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Half-Blood Prince test screening reports (UPDATE #2)
Test screenings for Half-Blood Prince took place this weekend in Chicago, Illinois. A few detailed reports are now online, revealing what the sixth film contains.
The first report can be found at Digital Spy (thanks to stumcd for the link). The poster reports that some effects were still to be completed, with blue screens visible in some shots.
SPOILER!!: report #1
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The movie opens with a scene from Order of the Phoenix, of Dumbledore and Harry at the Ministry on the night Sirius dies, standing in front of a barrage of flash bulbs. Then it cuts to an interior shot of an ultra modern office building overlooking the Millennium Bridge. There are dementors flying through the air and then the bridge starts to wave violently and then collapses with lots of people on it.
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In the next scene we see Harry reading about the bridge in the Daily Prophet at a tube-side coffee shop in Little Whinging. He flirts with the waitress and asks her what time she gets off work. But he is distracted by a passing train. When the train finally clears out, we see Dumbledore standing importantly on the platform. Harry joins him and immediately he is whisked away (side-along apparition) to Slughorn’s house.
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There is a lot more Ginny than ever before. She nearly equaled Ron for screen time. We first see her at the Burrow when Harry arrives outside and the first thing he sees is her reading through the window. Harry just stands there for a moment, gazing up at her. Although she is dating Dean Thomas she never looks happy with him, except when she is snogging him at The Three Broomsticks.
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In the very beginning at the Burrow, Ron cleans off a bit of toothpaste from Hermione’s cheek. Later in Slughorn’s class she describes what she smells in the love potion and trails off with “spearmint toothpaste…” Lavender is quite nauseating and although she never gives Ron a necklace she does something equally as vomit worthy, steaming up a window on the Hogwarts Express with her breath and drawing a heart with “R + L” inside it. His relationship ends when he is unconscious and moaning Hermione’s name after being poisoned. He remains confused about why it ended but very relieved.
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There is no Tonks and Lupin relationship and although Tonks’ hair is brown there is no notice taken or any explanation given. Tonks has maybe 2 lines. Lupin never talks about Greyback.
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But, sadly, we never get the pleasure of seeing Crabbe and Goyle disguised as girls. In fact, they are hardly in this movie. The Sectumsempra scene was really good, even without moaning Myrtle. As Harry and Draco throw spells at each other poor Nigel sits frozen on one of the toilets.
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The first kiss of Lavender and Ron was witnessed by both Harry and Hermione. Harry watches with a stupid boyish grin and Hermione faces slowly turns from a smile to looking utterly heartbroken. She quietly turns away to leave, and just as she leaves Harry turns and notices. She is far less angry than she is just heartbroken. She does send the birds she conjures at Ron but she is not so much furious as she is crushed and hurt.
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Ginny takes Harry to the Room of Requirement, and makes him close his eyes while she hides the [Potions] book. Then she kisses him briefly. By the time he opens his eyes she has vanished.
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There is no mention of the Gaunts, but the scene in Slughorn’s office is there. Dumbledore however is truly surprised to learn that Riddle made 7 Horcruxes. It is in that scene that he realizes the ring is a Horcrux. He realizes what it was because when Harry handles it briefly he moved his head like Voldemort.
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There is no Professor Trelawney, or the Dursleys. No Kreacher (no mention of inheriting Grimmauld Place whatsoever) or Dobby, or Bill and Fleur. There are no scenes with the Minister of Magic, and I don’t believe they even mentioned Fudge was sacked (though I may have missed it).
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Luna’s role was very small, but she does have the lion hat and she is the one to find Harry on the train under the invisibility cloak with the help of her Spectrespecs.
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Bellatrix runs on the table right after Dumbledore is killed. She is so excited, no euphoric and that is one of her ways of celebrating I suppose.
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Some of his [Snape's] last words to Harry are “You may have your mother’s eyes but you are as dim as your father!”
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The movie ends with the trio plus Ginny on top of the Astronomy tower talking and Harry saying he is going alone to find the Horcruxes. Hermione says something like, yeah right, you think your going alone? We are coming too. (major paraphrasing there) Then Ginny not saying a word sadly just walks away and leaves. She actually does not speak during the entire scene. Nor is she spoken to. She just listens looking sadder and increasingly heartbroken.
Now the only really cheesy and unspectacular thing about this whole [cave] scene is that they use a large white clam shell partially imbedded in a small rock to scoop up the potion. In my opinion it looked rather silly.
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At one point towards the end you can very softly hear Dumbledore mumble something like “please don’t hurt them, it’s all my fault.”
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The moment he touches it [the water] a hand reaches out and grabs Harry’s wrist. The whole audience jumped in fear. Harry tries to fend off the inferi with all the spells we hear him try in the books. But in the end he is pulled down into the water.
While Harry is underwater the view we have is from below him looking up and we can see the whole island from below as well.
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There is no battle inside Hogwarts and the only one to chase them [Death Eaters] is Harry.
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Harry then returns to find the whole school gathered around Dumbledore’s body, McGonagall in the front completely stunned and silent. Harry kneels down at Dumbledore’s side, brushes a hair out of his face and finds the locket, but does not open it. Clutching the locket He starts to cry and Ginny goes and holds him also crying. Then following McGonagall’s lead, everyone lights their wand and slowly raise them as one in the air.
