Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets – MOVIE – Episode 103
The Buddies continue their marathon with movie #2, Harry Potter and the Chambers of Secrets, directed by Chris Columbus. The Buddies delved into a number of movie topics including: Mr. Weasley’s book vs movie differences, the uncanny similarity between Quidditch and Star Wars space battles, and whether Moaning Myrtle’s voice is more terrifying than the basilisk itself. So, grab your broken wand (and maybe consider turning it around), watch out for basilisk snakes/Lucius Malfoy in the hallways, and get your slow clap ready for this week’s episode.
Intro (0:00-1:25)
Stock Up/Down (1:20-37:11)
Favorite Scene/Character/Magical Elements (37:12-54:17)
Conclusion (54:18-55:09)
NEXT Episode: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by J. K. Rowling
Transcript for SEO Purposes 🙂
Alright. Welcome to Book Club. I’m Dylan, here with the man who is just a stick with a ball for a head. Keith, what’s up, buddy? Hello, Dylan.
I didn’t know you could read. Alright. We’re back. Hey. Gotcha.
My reference for those that weren’t aware is that Dobby was the actor, quote, unquote, who played Dobby, was just a ball Oh. Without attached to a stick. Alright. Makes sense. Yeah.
Yeah. Exactly. Here at the Buddy Book Club, we’re breaking down some box office bangers. And this week, we’ll be discussing 2 thousand two’s Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets film. If you’d like to recommend a book or movie for us to read or watch, reach reach out to us.
Buddy Past episodes, you can visit our website, buddybookclub.com. Slide into our DMs or Twitter or Instagram, buddybookup podcasts. You can listen to us on iTunes and Spotify, wherever you’re podcasts. So please download and give us a review. Give us a follow on social media.
All that good stuff, please, and thank you, Keith. Our trip on the Hogwarts Express continues. We’ve done Sorcerer’s Stone book and movie. We’ve done the Chamber of Secrets book, and so now, naturally, we are on to the Chamber of Secrets film. I’ve seen it countless times.
This is your first time seeing Chamber of Secrets movie. Right? Correct. Yeah. Without further ado, let’s just jump into to stock up, stock down.
For stock up, what do you got? Stock up, really hating a coworker. Oh. Fortunately, I’ve had good coworkers along the way. I haven’t really experienced this, but I’ve I’ve heard those horror stories.
You know, luckily, I was able to meet d man, a lot of my I mean, just partner. I mean, just able to meet d man at work, so that hasn’t really happened for me. But Lock cart clearly fits the bill of someone that the co workers absolutely despise. And one of the biggest tonal changes, I think, from the book to the movie and correct me if I’m wrong here D man is, when we find out Ginny has been taken to the Chamber of Secrets, it’s in I believe the teachers lounge or whatever, right? The teachers like, break room where they’re smoking cigarettes and whatnot.
And I think McGonigle had just come back or was just talking to the Weasleys. She’s, like, super somber and one of the hardest conversations you can have. So she’s just kinda, like, gone mentally. The vibe I got was, like, everyone in the teacher’s lounge is terrible mood, and then Locker comes in all being, like, hello, everyone. What did I miss?
Yeah. You know what? Look, like, go you’ll fucking figure out yourself, you, like, dickhead. They’re pissed at them. You go figure it out type of thing.
Right? In the movie, I don’t know if you caught the vibe on the movie, but this is 5 seconds after them them telling Ginny is likely dead and captured. McGonagall, I don’t know how else to describe it other than has a look of pure ecstasy and glee and joy and gratification of being able to tell Lockhart he has to go find her. She’s like, oh, guess what? You’re gonna have to go find her now.
And she’s, like, smiling. I’m, like Yeah. Like, what? She hates him so much that it was almost worth it for to her that Janique may be dead in order to expose his fraud, which I think a lot of people can relate to. So, stock up really hitting a coworker.
Yeah. She was jazzed. All in all, it’s not a great look for McGonagall. Her character takes a couple of hits. But, yes, she was almost gleeful that Ginny was taken so that she can She’s, like, smiling.
