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Yesterday I went to see the HP movie The Order of the Phoenix. I don't get to the movies very often but I could hardly go back to school without seeing that, right? It was great. I think it's the best one so far.
I have spent the past couple of weeks borrowing the older movies from the library and watching them again. After I finished reading Deathly Hallows I felt the need to review the history. The first three movies were somewhat boring. I found them childish and trite. Hermione's character really annoyed me. I can't stand when female actors rely completely on expressions of negative emotion to display character. Hermione is always irritated, annoyed, angry or frustrated. She hasn't much depth in the first three movies. Ron is really shallow too - he's just a bumbling fool playing side kick.
But when I watched The Goblet of Fire the other day I was much more impressed. I really liked how Hermione came into herself. She had a far greater range of emotion. At the Yule Ball she showed some delicate blossoming. Ron is still an idiot, but he also showed some depth in subtle facial expression. He realizes his weaknesses and works to overcome them, even taking risks at being rejected in order to restore friendships.
The actors are growing up and getting better at their craft. I really like how the friendship between Hermione and Harry is developed. Their interchanges seem genuine and tender. At times I began to forget it was a movie, which never happened in the first three portrayals. I wonder if I like this movie better than the first three because I am a grown up and a mother; I am interested in the coming-of-age theme more than the magic/wizarding/fantasy elements.
Order of the Phoenix is the best one yet. I was glad they all had better hair cuts (mom speaking here). I felt so sorry for Harry in his loneliness and confusion. I cried several times, particularly in the scenes when he is with Sirius having heart to heart talks. I can see Harry being nurtured by the adults at Hogwarts more than I noticed before. He is clearly loved and cared for as a person and not just a savior/sacrificial lamb/superhero. His sweet personality shines.
As a teacher I was intrigued by the scenes where the professors are arguing or challenging each other. It puts me on red alert when Prof. McGonigall and Dolores Umbridge go head to head on the stairs in front of the students. I wanted to tell them to go in an office or something. It was heartbreaking when Umbridge fired poor Trelawney in front of everyone. I thought Snape did the best job of showing his complexity in this movie. He clearly was on the good side and helped Potter out even though you could see he hated Harry's father because of the way he was bullied in childhood.
Dolores Umbridge takes the cake though. She is my worst nightmare; you know how Harry is afraid he is like Voldemort and turning into him? Well I am sometimes afraid I could turn into Umbridge. She is so evil and clever and hateful. She enjoys a pink frosting of pleasantries on top of her wicked satisfaction with causing pain. She gives me chills. If I ever go to the dark side I will be her student.
I think that David Yates, who directed Order of the Phoenix and is starting to film Half Blood Prince in the fall, did a fantastic job in this movie. I think it is true to the book and far more challenging, thoughtful and poignant than the first three movies. I haven't read through all the books again this summer so I am wondering if this impression is valid. Has anyone else read all the books and seen all the movies this summer? What did you think about how they were done on screen?
Notes about diversity: Watching the movies I paid a lot more attention to racial/ethnic diversity than I did while reading. Perhaps because it is visual? Some of my random thoughts:
- I liked Kingsley's character and I wish he had more of an active role with speaking parts.
- I noticed that at the Yule Ball in Goblet Harry, Ron and Cedric all had Asian women for dates. I never saw an Asian man in any of the movies, did you? I wondered about the stereotypes of Asian women and if that had any influence in the roles.
- I didn't see any blacks at the Yule ball at all. Did you?
- I wish some of the major characters were other than white. None of the heroes or bad guys were anything but Caucasian. I read a review saying HP is multi-culti because of the muggles and half bloods, but I don't think that applies.
- What about international students? Was there a presence at Hogwarts of any International student activities or clubs? Wouldn't you expect that?
- There were several black students in the background at Hogwarts. I wondered if they have a Black Student Union. Just an odd thought that ran through my mind.
- I wonder if there are any gay/lesbian wizards? Do they have a GLBT group?
