Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire - What's missing from the movie? [SPOILERS!]

[Rykion]

My biggest issue with the series is when the wizardry community, who mind you live with and among muggles don't know what a TV or telephone. Heck they live in England and don't know what soccer is.

That's because it's called football. A lot of magical people do know something of the muggle world, others don't. Remember that their houses can be invisible to muggles and they can use magic to travel without ever seeing a muggle. Some of them really live a life apart from the rest of the world.

Edit: I do believe that it is used more as a humorous element than something completely logical in the setting. Though as I have mentioned it could really happen within the setting, but would not be likely to be so prevalent among wizards.

 

[mmu1]

That's because it's called football. A lot of magical people do know something of the muggle world, others don't. Remember that their houses can be invisible to muggles and they can use magic to travel without ever seeing a muggle. Some of them really live a life apart from the rest of the world.

You know what the real problem is, as far as wizards living in a world of their own? Why their cluelesness about things like cars and football rings false? They're not different enough. For the most part, they're just like you and I, which makes all these supposed differences - ignorance about technology, silly robes, parchment, pumpkin juice, whatever - seem more like pointless affectations. Especially when characters talk about something - like Quidditch, for example - and you could do a few simple word swaps and make it into a perfectly "modern" conversation about soccer.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

Astoundingly on-topic: Order of the Stick

 

[mojo1701]

I wrote a semi-coherent rant to a friend of mine over MSN Messenger once about how he's screwed coming out of Hogwarts. I might post it here, if I can find it, and if I don't have to clean the language up too much.

 

[Rykion]

You know what the real problem is, as far as wizards living in a world of their own? Why their cluelesness about things like cars and football rings false? They're not different enough.

The same could be said of most fantasy and sci-fi worlds. Most fictional societies closely mirror our own, or ones from the past.

There are still enough muggle born and half-blood wizards to introduce some more modern concepts into wizard society. Even people in full wizard families might take muggle studies to stay somewhat informed of the normal world.

This thread has really gone OT. Most or all of the important stuff that was cut from the movie has already been mentioned, so hopefully no one minds.

 

[Vocenoctum]

I mean, they put 17-year-old kids up against fire-breathing dragons, as a spectator sport.

Cut from the movie was the teams of mages standing by to stop the dragons if it went to far. When it ends, Cedric is badly wounded for instance, covered in burn cream. Also, the dragons in the book are remarked as being nesting mothers. The Golden Egg is in a nest among other eggs. The dragon won't stray from the eggs. Harry has to bait the dragon away, swoop down and grab the egg. The stupid (IMO) scene in the movie with him flying all over so he can defeat the dragon is just fundamentally flawed. At how many points could Harry have gone back and gotten the egg? (his supposed objective).

They kidnap fellow kids to use as bait for the champions to wrest free from the merfolk in the Black Lake.

The children were in no danger, Ron even remarks that Harry is stupid for waiting to make sure they're all rescued. (He waited a long longer in the book than the movie.)

 

[WayneLigon]

And according to the movie, this is all acknowledged as very dangerous -- like what would have happened to the little girl under the lake if Harry had not rescued her? The French girl seemed very concerned that she would have been lost.

Good god! Do the books explain this extremely dangerous stuff better than the movies do? Do the books give any explanations that perhaps these "games" are not as dangerous as they seem in the movie(s)?

In the books wizards are considered full adults at 17 (they can choose a vocation, and they can test for the apparate (teleportation) license), thus the age restriction Dumbledore places on the TriWizard Tournament. Probably because he was afraid Harry would enter. The Tournament had been discontinued many years earlier because of the high death toll, but Dumbledore revived it as a way to reach out to the other schools.

In the book there is actually a poem that goes along with the second task, which strongly suggests that people who are not rescued will die, but Ron says that it's just to make sure you get back before the time limit is up. I thought there was a thing later where it was said that they actually were in danger but the book is so huge I can't find it by skimming.

Many times, things are actually even more dangerous in the books. I'm pretty sure The Whomping Willow has killed or maimed people before. People who go into the forest die and not just from the hoardes of giant spiders in there.

Actually, Quiditch is more dangerous in the books. I'm pretty sure they mention that a few people die in the game at the professional level every year and it's not uncommon for a student to buy it as well. They're doing complex aerial acrobatics at a hundred miles an hour with no helmet and no protection Many of the games we see in the movies and books are much shorter than normal, generally because Harry is just that good a Seeker - the game ends when the Seeker catches the Golden Snitch. Some Quidditch matches have gone on for days in brutal tests of endurance.

Being a Wizard is dangerous business and they don't sugarcoat it for the kids. They start to hint at things in the last two books that - to my mind - mean that your years at Hogwarts are just a means of keeping you comparatively safe and hoping to train you to a minimum level of competancy so you're not a danger to yourself and others.

 

[Jeremy]

At the end of goblet of fire, of all the things Harry can tell Dumbledore about, he tells him about how his wand and Riddle's connected. There's a flash of recognition from Dumbledore and he whispers something like Praeori Incantatum. After which he immediately surmises that Harry saw his parents. And just as Harry begins to brighten, Dumbledore immediately contradicts himself by stating that no spell can wake the dead from their sleep. What's going on with that?

 

[WayneLigon]

And just as Harry begins to brighten, Dumbledore immediately contradicts himself by stating that no spell can wake the dead from their sleep. What's going on with that?

He doesn't contradict himself (though I would also say that Dumbledore never gives the complete truth about anything until someone can handle it - If there is a means of contacting the dead, it's probably terribly dangerous and not something you'd want to tell Harry about because a major part of his makeup is wanting to know more about the parents he never met. If he has an obsession, that's it. He'd find some way to use that spell, possibly with terrible consequences). The 'prior incantations' are just memories, echos, like the Patronus. They can speak and such, but there is nothing 'really' there. (Again, that might not be the total truth - I get the definate idea that the students are told very litttle about the really major magics that are possible) The actual effect is to show the previous spells that wand has cast, so it shows the deaths of Cedric, the groundskeeper, then Harry's parents. I think in the book there's suppossed to be a mistake about the order in which Harry parents were killed, but I can't remember.

 

[Rykion]

I think in the book there's suppossed to be a mistake about the order in which Harry parents were killed, but I can't remember.

In the first printing Harry's dad appears before Harry's mom. I had a friend that came up with a major conspiracy theory until it was pointed out as a mistake. It is corrected in the later printings and Harry's mom appears first.