So that she can call Lockhart on his shit, which is hilarious. McGonigal’s supposed to be a caring, though stern, and strict, but fair person. Like, that’s her thing. This is more the fake McGonigal that I created with the house cup vetting system. It’s like she had gambled that one kid would get murdered, and now Lockhart has to be on the case.
So she’s just tickled pink with the idea knowing that Ginny’s gonna die. So she’s like, yes. I’m gonna win that, the squares that we have going that a child will die. Got a great look for right there. My first stock up is and then a lot of these are just gonna be, like, movie based naturally.
And I think I did this for the last one, but it just needs to be said again. The the child actors, that’s a stock up for me. It’s just child actors in general. I don’t know if it was because when we were kids that kids’ movies with child actors were big, or now that we’re older, we just don’t see them. But, you know, I can think of countless movies, like, movies that were out in the theater that were directed at kids.
Usually, they’re sports related movies. But, The Sandlot, Stand by Me, The Goonies, like, these are Blockbuster Steven Spielberg attached movies that have child actors. I feel like there’s been some maybe like Super 8 or something like that or whatever those other ones were. But so I feel like we don’t have a lot of those lately is my point. And, usually, the act child actors are pretty terrible.
I am once again in this movie surprised by how good the actors were, like the kid actors. I thought, in general, all of the acting was very good in this movie, but I wanna call out Rupert Grint, for 1, who plays Ron. His facial expressions are top notch. The guy can act without speaking, which is a talent in its own right. Supposedly, in the Forbidden Forest, when they, like, meet Aragog, That’s probably his his peak for the facial acting because he’s the character.
Ron is deathly afraid of spiders. Well, it turns out that Rupert Grint also has serious arachnophobia, and he was so scared of spiders. This part, I don’t believe that Method. Method acting. Yeah.
He just got scared of spiders. He went to, like, the desert, slept with camel spiders crawling on him just so he could get deathly afraid of them. No. But this part, I don’t necessarily believe that the actor Rupert had hasn’t seen in full the the part with the spiders because it scares him too much. I was like, oh.
I know when he was a kid, I enjoyed that, but, yeah, I know. I don’t know. But supposedly, he was able to draw upon his fear of spiders. He just thought about spiders during that scene, because obviously, there’s no there’s no spiders there. But he just thought about spiders and was able to do all those facial expressions, so proud of him.
You know, 10 points for Gryffindor on that one. And then I thought both Malfoy’s, but Draco was really good in this once again. He’s just so hateable. He does a such a good job of being hateable throughout. And you had referenced at the top his, I didn’t know you could read line.
The the guy straight up improvised that. He forgot what his line was supposed to be, so he just turns to Harry as Goyle and is like, I didn’t know you could read. It’s a great pronunciation of Potter. Just a phenomenal. Potter.
Yeah. Yeah. I I love it. So all in all, I thought the child acting was great. Ginny, maybe not so much.
But Ginny has the funniest part of the movie. I don’t know what you’re talking about. When she almost died? What do you mean? No.
No. When they meet Lucius Malfoy and she, like, sticks up for Harry, the way the camera cut to her was hilarious. It was just, like, out of nowhere. The whole scene, I thought, was funny. I was, like, laughing Yeah.
Anyways. Yeah. I think Hermione also throws on a Dumbledore line there it’s like fear of a name is fear of the thing itself or something like that, which I’m pretty sure was a Dumbledore line from the first book. But, yeah, Ginny, although maybe not my favorite, doesn’t create issues in this one. In future movies, I fear that I will be talking a lot about how much I hate Ginny Weasley.
You’re, leading the witness here. I I gotta see for myself. You keep on mentioning it, but we haven’t even seen her act yet. Yeah. She had, like, 4 lines.
And there’s a reason she had 4 lines in a book that she has a lot of lines in. So She doesn’t really speak much in the book. I was looking for her to be more of, like, breadcrumbs in order to, like, see, oh, obviously, that she was being taken care of. But it wasn’t really that apparent, I don’t think, of the book. That she was the one that had the diary and was doing all this stuff?