I don't mean to criticize Rowling for these things, it's just what I was wondering about. I feel a little affinity for Rowling because she's about the same age as me and was a single mother of a baby when she started writing the books. I think we have a lot in common. I don't expect her to put characters in her story just to satisfy some ideal of "diversity". I just notice it when I watching and reading, and wonder about it. I think noticing what I notice says something about me, and about our culture in general. I use these "
noticings and
wonderings" as a way of examining my own perspectives. What did you notice about race?
Suzanne from Adventures in Daily Living gave me the Blogger Reflection award last week. I am so tickled to be on her list! Here's how she describes the award:
this award should make you reflect on five bloggers who have been an encouragement, a source of love, impacted you in some way, and have been a Godly example to you. Five Bloggers who when you reflect on them you get a sense of pride and joy… of knowing them and being blessed by them.
I had to think about this for a while, since there are so many blogs on my blogroll that I am enjoying this summer. I think I will chose five of my newer daily reads:
- Woman of the Tiger Moon: "Writing about single motherhood, homeschooling, gardening, gender constructs, and attempts at finding serenity and grace in the daily joys, blessings and vicissitudes of family life."
- The Whole Self: "I love touching yarn, attachment parenting, doulas, midwives, stacks of books, debriefing, black and white photos, cuddling, human anatomy and physiology, baggage, memories, organic eating, holistic health, knitting, trolls, anais nin, being spartan, children's books, fabric, family, herbs, houseguests, iced coffee, letterboxing, the idea of yoga."
- Mother Rising: " Mother, Artist, Vegetarian... and Chocoholic!"
- Lucky Beans: Writer, artist, gardener, and mom to three gorgeous children. They've just moved back to the States from Zambia.
- Gluten Free Girl: "food, stories, recipes, love" Shauna has just married the Chef. Her writing makes me hungry happy to be alive.
So, no real "kidlit" book blogs here. I guess I have been wandering the blogosphere a bit lately. It's August, right? I haven't posted as many book reviews lately either. I have some good ones coming up though, promise.
Here's what I am reading, listed at GoodReads. Until then, enjoy browsing the blogs above. All these bloggers are fabulous photographers, writers, and thinkers who are dancing through their days with joyful abandon. My heart lifts every time I visit them. Go see!
My son Buddy is going to be five years old at the end of the month. He is begging me for a Gameboy Advance. He found his older brother's old Gameboy from 10 or more years ago in a drawer and he has been playing Super Mario on it. I am pretty clueless about video games, as my oldest son is not really interested and I have pretty much ignored them all. I'd much rather have my kids messing around outside, riding bikes and playing ball.
Anyway I am thinking about getting Buddy a Gameboy for his birthday. Can anyone help me figure out what type to get? What games are good for a five year old? I know Pokemon is huge, but is it good? Do they learn anything from that (other than wanting to buy more games and stuff)? If he is going to be plugged in to a game machine I want it to be non-violent and not a big consumer-hook. I'm not crazy about movie tie-ins. I'd want it to be educational, challenging and creative. I teach computer to kids and I always try to choose creative, communicative, problem-solving, challenging and thoughtful games for my students so I know they are out there. I just don't know what's available for Gameboy. What do your kids play? What do you think of it?
I heard a great interview on NPR the other day. It was (Bottled Water: A Symbol of US Commerce, Culture) with Charles Fishman, author of an article published in Fast Company magazine about the bottled water industry. His article is entitled "Message in a Bottle." I was going to try to write a post about what I learned about bottled water, but then I saw another blogger already did a great job so I am just linking her.
Unplug Your Kids heard the same interview and did a great post.
Then there is this information about plastics leaching chemicals into your water. Read this if you and your kids drink from plastic bottles especially!
We are driving to the beach today. That cute toddler in the picture is driving us. I'll be back to host the Friday Poetry round up.
Vanity Fair is putting out an Africa issue this month. I just watched a music video of the photo shoot they did to take the cover photos:
In this behind-the-scenes footage, which is accompanied by a beautiful track from popular Senegalese singer Youssou N'Dour, Annie Leibovitz and guest editor Bono go about the business of creating the issue's 20 iconic covers. "It's a visual chain letter," says Leibovitz, "spreading the message from person to person to person."
Fascinating stuff! There are also articles on
Madonna's Malawi,
The Lazarus Effect ,and
Africa: An Interactive Map.
