TheFranciscos.Net

Feeling really awful today… I’ve got one of the most horrible headaches you can imagine. Work, of course, isn’t making it any better. At least I’m ahead of schedule on most of my development stuff so I can afford to relax a bit… of course I wish that it could translate to some days off. As it stands right now, with the week vacation I took in September, added with a few days off here and there, I actually owe the company money because I have -2 days of PTO.

Anyway, I got to watch a few good movies this past week – Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets on the big screen, and The Sum Of All Fears, Star Wars: Attack Of The Clones, and Lord Of The Rings: Fellowship Of The Ring Extended Edition. Here’s some quick thoughts on each:

The Chamber Of Secrets was probably my least liked book of all the Harry Potter books so far (my favorite being The Prisoner Of Azkaban), but I have to admit that this was an extremely faithful adaptation of the book. Great job most especially with Dobby, who was very believable and had just enough screen time to not be too annoying. The kids have also become better actors since the last movie (especially Ruper Grint who plays Ron Weasley) and makes the film much more enjoyable than the previous one. If I have a gripe about this movie, it’s that the Quidditch scenes, which gave life to The Sorcerer’s Stone, are so few. All in all though, well worth the time and money spent.

The DVDs were also quite good – I enjoyed Star Wars Episode II as much as I did when I first saw it – something tells me that this DVD will spend lots of time as reference material for my HT system. The Sum Of All Fears was all right, but I still think that out of all the Jack Ryans to play the role, Alec Baldwin is still the best. Ben Affleck just doesn’t cut it for me (as the lead actor in any movie).

The DVD I enjoyed the most though was definitely The Fellowship Of The Ring. It has 30 minutes of additional scenes (adding to an already massive 170+ minutes), but every minute was a great addition and fleshed out the characters much more. Like the book, the hobbits actually sing in one of the added scenes. Another addition which was well-pu were the gifts given by Lothlorien to the members of the fellowship. The best thing about the DVD though were the excellent documentaries about this huge theatrical project. It really gives you great understanding and appreciation of the work done to give people a few hours of entertainment.

If you buy only one DVD (or DVD set), make sure it’s The Fellowship Of The Ring. The picture and sound are probably among the best this format has to offer – and of course, the movie is also excellent. This definitely gets my vote for the best DVD of the year.