How Many Miles To Babylon? - 200 Things We HATE about PS/SS, First Fifty

This is Part I, the first fifty notes of 200. Parts II through IV are here.

Disclaimer: I am well aware that h8 is not a family value. I also know that hate is disappointed love. I love the Harry Potter books. I would have loved to love the movies, but they sucked. I write this list out of love, not hate.

Though I might rail against Chris Columbus or David Heyman, I have nothing against them personally. I don't know anything about them other than how they present themselves in the public. It's not Chris Columbus, but "Chris Columbus" the director, about whom I speak. Same goes for the actors.

I'm now aware that this list isn't properly citing all its sources. I'm in the process of correcting that. If you have any doubts if something is mine or not, it's best to comment and ask me. (Similarly, if you know where something is from, you can also comment and inform me.)

The inspiration for this list was 78 Reasons to Hate Star Wars: Episode 1 - The Phantom Menace. As Chefelf did for this list (but not for the sequels, for some reason), I put an asterisk (*) besides the items that we liked instead of hated. Twenty-seven items are starred, so if you want to get technical, this list should be called "173 Things We Hate About and 27 Things We Love About Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (AKA Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone)", but that's not as catchy.

For reference, I am Rebecca, or Redcoast, if you will, the owner of this journal. Isaac is my brother, who likes to collaborate with me and who is, as you will see, crazy.

1. Labyrinth

Of all the images that PS/SS could have begun with, Chris Columbus chose to show an owl sitting atop a “Privet Drive” sign. We pan away and a suspiciously digital-looking owl flies away. It’s extremely dull, and what makes it worse for me is the murky light in which the scene is illuminated.

2. Stupid Music

Dumbledore just appears, as he does in the book (of course, the light is so murky I assumed he was hidden in the fog, not that anything magical had happened). There’s nothing really wrong with this moment except for the stupid music in the background. The music is just amazed by Dumbledore’s little trick. The harp plays, the celeste chimes, the strings go crazy, and I think even a choir jumps in on the action. From now on, when anything happens, assume that overwrought, over-scored music is playing in the background ... making everything SO MUCH WORSE! And this score was written by John Williams. John Williams! Of Star Wars fame? Arrrgh.

3. Albus Dumbledore as portrayed by Richard Harris

Everybody loves Dumbledore. Apparently everybody loves Richard Harris, as well. Whatever. The way Richard Harris chose to portray Dumbledore just doesn’t work for me. He’s too old, too feeble. Too hushed. Too hoarse. Where’s the energy, Richard? Where’s my lively Dumbledore? Then again, Richard Harris did die after filming CoS, so maybe it wasn’t all acting. In that case, it’s Chris Columbus’s fault for casting him.

4. Dumbledore’s Beard

This is a separate point because it isn’t Richard Harris’s fault that his costume, beard, and wig look like they collectively weigh fifty pounds. I mean, look at this:



I mean, how does he even go to the bathroom? Okay, I squicked myself. Eww.

Yeah, I know JKR said that Dumbledore’s beard is long enough to tuck into his belt.² JKR is not a costume designer or a hairdresser. She is a writer. She exaggerates. It’s okay to deviate from what she says if it will make the movie better.

5. The Put-Outer

The first thing Dumbledore does–aside from appear out of nowhere and not trip over his enormously long beard–is pull out what looks like a little lightsaber, and suck the light out of the streetlights. This little device is called the Put-Outer. The only thing this accomplishes is that it renders the remainder of the scene so murky and dark I can’t see anything in it. Way to waste time and magic, Dumbledore!

6. The Cat-to-McGonagall Transformation

Dumbledore sees McGonagall in cat form, greets her, and the camera focuses on her shadow as she transforms. Very slowly. Slow transformations make for more impressive special effects, but for lousier powers. No “pop!” and change. Also, as Isaac pointed out, it’s accompanied by the cheesy “Whooosh!” sound effect. Rebecca calls this the, “Look! We have computers!” type of special effects.

7. “Are the rumors true, Albus?”