Yeah. You’d think they’d throw in a couple scenes of her, like, pushing her food around at the Gryffindor house table and just looking glum. What else do you have for stock up? Up? Stock up, attempted murder in a school.
Oh my Jesus. My god. What? Go on. What are you talking about?
Well, the scene with Lucius Malfoy and, I mean, obviously, there’s a much thicker change from the book. But and and Dumbledore is great. That that team is great with them too talking. But then, Luzunova walks away and Harry is like, I’ll I’ll get him and brings him the the sock in the book, which I kinda wanted to see Harry take off his sock, the sweaty dripping sock and put the book around it. I think that would’ve been better, but they they didn’t.
He put it in the book. But he tricks them and then Dobby’s freed because of that. And instead of being like, what the hell? Like, like, you know, get a little upset about it, he pulls out the Avada Kedavra or whatever. What’s the killing curse?
Yeah. Avacadabra. Yeah. He pulls that out day 1. That was just in front of everyone ready just to kill.
A student over that. So, and is there no such thing as attempted murder in the the the wizarding world? Like, he can just get away with that? He’s like, well, I guess I got pushed back while I was trying to literally kill someone. But what are you gonna do?
Let’s just, move on. Yeah. I found that part to be pretty interesting and wonder if he just went off the rails there because, supposedly, there’s some improvising around that scene where the actor, Christopher Columbus, just said, you know, go for it. Like, say something else to Harry, and he was like, you might not last long here or something like that. You know, you’re not always gonna be around, and Harry’s like, yes.
I will be, which they both just improvised, and, yeah, cool. Good for them. Fine line. But I’m wondering if he improvised the Avada Cadaver. 1, as movie watchers and also as book people at this time, we don’t know what that curse is.
So if you’ve read further in the books, you would know, obviously, it’s a killing curse. But if you’re trying to just, like, pull out of an Avada Kedavra in the middle of Hogwarts, you’re just sending yourself to like, you’re gonna kill Harry Potter here and then send yourself to Azkaban, which is I don’t know if they have the death penalty in, the wizarding world. I don’t think so. So, yeah, it seemed like a bit much over Dobby, even though I think the bigger problem Lucius had was that a child got one over on him. Mhmm.
But still to murder a child seems like a bit much. Apparently, you’re right. Apparently, he was improvising that because he was reading book 4, and he couldn’t think of any other cursors. And he was, like, oh, I’ll throw this out there. And they kept it in.
Oh, really? That’s what happened. That’s what I read. I mean, seems like that would be something that JK or someone would step in and be, like, yeah, we can’t have you just attempting murder in the middle of the hallway here. You’re a bad guy, but not that bad.
Yeah. Like, save it for book 4. Throw out this throw out the slug curse, and and we’ll call it a day. Right. Exactly.
Erectus, what is that again? I don’t know. You you Slugger erecta? Yeah. Something like that.
Yeah. My next stock up is you know, I gotta give it a shout out to to the CGI, and and maybe just the set pieces and practical effects as well. I thought Dobby looked incredible in in the movie. I I I wanna know your take because you had I mean, I’m sure you’ve seen Dobby. Yeah.
The problem is I’m I’m on Instagram, and now that I’m in the Harry Potter thing, I’m seeing so many clips. I’m like, I just slipped by them now because I’m like, fuck. I can’t be spoilers here. I was listening to a podcast today, and the ad talk about targeted podcast. The ad was for, like, the Harry Potter exhibit coming to Boston.
Oh, wow. They’re bringing, like, whole set pieces and whatnot That’s legit. To Boston. So, like I said, I thought Dobby was great. I loved the howler.
I loved the way it was represented. Like, how they I don’t know the word, but, like, personified the envelope to, like, make it seem like it was actually doing it. I love that stuff. I don’t think the mandrakes procedure actually, I know they weren’t. They were practical effects, but, there was just something we talked about on the book pod, and you were interested to see.
