Posted on Wednesday, July 13th, 2011 by Angie Han
Fake Criterion covers have become a pretty popular form of fan art as of late. Design-inclined cinephiles have fake-Criterioned everything from Orson Welles’ Macbeth to a French version of Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle to Kickpuncher (which is itself a fake movie), and it’s no wonder why. Criterion DVDs often get the kind of cool, artsy covers you would never find on ‘normal’ DVDs, which usually opt for something more tame and immediately recognizable.
The latest property to get the fake-Criterion treatment is the Harry Potter film series, which concludes this weekend with the release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2. Cooper Union graduate Patrick Sullivan created this stunning collection for his student portfolio, and it saddens me to know they’ll never actually be used. Flip through his cover collection after the jump.
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Tickets for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 have been on sale for a few days but true fans were waiting for this moment. AMC has announced that not only will they host back to back screenings of Part 1 and Part 2 on opening night, select theaters will host a four night event of all eight films culminating at midnight July 15 with the highly anticipated epic conclusion. Find out if your theater made the cut after the jump. Read More »
Though a good number of fans have already purchased their tickets to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 at midnight on November 19, most of us have not. Two weeks away still feels a little too early to make plans. Well, AMC has upped the ante with an event that’s sure to sell out from coast to coast. They’ve announced a mini Harry Potter Marathon at over 140 theaters on November 18 leading up to the opening of Deathly Hallows Part 1. It’ll begin at at 6 p.m. with a screening of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, followed by Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince and then, at midnight, you’ll be seated and primed for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1. We’ve got more information after the jump. Read More »
One of the questions all of our great storytellers now have to answer on a daily basis is, “Where is it all going?” Think of the writers of Lost. All anyone ever wanted to know from them was if they actually had everything planned out. Another person who has had to answer that question is J.K. Rowling, the billionaire author behind the Harry Potter franchise. Book after book, her story unfolded and critics would ask questions like, “Did you know about horcruxes when you were writing Sorcerer’s Stone?” Well, an awesome insider look at Rowling’s mind has just surfaced. It’s a piece of loose leaf paper where she outlines several chapters of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix and, looking at this page, it’s quite obvious that Rowling knew exactly what was going on with everything in her books. Check out the full image after the jump. Read More »
[This is part three of a four-part series. You can also read part one, part two, and part four. This article contains spoilers for the films discussed, but NOT for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince]
Next up: Director Mike Newell’s take on the Potter franchise. Newell cut his teeth directing TV but went onto demonstrate his range in film through well-crafted dramas (Donnie Brasco) and comedies (Four Weddings and a Funeral, Pushing Tin). While clearly talented, he’s not the first person that would have come to mind when choosing a director for this series, but obviously, all that matters is whether or not the film measures up. So how good is Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire?
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What is your favorite Harry Potter film? Which of the movies in the series do you think is the best reviewed? Highest rated by the mainstream public? Largest grossing. I can tell you that my favorite is Alfanso Cuaron‘s Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, and it seems like I’m not alone. Azkaban is the best reviewed and highest publicly rated of the bunch, yet it made the least amount of money of the series ($83 million less than the next lowest release). How sad. Lets take a look at the Harry Potter film series (so far) by the numbers.
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The HD-DVD release of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix offers a revolutionary new DVD feature called “Live Community Screening”:
Gather your own army of fellow wizards for a live community screening party. Invite other owners of the Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix HD DVD to simultaneously watch from their own internet-accessed players and text with your remote, PC or cell phone. When you host an invitation-only viewing, you control the film by pausing and playing the feature on everyone’s machine. You can chat live with your friends as you watch.
But the question is, will anybody actually use this feature? It requires all parties to own the HD-DVD disc, and a HD-DVD player with internet access features.
Meanwhile, Transformers director Michael Bay is at it again, this time he is spouting off conspiracy theories about how Microsoft is trying to sabotage the High Definition DVD format war:
“What you don’t understand is corporate politics. Microsoft wants both formats to fail so they can be heroes and make the world move to digital downloads. That is the dirty secret no one is talking about. That is why Microsoft is handing out $100 million dollar checks to studios just embrace the HD DVD and not the leading, and superior Blu Ray. They want confusion in the market until they perfect the digital downloads. Time will tell and you will see the truth.”
I don’t think Bay is seeing the big picture. Microsoft has more to gain from the success of HD-DVD than they do digital downloads (but the truth of the matter is they have much to gain from both). I do believe that this format war will have no winner, and digital downloads and on demand will triumph.
So what do you guys think:
- Would you use the “Live Community Screening” feature?
- Is Microsoft trying to sabotage the HD format wars?
Last year we wrote an article on how we wished that movie studios didn’t force us buy a movie in 5 different formats. I have a library of thousands of DVDs, which I now must re-buy in HD-DVD or Blu-ray, in addition to spending hours encoding them for my iPod video or iPhone or plunking down another $15 for a small extra-less digital version on iTunes. I suggested that with all this new found room on the next generation HD formats, why not include a small digital version that consumers could put on their portable video devices. And now Warner Bros Video has announced that are doing just that, but on the regular ol’ fashion DVD.
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix will be the first DVD to come bundled with multiple video formats on a single disk. However, there has been no word on whether the video will have some kind of DRM. Warner has traditionally resisted unprotcted media, so we expect them to have some restrictions. If they use DRM embedded into Windows Media Video, this could lock out non-Windows users and the whole iPod market. It’s a great idea, let’s just see if they execute it right.
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix hits DVD store shelves on December 11th.
source: electronista