After greeting each other by their last names, McGonagall and Dumbledore drop the formality and have a half-assed conversation in the dark. At least, McGonagall hisses out a couple of questions while Dumbledore rudely tries to walk away from her. Why does McGonagall even bother to ask about You-Know-Who if all she’s going to say is, “Are the rumors true?” You might want to specify which rumors there, McGonagall. (“No, no, no! He never did anything inappropriate with goats! Those were lies, vicious lies!”¹) Then she gets bored talking about the demise of the most evil wizard who ever lived, and moves on to dissing Hagrid. Nice, Minerva. Isaac pointed out that Steve Kloves usually takes out the lines from the book that are funny, witty, or significant, and leaves in everything else.

8. ’Salem’s Lot

This is Rebecca’s thing: ’Salem’s Lot is a novel written by Stephen King, about a small New England town that is invaded by vampires. The thing is, the word “vampire” isn’t used until about three hundred pages into the book. The events get steadily creepier and increasingly out of the realm of the possible, until there is no possibility except vampires to explain the events.

So: why didn’t they do the same thing with PS/SS? I know no one says the word “wizard” till Hagrid tells Harry he’s one, but Dumbledore’s Put-Outer and McGonagall’s cat leave no other possibility.

9. Flying Motorbike

The movie wastes about five minutes on Hagrid’s stupid flying motorbike. And they don’t even mention that it’s Sirius Black’s. Foreshadowing, begone! Ye cannot stay here!

10. Harry the Log Baby

“Try not to wake him,” says Hagrid, as he hands over a log wrapped in baby blankets to Prof. Dumbledore. The sound editor tries to make it look more convincing by adding some baby coos here, even though the log baby is supposed to be asleep. And yeah, they do this in every movie, but it’s still not acceptable.

11. * “Worst sort of Muggles imaginable!”

Dame Maggie Smith is da bomb as Prof. McGonagall. And she looks just like I imagined the character.

12. Hagrid’s Sniffle

Hagrid, instead of bursting into tears, sort of sniffles. Isaac thinks that Robbie Coltrane was absolutely emotionless as Hagrid. Rebecca doesn’t have a problem with it, because she thinks that he was consistent with the character he created. Pick one.

13. Opening Logo

This is Isaac’s thing as well. He thinks the opening title is the height of cheese, what with the stupid music (see #2) and the thunder and lightning and booming and choirooooh-ing and what-not and so-forth.

14. *The title

But Rebecca liked the way the camera zooms through baby Harry’s scar to the sky, reveals the title, and then pulls back from eleven-year-old Harry’s scar. It’s cool, and there’s something about the lighting or the framing or Daniel Radcliffe’s expression that makes him really look like Harry Potter. And they did the noble thing, that is, changed the title from “Philosopher’s Stone” to “Sorcerer’s Stone” in the States. David Heyman, preventer of a thousand confused children prying their clueless parents with questions.

15. *Harry’s Cupboard under the stairs

It’s small, it’s depressing, and Dudley taunts Harry by jumping on the stairs. It’s not too great, I guess, but it’s probably the only thing that’s competently designed in the movie, so it stands out.

16. Harry Melling as Dudley Dursley

“He’s too skinny, he mugs, he shouts, and he doesn’t do his whiney-Dudleyness,” says Isaac. Like Tom Felton, Harry Melling plays Dudley more of a snot-nosed movie bully than a real person. And incidently, the Dursleys are collectively the worst over-actors of the entire Harry Potter series (that is an achievement, my friend).

17. *Harry as Houseboy

Daniel Radcliffe does his best acting when he has the fewest lines. The first scene he has, he is quite effective in. The first time Rebecca saw it, she forgot the dullness of the “Dumbledore on the doorstep” scene and had the highest hopes for the rest of the movie. Hopes that were very slowly and excruciatingly crushed.

18. Harry’s Hair

... is hairy. Ha ha, I made a pun. No, seriously, they spent over a hundred million on this movie and they couldn’t give Daniel Radcliffe the Harry Potter haircut? Instead they gave him a bowl cut, which hides his scar completely and makes his face look round and cute (so that he barely resembles J.K. Rowling’s rather thin-faced, knobbly-kneed, unruly jet-black haired, lightning-bolt-scarred, green-eyed little wizard).

19. From Brazil to Burma

Steve Kloves apparently likes to make bizarre, arbitrary substitutions for his personal amusement. Rebecca would really, really like to know why the Brazilian boa constrictor became a Burmese python.

