Watch it in hi-resolution here.
Thoughts?
New Half-Blood Prince Trailer
Previous post: MythCon 40
Next post: We Are Wizards Documentary
Smart Talk on Harry Potter
Buy advance tickets to Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince and get a free song download on iTunes!
Half-Blood Prince Read Through!
Azkatraz 2009!
Come hear Travis speak at Azkatraz 2009 in San Francisco!
Networking
-
Recent Comments
revgeorge on The Seer Overheard, by revgeorge
Amanda on The Seer Overheard, by revgeorge
SPT on The Seer Overheard, by revgeorge
miles365 on The Seer Overheard, by revgeorge
Flu-Bird on Top 10 Scariest Kid-Lit Villains
Polls
Loading ...-
-
Search The Hog's Head
Custom Search Buy Tickets for Half-Blood Prince!
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince NetworkedBlogs on Facebook
Travis Prinzi on Facebook
{ 41 comments… read them below or add one }
Good trailer, I thought. It encompassed a lot of what is in the movie when compared to the teaser, which was mostly the riddle orphanage memory (although I thought that was a good teaser). Interesting the trailer will open in theaters the day HP 6 was suppose to come out although probably good for marketing because of the overlap between the Twilight and HP fan base. Now all I have left to wonder is when the Gambon discussion begins?
The Gambon discussions may take awhile on my part, Brent. I have yet to watch the trailer as I’ve been out of town most of this past week & won’t have a chance to see it until tomorrow.
But I’m sure I’ll only have positive things to say about Gambon’s performance.
It’s not as evocative as the first one; a bit humdrum, actually, especially with Gambon blathering on and on about the fate of the world and Harry being the Chosen One. Hermione blows that one out of the water with a well-merited swat. A lot of funny lines, including Harry’s response to Dumbledore’s portentous: “You are of course wondering why I brought you here tonight”:
“Actually, Sir, after all these years I sort of just go with it.”
The crashing waves outside the cave were kind of cool. But the only scene that really moved me was the one near the end: Harry screaming “Fight back you coward!” while Snape stares at him, stricken.
Something tells me we’re going to get sick and tired of these trailers before July rolls around.
Red Rocker wrote: “Something tells me we’re going to get sick and tired of these trailers before July rolls around.”
Yes, it was nice of WB to release this trailer along with the movie that they replaced HBP with on that opening date. I suppose they released it early so that it wouldn’t come as a shock and another slap in the face to HP fans to see a HBP trailer released alongside Twilight.
Still haven’t seen the trailer yet. I have to wait until my wife’s not in the room; she’s not as fanatical about HP as I am.
Okay, I finally watched the trailer. First off, Gambon. Not as annoying in this one as I thought he would be. Maybe it’s because I’ve had a pint or two after a long week & I’m feeling charitable. We’ll see when I rewatch it tomorrow how I feel.
On to more interesting stuff. Being an incurable romantic, I’m looking forward to the Harry/Ginny moments. Also saw a brief shot of Hermione crying; about Ron I suppose. Still, looking forward to seeing that relationship develop in film.
The other bits were quite what I expected. Just intriguing enough to get my appetite whetted for the film. Curses to WB for that since I won’t see it until next July. Hopefully in San Francisco at Azkatraz, wife willing. I’m looking forward to the scenes with Tom Felton. I think he’s been woefully underutilized so far.
Really just looking forward to the film, except maybe the Gambon bits. Unfortunately as little as Dumbledore was in OOTP, he’s much more present in HBP.
I have hopes that Gambon will be better than he has been. He’s good in other things – maybe he’ll finally get this right, or close to right.
I thought the trailer was quite good, actually.
And having it shown with Twilight isn’t because WB has anything to do with Twilight – that’s some indy studio I’ve never heard of. Who decides which trailers are attached to which movies, anyway? Anyone know?
Pat
Pat, I always thought they put trailers in front of movies that will reach the same audience as your target audience. I’m sure some studios prefer to put trailers in front of their own movies, but I assume varies. I don’t know which studio made Twilight, but it’s always possible that indy studio has some backing from WB. The big studios do like to do that (all in the name of profit, of course).
My reaction was word-for-word identical with Red Rocker’s.