Thanks to
Chasing Ray for the link. Be sure to check out her
Summer Blog Blast Tour of author interviews starting on Sunday.
National Wildlife Federation has a haiku contest going on. I think the only prize is the chance to see your haiku on their website next month. What the heck, it sounds like fun. You know I love haiku!
And have you checked out their Green Hour program? Get those kids out of the house and away from the screens a little.
They have something else brewing called the Great American Backyard Campout. It's happening all over on June 23. Sounds like time for S'Mores!
Last year at the end of the school year I had been blogging for about three months. Over the summer I discovered and played with:
- RSS feeds; Bloglines and Blogroll. I started using them so I could keep reading blogs on summer vacation without having to figure out how to remember or transport all my favorite blog URLs to my home computer.
- Del.icio.us so I could transfer my favorites/link lists to my home computer
- Flickr so I could share more of my digital photos with friends and family; but more importantly so I could post them on my blog without having to mess with bloggers dog-gone s-l-l-o-o-o-w-w-w upload times and glitches.
- Trying to sell things on E-bay. Not too successful, but interesting.
By the end of summer I was exploring the 23 Things and learning about:
- LibraryThing
- Technorati
- Wikis
- YouTube
- Pandora
- NetLibrary
- Podcasts
- Image Generator toys
- Rollyo
- FD toys on Flickr
Here's a list of the Web 2.0 awards from May. (Here's the short list of just the winners) I wonder what I will discover this summer. What have you started playing with lately?
Make your own news here. Mary Ann at A Year of Reading is doing the round up. Fun!
Do you have Celiac? This is a link to the BEST food blog in the universe. It's not just about food - it's about being full of joy and loving life. It's beautiful writing. And here she is teaching us about how to be healthier.
Did you know that 1 out of 100 people in the U.S. has Celiac disease? And only about 3 % of us know it. That means at least one of you reading this today ( and someone else in your family) is celiac, and you probably don't know it. Go read that link and think about it.
Checked these off my to-do list for summer prep:
- Finished writing report cards and updating curriculum maps for the school year
- Cheered as oldest son repaired, sanded, scraped, primed and painted the porch
- Planted the hanging baskets, window boxes, bedding plants, tomatoes and herbs
- Invited grandparents to preschool graduation and registered graduate for kindergarten (gasp!)
- Signed the preschooler/entering-kindergartner up for summer camp four mornings a week
- Registered and paid for family pool pass
- Bought, put together and hung the new porch swing
- Compiled a list of YA novels and teaching writing texts to check out of the library
- checked that the ice-cream maker is chilling in the freezer
- stocked up on sparklers, sunscreen, bug spray, poison ivy weed-killer and popsicles
Bring on those lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer!
What he said. I hear that!
Where is our rage?
This iris bud is to remind me of my potential. Yesterday it was a bud; this morning when we ate breakfast it was open in loveliness.
HipWriterMama has been writing inspiring posts every Monday. She is doing a 30 day challenge to encourage anyone who wants to participate to work on establishing a new good habit. She says, "...with every productive new habit, you'll find more motivation and determination to work toward your dream. And that is what I'd like this Challenge to show you. Your ability to work towards your goal no matter what."
I am joining in this week with my goal for the next month: My 30 day challenge goal is to study Nancy Atwell's "Lessons that Change Writers" and practice writing my own small moments of memoirs. I mean I will read her book in stages through out the month and write every day.
I have been intrigued by how teachers are using Atwell's ideas on teaching writing. I would like to learn to write those "small moments" that take a seed of experience and nurture it into a little sprout of beautiful writing. One step beyond haiku, if you will.
I am going to borrow the book from a teacher friend and work my way through the lessons, with myself as the student. Atwell is a seventh and eight grade writing teacher. I am putting myself in the learner's position to see how much I can get done. I am going to spend time every night writing - not for the blog or work or anything other than learning the practice of crafting memoirs in small pieces. Here is a sample lesson from the book.
I'll be checking in with Vivian every Monday to report how it's going. I invite you to join in and work on developing a habit of your own. It can be any little thing you want to practice... Go read and see what others are doing.