20. Dan Radcliffe’s Fake Acting

Okay. When the film came out, a lot of reviewers compared Daniel Radcliffe to Jake Lloyd and Haley Joel Osment. That is, that he was better than Jake Lloyd but not as good as Haley Joel Osment. Now, it’s Rebecca’s thing to say that a child actor gets all the credit and none of the blame. If Jake Lloyd was bad, it’s George Lucas’s fault, and if Haley Joel Osment was good, it’s to his credit and not to M. Night Shyamalan’s.

Daniel Radcliffe was fake acting. Blame Chris Columbus.

21. Stupid Vanishing Glass Scene

When Dudley punches Harry in the ribs, Harry gets his revenge by inadvertently removing the glass around the Burmese python’s cage. Only when you watch the movie, it kinda looks like Harry did it on purpose because he spends about five minutes glaring at Dudley from the floor. Dudley, who had been leaning on the glass for no reason, seemingly falls into the snake cage on purpose and watches the snake escape with no fear at all. After the python says “Thankssss” to Harry, the zoo-goers finally notice the huge snake, and react with various levels of staged fear. Only then do the Dursleys (who must’ve nipped out for a drink) realize that their son is trapped inside a zoo exhibit, and (over-)react with a ridiculous amount of fear.

And throughout this scene, Harry goes through a range of stupid expressions to show his emotions. “Surprise!” “Fear!” “Shock!” “Cheesy Grin!” “Trepidation!” “Gulp!”

22. The Editing

... is simply unacceptable.

23. Bizarre scene transition

Uncle Vernon locks Harry into his cupboard as punishment for the vanishing glass incident, and hisses into the grate, “There’s no such thing as magic!” while tinkly, magic music plays. Then suddenly we’re watching an owl deliver a letter. There’s no connection, no emotional context. It’s not even an ironic segue, thanks to the tinkly music. It’s just bizarre and off-putting.

24. *“Ate a funny whelk.”

Uncle Vernon flips over a postcard and exclaims, “Oh, Marge is ill! Ate a funny whelk.” That’s Rebecca’s favorite line of PS/SS. Straight from the book, too!

25. Semi-Retracted [Stupid owls]

Apparently, owls actually aren't stupid; just difficult to train because of their independence. I apologize to any owl who was insulted by my slight to their intelligence. But stupid or not, difficult to train means difficult to shoot. Animals and kids (and animal-like kids) are tough to shoot, period; in making a movie filled with animals and kids, the producers and directors would normally work very hard to trim out anything non-essential. Like the stupid flock of intelligent birdlife that harrass Uncle Vernon. So the important part of this point stands.

[Owls look pretty, but from what Rebecca has heard, they’re incredibly stupid birds and nearly impossible to train. This movie is filled with owls. I know that Steve Kloves doesn’t know anything about bird-training, and it isn’t his responsibility, but somewhere along the line, someone should have stepped up and said, “Gee, owls are really going to be a pain to shoot. Let’s cut down the owl scenes and replace it with something easier, like, say, character development. Then instead of spending our time and insanely huge budget trying to make a tawny owl fly from left to right on cue, we can ensure that the audience will be emotionally connected to the plot.”

I mean, c’mon! When Uncle Vernon leaves for work in the morning, he’s greeted by about twenty owls. It must have been a nightmare to shoot, and it’s not even a good joke. Why make a hard job even harder, guys? Come on!]

26. Toys in the cupboard

Harry has toys in his cupboard. They look like tin soldiers, or really big chess pieces.

27. Fiery face

Uncle Vernon is really hot in this movie. He’s on fire! He’s blazing! He’s sizzling!

No, wait. The editor chose to dissolve from a close-up of a fire burning in a grate to Uncle Vernon’s moustache, creating the illusion of a burning Vernon. Good job, idiot. Rebecca is confiscating your EGA card.

28. *No Post on Sundays.

Maybe Rebecca is going soft, but she liked the “No Post on Sundays.” Maybe it’s because it’s one of the few scenes that has more impact in the movie than in the book.

29. Dan’s voice change

Radcliffe really chose a wrong time to grow up. His voice seems to have changed half-way through the filming of SS. It’s not that noticeable except when his voice is over-dubbed, such as when the letters come streaming out of the chimney, and he protests in his new James Earl Jones voice, “They’re my letters!” If Daniel can’t make his voice sound younger, then they shouldn’t have re-recorded his lines.