After watching this trailer, I think for the first time I’m actually interested, even excited, about seeing the movie. The scene at the Cavern Lake looks like a wow.
The trailer did its job.
Loved the trailer too. Did not expect it at all. Enjoyed seeing more of the humor in this one. Well, if the months fly by as fast as the last three have, perhaps July will be here before we know it!
-Mary
aka ZoeRose
The trailer was awesome. I found it interesting that they including the scene where the Death Eaters blew up a bridge. It only was mentioned in passing in the book, but still interesting nevertheless. July is just too far away.
Just when I try not to be a bitter fan, this came up . . .
I think it will be Chardonnay tonight . . . .
I’ll send the rehab bill to WB
Okay, watched the trailer for the second time. Perhaps I’m getting soft or something, but Gambon still wasn’t as annoying as I’d thought he would be. Hopefully Red Rocker can snap me out of this position.
Just really, really getting excited for the film. It looks, if looks can be judged by a couple of trailers and also a fair few pictures, to be a great movie.
revgeorge, you’re being lulled into a sense of false complacency. Gambon is still very, very bad: it’ s just that he’s now bad in a different sort of way. In the past he projected the panicky confusion of a deer-in-the-headlights, with occasions bouts of yelling and physical assault. He’s now into breathless over-dramatization:
Without this memory we (you?) leave the fate of our world to chance. We (you?) must not fail. You are the Chosen One, Harry.
Oooh.
How long do you think you can listen to that kind of one-note histrionic exaggeration before you start longing for the dive off the Astronomy Tower?
The visuals look quite exciting, of course. But I’m also intrigued by the tiny bits of music we heard. Does anyone know: is Hooper writing the score for this one again?
Red Rocker wrote: “How long do you think you can listen to that kind of one-note histrionic exaggeration before you start longing for the dive off the Astronomy Tower?”
Thanks for bringing me back to the painful reality of Gambon’s performance. Perhaps after my vacation I was a bit too relaxed & calm. Agree totally with you. It will not take long for the one note histrionic exaggeration to drive me bonkers. I was already planning on cheering at the Astronomy Tower scene but I suppose I’ll have more fuel for the fire.
To talk about more than just Gambon in the trailer, Jim Broadbent looks nothing like my conception of Slughorn. But if I’ve read rightly, his performance is supposed to be good. Anybody else heard anything about that?
Actually, my cheeriness at the Astronomy Tower was going to happen without or without Gambon as Dumbledore. This was the book where I really felt he was using Harry. I kept yelling at the book–’Just do it yourself’ everytime he gave Harry a hard time for not succeeding in his requests. (The teacher-student manipulation thing is really creepy for me–being a teacher myself. It is beyond inappropriate.) For this reason maybe Gambon will be just fine at ‘manipulative, creepy Dumbledore.’
The trailer looks great, but it’s just too darn far away.
Professor L, this is the first time I can remember disagreeing with you on something! I’ve argued at two conferences now that Dumbledore’s work with Harry in those lessons was the best example of real, authentic, apprenticeship-model pedagogy in the whole series. Only Harry could get that memory. Harry was being invited into the real task of taking down Voldemort. It’s the complete opposite of the pedagogy of Delores Umbridge.
I too felt very uneasy at how Dumbledore made Harry get the horcrux-memory from Slughorn. Unlike you, Professor L I couldn’t yell at Dumbledore to “Do it yourself!” He was obviously doing it the best way he knew: getting the person most likely to succeed to do it. But in doing that, he was being outrageously manipulative, and very creepy to boot.
He knew Slughorn’s soft spot for Lily. Knew that Harry’s eyes were just like Lily’s. Suspected that Slughorn felt really bad for having told Riddle about the horcruxes. Suspected that the only way that information could be gotten from him was by a combination of appealing to his sense of guilt and his feelings for Lily. The key was Harry’s eyes.
So Harry’s task was to flash his eyes at Slughorn, while coming up with just the right combination of guilt and appeal as to dissolve Slughorn’s resistance to telling the truth.
Call it persuasion. Or call it by its real name: seduction.