I have a couple questions for the group. Every time I check my site meter I find several searches for this image. Last winter I posted about St. Nicholas day and putting out shoes out, and I linked to this image. I didn't even post the actual picture, just a link. Now lots of other people are looking for that picture. Why? What is the big deal with this picture? I am telling you two or three people a day come to my site looking for this picture. Can anyone explain this mystery to me?
Another question I have about image searches: sometimes in my sitemeter I see people have been searching for my pictures on Flickr. How do they do that? And why? Do they see the picture on Flickr and wonder where it's been posted on the web? It looks to me like the search term is the url of the photo on Flickr, so that must be what they are doing. Why?
One thing I hate about the new blogger; when someone does a search they don't get the actual post in the results, they get a page with the archive of the month the post appeared. So instead of getting something about the author/book they are looking for they get to read a month of my blog. That would annoy me if I was the searcher. Why can't they just get the thing they are looking for, instead of having to continue to search a month's worth of posts to find it? For example: this search term, "thelma cooke unseen companion" gets you this as the fifth entry in the Google search results: http://awrungsponge.blogspot.com/2006_07_01_archive.html. Then you have to scroll down through all the July posts to find the one about Unseen Companion. Annoying! Why can't a Google search come up with the individual post?
Thoughts anyone?
I am particularly interested in books that involve Black, Asian, Native American and Hispanic kids as well as White kids. I have been trying to think of a way to say in the header that this blog is mostly about books by, about, or including people of color. That is a mouthful of a phrase but I couldn't figure out how to reduce it and mean the same thing. I don't particularly like the terms "multicultural" or "diversity".
When I was growing up I remember hearing the term "salt and pepper" as meaning a mixed family or group. Salt is white and pepper comes in a lot of shades of brown and black. That's the kind of books I am reading and writing about here so I think it is a good description. What do you think? Does it give you the picture of my kind of books?
I have decided to join in with TV turn off week. The first time I did this Buster was in first grade. It seemed like a crazy idea at the time but a lot of families in the school where I was teaching were doing it so I joined in. It was hard at first. We really missed our favorite shows. But we ended up spending more time having fun together and it was amazing how relaxing our late afternoons and evenings were. We went back to watching TV after that week, but it changed my perspective on a lot of things. Commercials, for one thing. They are a lot more ridiculous and obnoxious once you get a little break. Consumerism is not as pretty once you get out from under the spell.
Over the years Buster and I gradually got unplugged more and more. I only have one TV and it's not a very good one. I got rid of cable when he was about 12 because I didn't want him watching all that junk. All my old favorite shows went off the air and I didn't get attached to any new ones. A couple of years ago I put our TV up in the attic so Buddy wouldn't get hooked on it before he was preschool age. I liked having it up in the attic because it kept Buddy from always getting into it. It's a lot easier to keep a toddler from getting into mischief with turning the box on and off and on and off and sticking things in the VCR if it's not in the room where they play. I took it back down to the living room again when the Pope died and we had a German exchange student living with us. We wanted to watch the funeral and the new Pope being chosen.
I have the TV in the living room again and I am noticing that we are getting to rely on it more and more. My boys are put in front of a TV at their day care. That is one of the things I really don't like about it there. I have questioned it and the teacher say they only use it when they are busy fixing lunches or it's raining... but the truth is both little guys have learned to sit still and watch TV more than I think is healthy for toddlers and preschoolers. The American Academy of Pediatrics says it's better to have no TV at all for children under 2. That makes a lot of sense to me. They are developmentally invested in wandering around investigating and manipulating and touching things to explore their world. They should be talking to people in real life, not watching the screen.
Anyway, Punkin, my two year old, comes in the house after school every day and goes straight to the movie shelf. He loves Thomas the Tank. He shouts with glee when Curious George music comes on the TV. He can sit still in my lap for half an hour with his thumb in his mouth and watch TV. I like the cuddle time but I don't think it's healthy for him to be so attached to the magic box already. I got in the habit of letting them watch while I am cooking dinner. Usually it is only half an hour but since they sit so still and quiet it is really hard not to let that stretch into an hour or two... LOL the free time is so attractive! So I think we need a TV turn off week.
