That's a crock of crap.

When they give me inflation adjusted data, maybe then I'll concede that Harry Potter has defeated ANY of those franchises.

[indy4 155]

I was more afraid Doyle would get an Oscar nom...this score has no chance.

Best Potter Scores:

1. Prisoner of Azkaban

2. Sorcerer's Stone AND Order of the Phoenix

3. Chamber of Secrets

4. Goblet of Fire