...and yes, RENT gets all caps. Deal. Anyway. I have now seen my required viewing for the Thanksgiving weekend (gotta go in NJ where a student ID warrants a ticket for $5.75). And I have to say...I was pleasantly surprised by both. Both stories are adaptations from elsewhere and could have been mangled beyond repair (see Prisoner of Azkaban post) but they were not. Neither film was perfect. But if they were, that wouldn't feel right, either.
I saw Harry first, after enduring a week of "What do you mean you haven't seen it yet?" Let me say right off that condensing a 730-odd page book into a manageable movie is quite a task. They shaved the story down to the bare bones, only allowing for the smallest traces of subplot, of which there are many in the book. However, the effect worked. The movie did not feel as though it was a whole that was torn into pieces and glued back together. It flowed well, moved along exceptionally quickly and made you momentarily forget what was not there. I'm still not a huge lover of Michael Gambon's Dumbledore, but I liked him well enough. Director Mike Newell, the first Brit to direct a Harry movie, did a good job of mixing dark with light and maintaining the magical spirit of the books. I, of course, pictured some things differently than they were depicted in the movie...but that is to be expected. Harry's scar was now on the correct side of his head and Fred and George actually had lines.
RENT on the other hand, at times did feel as though it was pasted together...but not necessarily in a bad way. I found that the exuberance of the play was intact, though it was obvious in some scenes that the actors were lip-synching...The songs were moved around and some of the plot-points were somewhat blurred but I felt that if I laughed and cried during it, then it served the purpose. The thing I found most irritating was that the play is sung-through; the actors sing even the dialogue. The movie used much of the sung dialogue...but it was spoken so it sounded as though the characters had taken to speaking in rhyme. That said, the cast is such a diverse group of beautiful and compelling actors that it is hard not to buy into the story. A couple of my favorite songs were cut out, but the movie was a little long anyway so there was really no way to make it a manageable length and not cut anything. The thing I missed the most was the fight between Mark and Roger near the end (quoted in the previous post) because that is where the most constant relationship seems as though it's in jeopardy and it's a little harder to get behind Roger running away to the west if that scene is cut. It is also harder to understand that when he comes back, he and Mark patch things up with a single hug. Anyway.
That said, I know that my DVD collection will have at least two new additions whent he time comes.
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