What did you think about the the mandrakes? Yeah. I think that that was kind of what I was expecting. But you can’t have, like, a little little baby there. You mentioned it too in the other pod.
They actually are, like, yeah, we’ll chop them up and murder them and, make a recipe out of them. I was, like, wait, what? So, they actually say that in the movie. So They look more like ginseng or something like that. And They look like they deserve to die, so that’s fine.
Yeah. Definitely deserve to die. Yeah. Supposedly, the and I’m gonna say supposedly a lot because some of the stuff I saw on the Internet, I’m not a 100% sure on. So if I say supposedly, it means no one can clap back with me.
We’re fine. Yeah. We’re fine with that. It’s all true. The Dumbledore office was, like, the most expensive set piece to be created in the cinematic history or something like that, which I don’t know how that’s possible.
But, suppose I feel like Christopher Nolan makes, like, set pieces that move and rotate and, like, Inception. Like, that wasn’t more costly? I think that was just a hallway that moved. It just felt good to be back at Hogwarts. And I I don’t know if it’s necessarily a hate for me, but, once again, I feel like this movie, just like the book, is just kind of like an extension of the first book and movie, and it’s the same kinda thing done all over again.
But if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. And as someone who, when I saw this movie in 2002, hadn’t been in the Harry Potter universe in a year, like the cinematic universe. It just felt good to be back. I think wherever they filmed it, like the castle or school or whatever they wherever they did, the estate, It’s just so perfect. I loved everything about being back in there and seeing stuff.
I mean, even McGonagall’s classroom before she goes into her Chamber of Secrets spiel, which I’ll get into later, it’s just so cool. Like, there’s it’s massive. There’s animals hanging in cages all over the place, there’s crazy drawings on boards. I feel like any of those wide shot scenes, you can just pause and spend a long time just looking at all the different stuff happening. And that includes the Weasley house, which I thought was awesome and done so well.
It’s like a little cottage that you can tell this family has grown. And as they’ve grown, they’ve built onto this little cottage, and it’s such a junky way, but it works for them. And even down to their dining room table, which has all sorts of mismatched chairs that they probably got at the, you know, the local yard sale, I I loved it. It. So the look of it felt great.
Yeah. And I don’t know if it’s good or bad, but when I was reading, I was picturing more of the Harry Potter movie world. So when I saw this movie, it wasn’t as much of a, oh, yeah. That’s what that would look like. So I’m already invested in the first movie.
Now I’m carrying those ideas over to the second one. So, like, now that I’m seeing the movie, I’m, like, not as Mhmm. Not surprised as much as I was, I guess, when I reread the first one or watched the first movie. Yeah. So someone who hasn’t seen a lot of the movies and now you’re rereading the books and have now starting to see the movies.
Are you finding that your pictures in your mind from the movies are taking over your pictures in your mind from the books? Yeah. Which is unfortunate, but I also think that’s a little bit just revisionist history. Right? When I’m reading it, I’m not I’m just, like, picturing whatever I wanna picture, then I watch it and it it’s, like, yeah, that’s what I was picturing, you know.
So it’s just more of that, like, self fulfilling prophecy that you’re Yeah. Which you don’t know which came first, the chicken or the egg or my imagination or the the movie. So Well, no. The it’s it’s for sure that the egg came first. Yeah.
That’s that’s how it works because you can’t yeah. Wow. You’ve solved the that philosophical question that no one’s been able to answer just like that? Yeah. Because the first chicken had to come from an egg.
Based on what? So as some animal had a mutant egg that was a chicken egg, and then that chicken was born, and it mated with another one of those mutant things and had more chicken eggs. What if it was, like, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and there was a Green news? Yeah. And so it turned into this a chicken.
Gotcha there. Good. Didn’t I? You know what? I didn’t think about that.
It was, like, some green prehistoric ooze that a dinosaur laid in that turned into a chicken. Exactly. And then it grew 8 wings. Head to buddybookclub.com for more information on that. You can’t come at me with chicken self care.
That’s that’s where my expertise lies. I don’t have many expertise. I actually have none other than the chicken wing theory. That’s it. So don’t come at me ever.