30. Hut-On-The-Rock

The Dursleys and Harry take refuge in a really crappy-looking CGI Hut-on-the-Rock. Rebecca misses the toothless guy who loaned them his boat, that would have ruled to see that. Incidentally, though the Hut is supposed to be the nadir of residential architecture, it does have two stories.

31. Slo-o-o-o-ow Entrance by Hagrid

After Harry draws his own birthday cake in the dust, there’s a thundering boom from the doorway. Everyone panics. Dudley and Aunt Petunia whimper their trademark whimpers and Uncle Vernon growls his trademark growl, grasping a rifle. Harry, of course, just stands up, looking fearfully at the door with his innocent, wide eyes. Everyone stands around for approximately five minutes waiting for Robbie Coltraine to smash the door down, which falls over rather like the White King’s sword. Hagrid slooooooowly swaggers into the hut, shadows covering his large Columbus mane, so that he looks like an overgrown lion in a giant sack. The music swells–the Dursleys stare in horror–the camera zooms–the suspense gets bored and takes a smoke break–and the grey light shines on Mr. Emotionless Robbie Coltraine, who says, “Surry abu’e tha’.” I don’t know if this is supposed to be funny, scary, or confusing. And neither do Harry or the Dursleys. They stand there looking awkward and stupid while Hagrid sloooowly replaces the door.

32. *“I’m not Harry!”

Hagrid, who’s a bit slow, mistakes Dudley for Harry. Dudley exclaims, “I’m not Harry!” That’s actually kind of funny because Dudley is played by a guy named Harry. Well, we thought it was funny. It’s an inside joke.

33. Fake Stuttering

Rebecca cannot tolerate three signs of incompetent acting: fake stuttering, fake interruptions, and half-gestures. All three are foreign to every manifestation of real emotions in the human race. No one in real life ever fake-stutters, or fake-interrupts, or swivels their hands about their wrists as if their arms were fastened to their sides. It takes her right out of the movie when any of this happens. And it happens a lot in PS/SS. Daniel Radcliffe and Harry Melling bring us our first serving of fake stuttering when Hagrid appears. “I-I-I’m not H-H-Harry.” “I-I am.” Shut it, y’all.

34. “’Course you know all about Hogwarts.”

Isaac earlier complained that Hagrid shows no emotion. In the book Hagrid assumes that Harry knows he’s a wizard when he finds out that Harry doesn’t know, he shouts the pages off the spine. In the movie, Hagrid growls, “Course, you know all abu’e Hogwar’s.” Harry says lamely, “Sorry. No.” Hagrid leans forward and grunts, “Yer a wiz’rd, ‘Arry. An’ a thumpin’ good one I’ll wager, once ye bin trained up a bi’.” Where’s the fury?

35. *Aunt Petunia’s little speech

Aunt Petunia’s tirade about Harry’s mum is a moment straight from the book that works beautifully. The audience simultaneously learns about Harry’s mum’s background, the soon-to-be very important fact that she was Muggle-born, and gets a glimpse into Petunia’s motivation for abusing Harry. Deep stuff, man. Deep and good.

36. Hagrid’s beard

Chris Columbus strikes again.



Seriously, what is his problem with well-kempt hair?

It must be a real pain to have to wipe the vomit out of that beard. And, like Dumbledore, he adds to his suffocation by wearing heavy winter clothes.

37. Dudley’s tail

... is dumb looking. Also, it’s kind of cruel for Hagrid to attack an innocent bystander, especially a little Muggle kid.

38. “Unless you rather stay, o’ course.”

Ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer, Hagrid. Technically, it’s not a question. But it’s still stupid. Say, Harry, do you want to stay with your abusive relatives and go to a crappy public school, or do you want to go off with a giant to a crooked alley, a butterbeer village, and a magical school? Hmmmm.

39. Quirrell’s fake stuttering

Yeah, I know it’s in character for him to pretend to stutter. Still cannot stand it.

40. “I’m not sure I’m exactly the right person to tell you that.”