Travis, I can totally get into your interpretation that Dumbledore was teaching Harry, by way of apprenticehip, how to manipulate people’s feelings in order to get what he wanted. But to the best of my recollection, you are the one who resists that particular conceptualization of Dumbledore.
Oh, sheesh. Dumbledore didn’t teach Harry how to do anything manipulative in that instance. He told Harry that he was the only one that could get the memory, and Harry had to figure out how on his own.
And Harry was only trying to get Slughorn to do what was right. You’ll recall that Slughorn was withholding, you know, the most vital piece of information for bringing down Voldemort.
*sob* we part ways!
I guess looking at it from the point of pedagogy, it’s good. I’m a firm believer in the Master/Apprentice model.
I just couldn’t get past the ‘you might be getting your student killed’ ethics issue. With my students it’s always I would die rather than put any of them in danger. Some teachers do use psychological manipulation and it is creepy to see it. Some of what Dumbledore does in this book seems to cross that line.
But I keep forgetting that the parents of students at Hogwarts must have signed the broadest disclaimer any school has ever drafted, ever!
I think I agree with Travis on this more than with you, Red Rocker. Finally something to disagree about again!
While I do acknowledge that Dumbledore was manipulative, or to put it another way, way more secretive than he had to be, I still think his manipulations were more along the line of a general issuing orders to his troops & asking them to do things they may not necessarily understand & that may put them in harm’s way or even lead them to end up sacrificing their lives for ‘the greater good.’
I think Dumbledore did end up teaching Harry a lot & I think a clue to the freedom which he granted Harry to a great degree goes all the way back to HPSS, where Harry makes the observation that Dumbledore pretty much knows everything that goes on Hogwarts but that he was willing to let the Trio give it a go first.
Dumbledore certainly wasn’t perfect & he was, if you want to consider it that way, manipulating Harry but more like manipulating him into surviving his conflict with Voldemort. And the fact that he asks Harry for forgiveness & admits that Harry was the better man is, I think, a sign that he knew his ways were not the most noble or helpful at times but that he did what he thought was right.
And Harry learned it, too. Harry knew that Ron had to be the one to destroy the Locket because of his lessons with Dumbledore. The text says as much.
Professor L, I can certainly understand the point about the possibility of Harry getting killed. Of course, Dumbledore had opened up that possibility way back when he was 11!
Professor L wrote, “I just couldn’t get past the ‘you might be getting your student killed’ ethics issue.”
But Harry was marked for death the moment Voldemort heard the partial prophecy & decided to act on it. And he was marked, for better or worse, as the Dark Lord’s nemesis literally by the scar on his forehead & the fragment of Voldemort’s soul embedded in him. “Neither can live while the other survives.” Harry was kind of a dead man walking & Dumbledore knew that as long as Voldemort was out there somewhere & could come back that Harry was as good as dead. So, does Dumbledore prepare Harry for a final confrontation with Voldemort or does he just let him wander about until Voldemort kills him?
Go back to the beginning of the book: how does Dumbledore convince Slughorn to join up? By flashing Harry at him. Acquitting Slughorn of any sexually inappopriate motives, and accepting as given that he collects high achievers, this is still completely manipulative of Dumbledore.
Dumbledore doesn’t tell Harry to do anything manipulative. But how else is Harry to get the memory that Slughorn patently does not wish to disclose? To argue that Dumbledore didn’t mean for Harry to use manipulation, while knowing that he has already used Harry to push Slughorn’s buttons, and knowing that Harry’s only advantage are his green eyes (i.e. his likeness to Lily), is not very credible.
As for the argument that Harry was trying to get Slughorn to do what was right, you don’t need me to point out that that is an argument of the means justifying the end. And we’ve all seen how badly south that argument can go in the last eight years.
And once again, the funny thing is, with such opposed points of view, we’re both supporters of Dumbledore. I respect him too much to cheer as his inadequate doppelganger falls off the Astronomy Tower. I will imagine, however, how some of my favorites for Dumbledore would have played it.
Harry also learned from Dumbledore & from his parents the difference between being dragged into the arena to face a fight to the death & walking into the arena with your head held high. And he also learns about faith, love, & hope all throughout DH by learning Dumbledore’s lessons about love & self sacrifice.