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There was no Amycus or Alecto anywhere I could see. Oh, and there is no Rosmerta either.
Book Six has either too much snogging or too much Voldemort – neither of which I complained about and both which I rather enjoyed – but this movie completely balances the two quite nicely. It seems effortless almost. But there are really dark scenes and then there are very fun scenes.
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While I realize they’re not props, by far my FAVORITE scene in the movie is the one that takes place at Weasley’s Whizarding Wheezes! It’s so good to see them after the initial subdued opening of the film and their scene, while about five minutes long, is the best. The filmmakers simply couldn’t leave it out – and it does well to show that some people in the wizarding world are able to break through all the fear going on out there. Diagon Alley is otherwise almost completely empty – Ollivander’s shop is empty. Can you believe they mention it? They do. They even have time to walk inside and feel sad.
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There are only two Pensieve scenes included. The scene from the teaser trailer, Young Tom Riddle in the orphanage, and the scene in Slughorn’s classroom both shortened and elongated just like in the book where we learn about Horcruxes.
An ongoing discussion about the screening can be read at the Leaky Lounge.
The sixth film releases on July 17th 2009.
UPDATE: A question & answer session about the test screening can be found here.
The film opens with an assault on a bridge in London by Death Eaters. The fly around it in corkscrew-like formations, causing the bridge to collapse into the water below. They make their way into Diagon Alley, put a bag over some guy’s head, and take him away.
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[Harry and Dumbledore] make their way to the tower and instead of using a charm to immobilize Harry and cover him with the invisibility cloak like in the book, Dumbledore just sends Harry away, and Harry goes downstairs, stops & watches the following scene through cracks in the floor above him. Malfoy tries to kill Dumbledore but realizes he can’t. Snape arrives on the floor below & signals Harry to be quiet, which he uncharacteristically does. Snape then goes upstairs & sends Dumbledore to his death.
I've got to agree with jaiboi2 here. For fans of the books, the quality of the movies generally depends largely how much of the book content makes it in. I can't speak for all, but I know that when I go to see a new HP movie, I'm looking forward to seeing my favorite parts come to life. While I can enjoy the film, it is disappointing to see when stuff is omitted
Sure seeing things cut from the movie is disapointing, but to assume it's a bad film based on what's been omitted is silly. There were things omitted in OotP, but my problem with that film was the complete lack of emotion I felt at the end of the movie. It didn't move me through a wave of emotions like GoF or PoA did (even though both those films omitted more than OotP). Lord of the Rings was not completely faithful, but it matched the tone of the book. Does that make it a bad series? No of course not. I think we should give the film the benefit of a doubt before we decide it's a total disapointment.
yeah you should read the books mate at least 1 and 2 were true to the novels. all im saying is they should stick to the book as much as they can. i mean cmon dumbledore immobilises harry in the book under his invisibility cloak and in the film he,s watching from under some floorboards gimmee a break. if i was in charge of the film id at least get the bloody ending right
I have found the majority of the films dissapointing. I walked out of Philosophers Stone when I saw it in the cinema, and it took a lot for me to give the other films a chance. CoS was a pretty decent effort, but again PoA was absolutely dreadful. I was insulted.
GoF however was a fantastic, it marked a positive turn in the series, which was continued into OotP, where, I think we have had the best combination of writer/director so far (I have never been and never will be a fan of Steve Kloves, his scripts are contrived and cheesy and his command of the cannon and dialogue from the books is seriously skewed). However, reading these reviews has left me feeling the same dissapointment as it did after I had the misfortune to watch PoA/PS. I don't mind them adding in the extra scene at the Burrow, it helps with the pacing, and will have little impact on the events of DH, they have magic after all ( ), but Harry flirting? That would never happen, Harry can barely hold a conversation with a female who isn't Hermione, it is preposterous.
Only two scenes for the memories? If they are not detailed, it leaves little point to having them at all, the whole point of HBP is essentially to prepare Harry for defeating Voldemort by educating him about V-Diddy's past. It is the whole point of the book. You could leave out everything else from both mediums, so long as you concentrated on that, but from reading these reviews, it seems that WB have again gotten their focus wrong.
As much as the series as a whole has ended now (the books are gone, the films are an interesting experiment in novelty, it seems), I am now getting to the point of wondering whether to put myself through the almost trauma that it appears watching this film may be. I am long past expecting to see exactly what i envisioned on the screen, we all learnt our lessons on that one at varying points, but I do not believe that there is any excuse to make a catagorically *bad* film, which is what it appears we are headed towards.
I suppose final judgement will have to be reserved for closer to the time, but right now, I just cannot bare the thought of going to see it. And this makes me sad.
I'm sorry Em and other mods if this is perhaps the wrong place to put this, but I just had to get it off my chest.
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"I must not tell lies"
Last edited by ebony_wandson; 09-10-2008 at 03:40 PM.
Reason: correcting gramatical errors
Half-Blood Prince test screening reports (UPDATE #2) 
), but Harry flirting? That would never happen, Harry can barely hold a conversation with a female who isn't Hermione, it is preposterous.