So says Hagrid after Harry demands to know why everyone (or at least four people) in the Leaky Cauldron knew his name and they all (or at least two of them) wanted to shake his hand. Despite that Hagrid was flaunting Harry the way one might flaunt a Nimbus 2000, or Helga Hufflepuff’s cup, he refuses to explain what happened to Harry. If Robbie Coltrane played it like Hagrid was too much a softie to watch Harry cry, or that he was nervous he would screw such an important exposition scene up, or—you know, if Mr. Emotionless had played it like anything at all, this might make sense, but instead Coltrane dismissively throws the line over his shoulder, like he knows what a piece of crap the script is, and the best thing is to just get it over, and he can’t wait to get out of the Hagrid suit, and now whenever he gets an acting job everyone will be like, “Oh, it’s Hagrid!” despite all the great acting he’s done over the years, so he’ll be darned if he puts any kind of effort into playing a half-giant in a stupid kids’s movie.

Or, to paraphrase:

“See, Harry? Yeh’re famous!”

“But why, Hagrid? All those people in there–how do they all know my name?”

“Oh, go to hell, Harry Potter. Go to friggin’ hell.”

41. Look! We have computers!

And we used them to make a gratuitously fancy entrance to Diagon Alley! “One minute the bricks were brick, and then they were rubber! It was like magic! And then they rearranged themselves with a incongruously realistic scraping sound, and we stood there and grinned our cheesiest grin!”

42. *Extras make the world turn round

... and the Diagon Alley scene a little more bearable, thanks to their dedication and effective acting. Though there are probably too many of them.

43. Diagon Alley

Sigh. The over-wrought Williams score. The boring design. The fact that pretty much all you can see is Hagrid’s back, anyway. The moronic exposition Hagrid spouts. The pain. The boredom.

44. The new Nimbus 2000!

Are the kids in Diagon Alley paid to advertise broomsticks? They exclaim, “Look, it’s the new Nimbus 2000!” And instead of talking about it the way real kids do, they wait until another kid says, “It’s the fastest model yet!” as the camera pans to the end of the stick, where the words “Nimbus 2000" sparkle cheaply. It’s lame and slow and is no better than the useless bats and owls. The film has too many “Gape and Grin” moments and this is one of them.

45. *Gringotts

Kinda goofy-looking, but well designed. And the chandeliers are filthy and covered in cobwebs, which is funny. The Gringotts goblins would have cleaner chandeliers if they supported diversity.

Also, Harry is terrified by the goblins–frightened by their appearance and spooked by Hagrid’s warning about them. Not only is this a nice break from the cheesy grin, it’s a commentary too. Remember the first time you went to a bank? Scary, wasn’t it? The bank was scary, the guards were scary, and the tellers the most frightening of all.

46. The Safest Place There is

From what I can tell, all you need to make a withdrawal from Gringotts is the key to the vault. Harry and Hagrid never show any sort of identification. I would assume that there is some magical process going on that we can’t see, but in the books, the Weasleys often withdraw money from Harry’s account without his knowledge or consent. And in the third book, Sirius Black, an escaped fugitive who should’ve long had his assets frozen, and who is suspected of wanting to kill Harry, uses Harry’s name to withdraw a large amount of gold from his own account. What I’m saying is, in what way is Gringotts the safest place, aside from Hogwarts? (And while we’re on the subject, Hogwarts has had plenty of breaches of its security as well.) Even a Muggle bank is harder to steal from.

47. Goblin fingers

The goblin makeup looks terrific, until we see a close-up of the fingers, which are stiff and unable to bend at the last joint.

48. Griphook & the Lantern

The movie wastes about a minute on Griphook, the goblin who opens Harry’s and the other vaults, saying stuff like, “Lamp, please.” “Key, please.” I know Griphook was played by Verne Troyer, but please. Skip ahead to the important stuff.

49. The grubby little package in Vault 713

The revelation of the contents of Vault 713–a very high-security vault containing a mysterious object–is just stupid. Since it’s just a grubby little package, you could go for comedy here, but Columbus’s camera work and Williams’s dramatic music make it very not funny. In the end, it’s just odd. Oh, stupid, stupid Columbus.

50. *John Hurt

We liked him. And that great little scene where Harry’s wand finds him. The wand chooses the wizard, you know.

Part II here!

Notes:

1. Aberforth, Albus's brother, was accused of using inappropriate charms on a goat. Reference.
2. Or as Roger Ebert put it in his review, "his beard so long that in an Edward Lear poem, birds would nest in it."