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richard harris

Hogwarts Revisited

It was great news to hear that Ali Ismail Abbas has been flown to Kuwait and is receiving proper medical care. On a more cynical note, how good it was of Mr. Blair to condescend to ‘comment’ on the situation. But I’m not going to have another war rant…

Monday, I went to buy the video of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. A bit of extra money came our way, and since this counts as extravagance in our current impoverished state, what the hell! We watched it Monday night.

I thought the first HP movie was just okay. This one was a huge improvement, although as each of the books is longer than the last, there was much more condensing. Arguably, the plots also get better, so perhaps a stronger plot suffers less from omission. It was fast-moving and slick. The younger cast were much more polished. Robbie Coltrane was his usual awesome self. The FX were much better, in particular Dobby the house elf… I thought they might mess him up, but he was a wonderful CGI creation, furnished with a wide range of extremely realistic and endearing mannerisms.

Harry Potter 2002
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Christmas Entertainment

No updates over Christmas period. I couldn’t be arsed. Actually, I have (yet again) been wondering what purpose this Web site serves at all, and I’m lost for answers. It is something to do when all else fails, yes. I enjoy fiddling with it sometimes. But it doesn’t really say much or do much. It’s just there. Hmmm.

Christmas was quite boring. The television was generally rubbish, so no surprises there. The Only Fools and Horses special was pretty good—somewhat better than last year’s weak effort, anyhow. I OD’d on the soaps a bit, and they were, uh, full of shocks… Jamie died in EastEnders (wow, big surprise), Ray was the stalker in Emmerdale (wow, even bigger surprise), and Richard didn’t kill anyone in Corry (actually, that was a surprise).

The Hound of the Baskervilles film (mentioned here) was fairly good. It wasn’t quite as faithful to the original as had been implied, but I did like it. Although, Richard E. Grant being in it (as Stapleton) made me realise what an absolutely perfect Sherlock Holmes he’d make. Richard Roxburgh’s Holmes was okay, but Grant could have been genuinely great. A missed opportunity.
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Computer Fakery

Since I was droning about Harry Potter earlier… today (er, yesterday), I read the appalling story/rumour that they might use cast-off footage of Richard Harris from the first two movies, combined with his stand-in and computer trickery, to generate an artificial ‘performance’ for the third movie!

I really, really hope this is only a rumour…
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Retail Therapy

Today, being out shopping (for food, not pleasure, alas), I passed a book store and I of course succumbed. Some people buy shoes; some people can’t pass a novelty shop without buying some little cuddly toy; but me, I guess it’s books. It used to be comics more than books, but books are better value for money these days, and comics don’t have many Jack Kirbys out there anymore. (*sigh* I might get nostalgic.)

It was a close one. This store had several copies of Stephen King’s Cycle of the Werewolf, with wonderful illustrations by Bernie Wrightson. I wanted this so much when I heard about it maybe 17 years ago, but amazingly, I have never seen it for sale anywhere. I didn’t even know it was still in print. Anyway, that’s earmarked for purchase v.v. soon. I passed it today.
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