If Slughorn has the most critical piece of information in order to bring down Voldemort, and getting him drunk and reminding him of someone he was very fond of can get that information out, I’m going to do it. I haven’t tortured him. I haven’t even hurt him. I got him drunk. He apparently already likes to do that.
I’m not sure you can parallel that issue with some sort of Machiavellian methodology and put it on par with rendition, waterboarding, and the other types of morally awful things that have gone on under the name of “protecting” America over the last eight years.
Okay, so I probably won’t cheer when the magic moment happens during the movie; I’ll probably just give a silent fist pump like Flitwick does in OOTP when Fred & George leave.
I’ll admit this much – I think I’m starting to worry about myself. My favorite HP character is Dumbledore, someone the majority of HP fans sees as manipulative and Machiavellian. And my favorite character from Heroes is Noah Bennett – a pretty shady guy who will justify any action as long as it protects his family.
I might need some new role models.
I must be weird, too, since my favorite character was Harry. I thought nobody really liked him.
And I like Luna!
I’m not necessarily looking at this rationally within the story thing. Remember, I’m the one WB drove to drink!
I just don’t like Dumbledore here! If Harry were a grown-up, I wouldn’t be as creeped out. I stake my right to be creeped!
Professor L, nobody can, of course, tell you how to feel or deny your feelings. But our feelings can be tempered by an outside look at them, which I think is what Travis & I have been trying to do. I mean, I think it’s probably a valid read of Dumbledore to see him as manipulative & Machiavellian. But it’s also possible to read him differently than that, too. And I think Dumbledore answers the questions about himself in the end anyway when he admits that he needs Harry’s forgiveness & that he knows that Harry was the better man. He’s giving an admission, not in so many words of course, that he knows his way of doing things was not the best or most morally right way of doing things.
Of course, I suppose it depends too on whether one thinks that’s really Dumbledore or just Harry’s imagination in the King’s Cross chapter
all, there is truth in what you say:
revgeorge, of course a lot of things we think we know about Dumbledore depend on where King’s Cross takes place. And yes, Harry did learn some good life lessons from Dumbledore, in addition to some questionable ones.
Professor L, absolutely, if Harry were older, it wouldn’t seem as bad. That was the first thing that hit me, way back when I first read Prince, that Dumbledore was using a minor as bait to catch a fat fish.
Travis, of course rendition and torture and are not the same as getting a man drunk and flashing your eyes at him. I was using an extreme example to challenge your argument that a good end justified some dubious means. Your return argument that it depends on how dubious the means are is a valid one. Yes, using a minor to catch a fat fish may be justifiable if the fate of the world hangs in balance. So we hold our noses and go ahead. Doesn’t make it right, does it? And it is the beginning of an extremely slippery slope. Which I think, btw, that the author recognized. I think she meant to show us Dumbledore with the benign mask off.
And you know, Dumbledore is my favorite character as well. Not despite the moral ambiguity of his methods, but partially because of them. He is a complicated man, and had a messy life; he strove to do good, but sometimes strayed so far off the right path that those who looked up at him were aghast (that’s us!) The reviewer in Newsweek said it well in his conclusion of the book review for Hallows: it’s a story about growing up, finding out that our adults aren’t perfect, forgiving them their flaws and still loving them, and shouldering the responsibilities that come with adulthood.
That is a good review assessment, Red Rocker. The only thing the reviewer could’ve added to make it more complete was “recognizing that we ourselves are also not perfect.”
Now, if we really want to talk about someone who’s truly disturbing with children, let’s talk Willy Wonka!
I’ve only read an abridged version of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory but Willy Wonka didn’t seem nearly as, well, wonky, in the book as in the Burton/Depp movie. I’m more than half-convinced that Depp was channeling Michael Jackson there.
I’m giving you the Newsweek review from memory. I tried to access it electronically but cavilled at the part where they asked for a credit card number. I think it also said that Harry learned that part of growing up was realizing that our adults are not all-powerful and can’t protect us from all harm.
Red Rocker, revgeorge, Travis, you gentlemen hit on so many good discussion points on the Dumbledore/Harry, Headmaster/Apprentice aspect especially with the coming release of HBP next “July” (did anyone notice WB didn’t place a release date on the trailer) that there is not much to add to your many great observations.