Buddy is having his tonsils out on Monday morning. My mom is going to take care of him at her house the rest of the week while I go back to work. He has to be out of school for 7 to 10 days and I thank God she is able to do it because I don't have that many sick days left. I decided if she lets him watch TV at her house that is her prerogative, but at our house we will have it unplugged.
I wish there was a way to know how much electricity I save by not having the whole set up plugged in. I guess I could try to read the meter and then read it again at the end of the week and compare that to a normal week... anyone ever do that?
Links:
Journey to Mom
Unplug your kids - she's doing the blog challenge
TV Turn Off Network
Fact Sheets
Ad Busters
Facts, FAQs, Alternative Ideas
Crayola Activity Calendar
I have been toying with the idea of making book lists for the past six months or so. I thought about:
- Making lists in blog posts and linking them in my sidebar; but if it is just a plain list with no links that seems boring to me.
- I would want to have links to Amazon or somewhere so you could read reviews and see book covers, and I don't feel totally comfortable linking a big chain bookstore.
- I thought about making a list at Amazon and linking that - I have explored other peoples listmania lists and experimented with that. I just don't like feeling like I am selling for them.
- I thought about using LibraryThing to make a list by tags. I am not good about being consistent and thorough in my tags. I just spent about an hour editing tags to match "board books" with "board book" and "primary" with "primary grades". Tags are always a work in progress with me.
- The other thing about LibraryThing is that not all my books are in there and not all the books in my list are actually owned by me. Most of the ones I borrowed from the library and loved enough to want to include are tagged "wishlist", but not all.
- Of the books I actually own, I have only LibraryThing cataloged the ones I want to discuss or recommend. Mostly they are by, about or illustrating people of color, are kids' books, or deal with education, adoption or parenting.
Anyway, if you go to my library on LibraryThing and click on some of my tags you will see a list of toddler books, picture books, multicultural books, African American, etc. You can also see who else has those books, read some reviews and find links to the books at book sellers or WorldCat (which shows you which local libraries near you have the book). I would really appreciate it if you would look that over and tell me if you find it helpful or useful. Also, if there are books you would recommend leave me a comment and I will add them to my wish list. I am always looking for more really excellent kids books by, about and illustrating people of color. What are your favorites? Do you have a list or a link to a website that has a good list?
For those of you who may not know it, this week is the celebration of Yom Hashoah, honoring the victims (Black, Gay, Handicapped, Jewish) of the Holocaust. It falls on Sunday and many churches of varied faiths are honoring this holiday as a part of their services. Traditionally, the following poem is read as the 6 candles (for the 6 million who died) are lit.The last, the very last,
So richly, brightly, dazzlingly yellow.
Perhaps if the sun's tears would sing
against a white stone....
Such, such a yellow
Is carried lightly 'way up high.
It went away I'm sure
because it wished
to kiss the world good-bye.For seven weeks I've lived in here,
Penned up inside this ghetto.
But I have found what I love here.
The dandelions call to me
And the white chestnut branches in the court.
Only I never saw another butterfly.
That butterfly was the last one.
Butterflies don't live in here, in the ghetto.
Pavel Friedman, April 6, 1942
Born in
Prague on January 7, 1921.
Deported to the Terezin Concentration Camp on April 26, 1942.
Died in Aushchwitz on September 29, 1944.
Kiri Davis is in second place now! Did you know you can vote once a day, every day? Go over there and see her film A Girl Like Me and vote or vote again! She is up for a scholarship from CosmoGirl. Spread the word - she is talented and smart and made an amazing film.
I blogged about Kiri Davis before; she made a film showing how young children are sensitized to good/bad images of race. She repeated the Clark doll study from the 60s to see if young children would prefer white baby dolls over dark skinned ones. Sure enough, white and black kids said the white dolls were more beautiful, better and smarter than the black dolls. It is heartbreaking to watch this film. We need to work on this people!