Alright. That’s fair. I respect it. My next stock up is nightmares, so stock up to to to nightmares here. Alright.
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets is a kids’ movie that’s based on a kids’ book. It’s rated PG, but boy, does this movie get dark pretty fast. We had talked about before how the opening credits get a little darker and darker and darker. I feel like this one is already pretty dark, so I don’t know how it it could get darker from the opening credit standpoint. But the creepy voice of the basilisk saying, girl, girl, Gail.
And then they’re talking about, oh, this message is written in blood, and the message is like, her skeleton will lie in the chamber forever. And, yes, I do understand that this is from the book. Like, all this stuff was in the book. Mhmm. But when you see it, it just kinda brings it to life a little more.
And I thought, in general, it was, like, a pretty scary movie. Like, I would wonder for parents out there, what age do they feel like is appropriate to show their kid this movie? Because I I feel like the nightmares might be inevitable. I mean, even the spiders running after them, even, that when he when Harry goes to Knock Turn Alley, like, all the creepy witches and wizards being like, oh, hello, boy. It’s like that’s that would’ve that would’ve spooked me as a kid, I think, but I was a little softy.
So I know in Germany, which, you know, it’s Germany, so you think they’d be a little looser, But they changed a bunch of this stuff. Like, they changed, you know, I I don’t know exactly what they changed, but they changed a lot of it. They censored a lot of it so it could get a different rating, whatever their rating system is at over there. I don’t know. And then what’s funny is that all of their all the countries around it didn’t censor it.
So there was a big black market trading of outside of Germany copies so that the Germans could see the uncensored version. But, yeah, I thought it was pretty scary. What did you think? Well, yeah. I think Ellie was, when we were watching, it said that she had nightmares from, like, certain scenes, which, like, the spider scene, obviously, the last scene.
There’s a lot of, I would say, scary scenes. But I will counter that there were a few things that were left out that I actually had a stock down for being a kids movie. So I’ll I’ll this is the first time that you’ve been buying and I’m selling essentially the same thing. Oh, okay. So you can buy my stock.
Right? Because I’m selling it. Yeah. Anyways, one is mister Weasley. What happened to him?
I mean, talk about emasculating a character and just making him just the weakest. You you go from being the the biggest swinging dick on the block to I don’t know who that was. I don’t even know who that character was. What what what was he doing? Good.
He didn’t even throw down. He doesn’t throw punches at Lucius Malfoy at all. He’s just like, Get out of here, Lucius. After getting this insulted to his face, like, 15 different ways. Just a just a big fizzle there even though that scene was funny, like I mentioned.
I was wondering how long it would take us to get to, talking about mister Weasley not not throwing hands. So I’m I’m glad it only took 20 minutes. Hate to see that. But what did you think because we’re talking about the CGI and also the scare factor. What did you think about the look of the basilisk itself?
Looked more like the Game of Thrones dragon, honestly. Sounds like, oh, where’s the wings in this bad boy? Yeah. I thought it looked more like a dragon or like some sort of sea snake. I thought it was the only PG part of the movie.
It was not scary whatsoever because it was so fake looking. Like, it didn’t look like something that would be real. Did you ever watch the Kevin Sorbo Hercules series back in the day? And I feel like I’ve asked you this before. Yeah.
And Xena followed it right away. Xena, the warrior princess, Lucy Lawless. It reminded me of something out of Hercules. It just wasn’t wasn’t real like. Well, you also only see it for, like, 30 seconds and then immediately gets its eyes cut out, and it, like, can’t smell Harry.
It’s like, what is this thing even that scary? It’s kind of it’s gone a week. Fox did poke his eyes out in the book too, like, pretty early on. It has to. I’m just saying it’s hard to be intimidated by the way it’s something that just, like, shows up for the first time in the movie and 2 minutes later, it’s the biggest weapon’s gone.
It’s, like, that wasn’t that scary apparently. Yeah. Then when it blocks Harry in that pipe, it’s, like, oh, Harry’s done for, but it just moves on. It’s like, wait. Well, hold on.
