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lederhosenThe thing that bothers me with HP isn't the characters who are meant to be the villains... it's the rest of them.
Had I been Dumbledore, my speech at the end of the film would've gone something like this:
"Cedric Diggory died defending a friend. Does that make him so brave? Perhaps not. I daresay many of you - not all, but many - could be shamed into that sort of courage, when it came to somebody who had just saved your own skin. Shall I tell you what really made him stand out?
"I could not help but notice the vast majority of you, who are now gathered in this room, wearing badges to the detriment of one Potter. You were of the opinion that he had cheated his way into the tournament, and you made no bones about expressing that sentiment. And yet, none of you are wearing those badges now. Why is that?
"Did you, perhaps, take them off after the third challenge, in recognition of the awful danger Potter had just faced? I think not.
"Did you take them off after the second challenge, in which he demonstrated nobility of spirit by placing the protection of a stranger above victory? I do not believe so.
"No, you took them off after the first challenge, in which he did nothing more than to complete the task he had been given. At the beginning of that challenge, you thought him a cheat; since he demonstrated no particular moral fortitude in that challenge, I can only presume that in your eyes, victory excuses cheating. Mr. Diggory, to his credit, never wore such a badge; I do not know what he initially thought of Potter, but when all around him were doing otherwise, he was willing to suspend judgement. That is the brand of courage that made him exceptional."
Not that the adults get off entirely scot-free, either. The second challenge is a pretty sick-minded thing to inflict on children. (Did they just knock on Ron & Hermione's doors and say "Excuse me, we'd like to put you to sleep at the bottom of a lake, if that's OK with you", or what?)
And what sort of idiot appoints a former Death Eater as headmaster of a school for impressionable youngsters?
(The whole "pervy ghost in the boys' bathrooms" bit was more than a little creepy, but I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt on that one and suppose that they didn't have any options for getting rid of her.)
Had I been Dumbledore, my speech at the end of the film would've gone something like this:
"Cedric Diggory died defending a friend. Does that make him so brave? Perhaps not. I daresay many of you - not all, but many - could be shamed into that sort of courage, when it came to somebody who had just saved your own skin. Shall I tell you what really made him stand out?
"I could not help but notice the vast majority of you, who are now gathered in this room, wearing badges to the detriment of one Potter. You were of the opinion that he had cheated his way into the tournament, and you made no bones about expressing that sentiment. And yet, none of you are wearing those badges now. Why is that?
"Did you, perhaps, take them off after the third challenge, in recognition of the awful danger Potter had just faced? I think not.
"Did you take them off after the second challenge, in which he demonstrated nobility of spirit by placing the protection of a stranger above victory? I do not believe so.
"No, you took them off after the first challenge, in which he did nothing more than to complete the task he had been given. At the beginning of that challenge, you thought him a cheat; since he demonstrated no particular moral fortitude in that challenge, I can only presume that in your eyes, victory excuses cheating. Mr. Diggory, to his credit, never wore such a badge; I do not know what he initially thought of Potter, but when all around him were doing otherwise, he was willing to suspend judgement. That is the brand of courage that made him exceptional."
Not that the adults get off entirely scot-free, either. The second challenge is a pretty sick-minded thing to inflict on children. (Did they just knock on Ron & Hermione's doors and say "Excuse me, we'd like to put you to sleep at the bottom of a lake, if that's OK with you", or what?)
And what sort of idiot appoints a former Death Eater as headmaster of a school for impressionable youngsters?
(The whole "pervy ghost in the boys' bathrooms" bit was more than a little creepy, but I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt on that one and suppose that they didn't have any options for getting rid of her.)
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no subject
Date: 2005-12-04 01:13 am (UTC)That's actually not very surprising, since Durmstrang is noted for actually teaching the Dark Arts. And when you think about it, one of the former members of the Hogwarts Board of Governors was a former
incredibly hotDeath Eater.no subject
Date: 2005-12-04 01:44 pm (UTC)incredibly hotformer Death Eater.And I deny watching Black Hawk Down tonight just for the hot bods therein.
no subject
Date: 2005-12-04 03:47 am (UTC)When Moody said he needed to speak to Ron and Hermione without Harry, while they were all trying to figure out stuff for Harry the night before the 2nd challenge. That was when they got them. Dunno whether they were asked or just knocked on the head. Book might say.
no subject
Date: 2005-12-04 11:13 am (UTC)It surely is. The whole series is dark, and it gets darker as it goes along. Its morality is loose, and questionable in many ways. The books are written from Harry's point of view, and he is the boy who lived in a cupboard until he was ten. He has a tendency to accept things that other people would consider intolerably cruel.
I'm pretty sure that Rowling is knowingly writing the series this way. She seems to keep trying to warn younger readers away, because she knows it's going to get worse before the end.
no subject
Date: 2005-12-05 12:06 am (UTC)In the book the Ron & Hermione go to sleep thing happens off-screen---they are called away, just as in the movie, and Harry doesn't get to see them next morning until he figures out it's Ron that's been "taken from him." That said, the first thing Ron says to him in the book after they get out of the water is to tell him off for staying there waiting for the other champions to also get there and take their hostages to safety: Something to the effect of "you idiot, did you really think Dumbledore would let us drown?" So I think the hostages were told what they were getting into and given reassurances, but the champions weren't.