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the only thing that disappointed me about OotP (the movie) was how *edited* it was. it was probably the shortest of all the HP movies, yet so much was left out. something that will be crucial in the last movie is that there was no cleaning of the house (when they find a locket they can't open, and how they kept finding kreacher with stuff they were trying to throw away). indeed, i wanted to see more of kreacher. and the part about mr. weasley getting bitten by the snake was much shorter than in the book. in the movie, harry has the dream, then you suddenly see him being rushed down the hallways of the school, and then suddenly mr. weasley is fine. it was so choppy here (and in other parts too) it felt like someone had literally cut scenes out with scissors.
but yes, overall, the movie was still wonderful :)
I didn't really like this movie. I love the Harry Potter books, and this movie just seemed like it went way to fast. I thought the movie missed some important parts also. I guess it was just way to choppy for me.
Isn't this the book with the song "Weasley is our King" I think it is, I understand they had to cut stuff out that wasn't so relevent, but I liked that little plot line for Ron. He never gets the glory and at towards the end of book 5 he was. I missed that, but I understand why they cut it.
I hope the next movies are better.
You are correct, they cut a lot out. I was thinking that if you hadn't read the books you would have no idea what was going on. So much doesn't make sense without the missing parts. Andrea you are right about Kretcher. He is important and they totally missed that.
re: weasley is our king: was there quidditch at *all* in this movie? i don't think there was. it was not in GoF either, book or movie, but that was written into the plot. and of course it's not in DH for obvious reasons.
I didn't like the movie because I had just read the book, which made it even more obvious how much stuff was left out. They streamlined some plot points - like Kreacher - that kinda matter to the series.
On the other hand, my husband - the movie guy - really liked it. He thought it was well done as a film and was really impressed with Daniel Radcliffe's growth as an actor.
On the issue of diversity - or lack thereof - I've noticed it in all of the movies. Like you mentioned, with it being so visual a medium, it becomes more obvious than when reading the books. I suspect that the producers don't have much choice but to follow the books, but then there's the question of diversity in the books. Interesting thoughts.
Granted, I went to public schools, but I don't recall there being very many international students, much less enough for a club on their own. As I recall (in very hazy memories, admittedly), the international students hung with the language clubs that were relevant to them, i.e. the kid from Germany came to German club meetings.
As for black students groups or LGBT groups, I know it's been a long time for me since junior high and high school, but I don't recall those either. I didn't see separate groups for those until college. Although again, it was a long time ago, there wasn't as much of a push to accept diversity by separating everyone out (hrm, this is an interesting concept...) at that time, whether you define "time" as around 1983-84, which is when I would have been 15, or 10th grade, my level in school when I was 15.
I love the books -- greatly dislike the films (am very difficult to please that way!) but go to see them anyway with my teenager! Still, I do think OoP was the best one yet, and I do like the trio of actors very much. I just think that as adaptations they aren't particularly good. An excellent example of a particularly fine film adaptation of a beloved book was the recent (well, not so long ago) The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.
Re: diversity -- we write what we know, particularly our first novels. And HP was really one long novel, that's how JKR says she thought of it. So I guess I am not surprised (?). In the books Dean is black, Cho is AngloAsian, and the Patil twins are AngloIndian, or perhaps Pakistani. Oh, and yes, Kingsley is black. But that's it. So really, the movies couldn't be expected to be particularly diverse. In terms of there being international students, other countries had their own wizarding schools -- there didn't seem to be much educational mixing that way. Also, and JKR has talked about this, she put in quite a lot regarding racial diversity in terms of the different magical beings: merpeople, house elves, giants, goblins, centaurs and so on. So it's there, just not presented in our real-world "white" vs. "other" reality.
And I think I'll stop rambling now!
You are right, there is a lot of "racial" diversity when you include other types of beings. Hermione's concerns about house elves and the Goblin's alternate view of possessions comes to mind. I was struck by how important the Goblins' possessive feelings toward the Griffindor sword came into the story and how Harry and Ron didn't really understand the significance of that, although Hermione began to understand it. There is more to think about here. It makes me want to re-read them all! LOL
I have to agree with some of the comments that this was my least favorite movie too, but now my least favorite book. I think it's really hard to separate the 2. As for the racial issues, maybe JK Rowling doesn't bring them up in particular because there's more than just "racial" diversity in the wizarding world -- like the dwarfs, the giants, the pure-bloods, etc. Those differences trump any racial differences. Thanks for bringing up such an interesting point.