I feel the point of Professor L’s lament of teacher/student endangering in the ways that Dumbledore places Harry into so many life threatening elements in Harry’s journey towards the ultimate defeat of Voldemort, but we need to remember that Harry Potter is no ordinary student in an English boarding school. This is one who was chosen from birth, marked with a scar that identifies him in a way with “death” and the Dark Lord who desires to enslave the entire wizarding world or destroy those who stand in his way.
Professor L, Dumbledore couldn’t have “endangered” Harry more than he was already. With the mark of the Dark Lord upon him, he was already chosen for the battles that Dumbledore regrettably had to send Harry into from a very young age in HPSS through HPDH. Harry being (the better man) the one to carry out what Dumbledore ultimately realizes he was too weak as a man to do. He could not trust himself with the power of the “Deathly Hallows”, the temptation was too great upon his “ego”, i.e. Grindelwald.
Was Harry manipulated by Dumbledore, to a degree yes, was Harry not told the full truth by Dumbledore before each dangerous task put before him, yes again, but then if Harry knew in advance the possibilities of the torture the Dark Lord would inflict on him, would Harry have walked on to the next task in the battle? This is why Dumbledore apologizes to Harry a number of times at the end of each book (and in the “Heavenly Kings Cross in DH) for having him face great danger and personal challenges each year. Plus as a teacher/Headmaster he had to let the student (Harry) go onward with the possibility of making wrong choices and failing at times in order to learn, even in what may seem to us as extreme life threatening elements in the story.
We find out in the end Harry Potter was more than up to the task, in spite of his doubts at times and feelings of loneliness along that path to the end.
As John Granger likes to remind us, Harry is the classic Christian Everyman.
Oh, the trailer!!
I think this movie is going to be the best of the bunch so far from what I have heard from the screenings and this trailer.
Gambon seems closer to the Dumbledore of the book in this one than any of the others so far. More studeous and not so brash and harsh in the intense scenes as in the other movies. It looks like a great balance in this film ,between the serious elements and the humorous moments that are needed in a very intense story.
David,
Despite saying that all the good stuff has been said, I think you made some good points.
I think perhaps we’ve been a bit too harsh on Dumbledore. Not to excuse his flaws & failures but we do need to place ourselves into the situation of the story, i.e. the Wizarding War, parts one & two. And the plain fact is, people do things in war they would never consider doing otherwise. And some of those things they do are bad things or morally questionable things. Doesn’t make it right but makes it more understandable.
And the fact is, Harry is different. He is the Chosen One. But he normally doesn’t get a big head about it. His friends & his teachers don’t let him get away with that.
And because of his status as marked for death by Voldemort, Dumbledore begins training Harry to survive. Note that Dumbledore never says anywhere that I can remember that he agrees with Snape’s assessment that Harry is just a pig for the slaughter. Think of the way we teach people. Do we start with explaining everything to them or do we work them up towards more & more knowledge & comprehension? Do we teach a child how to read by first explaining everything there is to know about reading or do we start by teaching them letters and the sounds letters make?
Dumbledore gradually brings Harry along in his understanding & knowledge. At times this probably does skate perilously close to manipulation, & I think we can agree that even if Dumbeldore is teaching Harry he still could’ve done it a bit more openly & honestly. It was his own failings that held him back. But he is teaching Harry how to survive but perhaps even more importantly how to defeat Voldemort. In DH, in regard to the Hallows & the Horcruxes, he admits that he was counting on Hermione to keep Harry from getting too far ahead of the lesson Dumbledore was trying to teach.
To come back to the trailer, I will freely offer an apology for the book Dumbledore but not for the screen Dumbledore.
About the trailer: did anyone else notice that this movie seems to be the first self-aware one? As in, the characters (Hermione and Harry) are aware of the mythos they’re living in (e.g. The Chosen One, Dumbledore’s periodic revelations of The Truth to Harry) and are able to make fun of it? As in, this could be the first postmodern Potter movie ever?
Hadn’t noticed it, probably because it’s used for comedic value. But now that you mention it, that does seem plausible.
Travis, you crack me up.
-Mary