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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I’ve always wished that Warner Bros had filmed extended editions of the Harry Potter films, in the same vein as Peter Jackson filmed the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Of course, anyone who knows the many differences between the books and the released films knows that it really wouldn’t have been possible. To squeeze the most important plot points into the films, scenes, characters and information have been combined in a way that sometimes eliminate the wonderful side stories that we loved from the novels.
Over the course of the series, there have been many scenes, sequences and moments that were filmed but ended up on the cutting room floor. And it appears that Warner Bros is hoping to squeeze a bit more money out of the very popular wizard franchise by releasing extended editions of all the Harry Potter films.
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[This is part one of a four-part series. You can also read part two, part three, and part four.]
While discussing which movie to review for next week’s /Filmcast, my co-hosts instantly gravitated towards David Yates’ newest take on the Harry Potter universe, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Having seen the wonderful and thrilling trailer for this film (in IMAX no less), I wasn’t opposed to this, but I was forced to make an uncomfortable confession: I had never watched a Harry Potter film or read a Harry Potter book in my life. The reasons for such a travesty are numerous and varied, but as Sam Seaborn once said, let’s not focus on the fact that I’m late to the party; let’s just be glad I arrived at all.
I contemplated watching the film without watching any of the previous films but was told by many, many, many people that this would be a terrible idea. Not only would the new film not make any sense, but I would be robbing myself of experiencing the entire Harry Potter storyline. So, I decided to undertake the task of watching all five films and writing some brief reflections about each one, culminating in a viewing and a review of the sixth film later this week. My hope is that this will spark some conversation about the previous films, and help us appreciate the benefits and shortcomings of each one’s contributions to this epic series.
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