Use your tongue. Snakes smell with their tongues. I know this. I had Zubas as a kid. But as someone that grew up watching Aladdin a lot, when Jafar at the end of Aladdin turns into a snake, like, he turns into a cobra, That was legit, and that was scary, but awesome.
This was just like some sort of weird sea snake thing. I think what it needed was it needed a head that was different from its body. Like, the head just kind of went into the body. Most venomous snakes have their venom sacs out. You know what I mean?
And and maybe I’m making that up. I’m just thinking, like, bite by teeth. I don’t know your name, but okay. Yeah. Well, it just meant, like, the head itself should be, like, separate from the body.
This thing was just, like, its silhouette was just straight. So I just think it needed some sort of differentiator. I don’t know. I’m I’m probably being too picky. I I thought what was scarier was when Harry started talking to the snake.
I was, like, oh, shit. Like, I didn’t realize he was speaking like that to the snake. That is scary. You know, like, this bit book gets banned for being, like, demonic. Mhmm.
If you showed me that clip, I’m like, yeah. We can’t have the hero doing that. What’s going on here? This hero’s literally, like, speaking in the devil’s tongue. Yeah.
I thought that I out of that whole scene, the only part that I thought was scary was just Tom Riddle being, like, charmingly creepy, which I always find to be unsettling is when someone’s being, like, smiling, but they’re being really mean. It’s like that that that that bucks me up. I agree. The last one I had was was just a good slow clap? We’re on the opposite end, Eric.
Stuck up to a good slow clap? I’m stock upping it because the stock for a slow clap is at an absolute 0. Is it? That’s a a high selling stock, I thought. No?
I don’t know. It just it it never really works for me, and it definitely didn’t work here. But I had to just just stock it up because we’re talking about at the end of the movie when the basilisk is vanquished, Tom Riddle is identified as Voldemort and put to put to bed, and they’re having a feast in the great hall to, celebrate that no one died. Everyone’s getting un petrified. And in walks Hagrid who you know, our boy, Hagrid, has been falsely accused of opening the Chamber of Secrets, not once, but twice.
He has spent the last 2 months in Azkaban, which after getting into the 3rd book, we know how terrible that must be. And and what sort of welcome does he receive when he walks into the great hall, but a slow clap? Like, a couple of Gryffindors are like, oh, the Hagrid’s back. And then, like, it it it gets a little bit more after that. But can we have, like, I don’t know, a public apology, like a pardon from the minister of magic that that shows up and bows out of that?
Prison, like, 3 weeks later because they’re like, we’ll send the the one owl that, like, can barely fly. It’s not that important to get him out. They’re like, go send an owl to get him out of there. Excuse How about someone apparates, takes him out of jail, and apparates back? Like, what are we sending an owl for to Azkaban so he can continue to live with the mentors?
I I was a little shipper for it. I I thought Hagrid didn’t deserve it. Yeah. I’ll add my 2¢ because my stock down was the finishing last slow clap for people. You know how they do that when, like, someone’s, like, last place and they, like, come in and they’re, like, yeah.
So I think we’re on the same page, actually. I thought you’re gonna go the opposite route. But the problem was it’s just that, one, as a viewer, Hargro’s Azkaban, he doesn’t really fight it. He’s like, alright. I guess I’m going there.
Like, if you know what Azkaban is, but now that we’re doing book 3, you’d be like, fuck no. I’m not going there. This isn’t me. I’ll find to the tooth and nail. Like, I’m not going there.
Right? And he’s instead, he’s like, alright. Sounds good. Like, I thought he was just going there, read a couple books, do a couple of push ups. He’ll be out in a couple weeks.
No big deal. Right? When he’s going to, like, the worst place of all time. He’s gotta be fighting a little bit harder. And actually, the only time we hear about Hagrid after he gets taken away is them saying his name in vain, being like, why the hell did he send us over there?
He’s not top of mind in any way. So then the ending when her Hermione comes, you’re like, what a great feel. Like, that gif where Ron looks and then Harry’s head pops out and looks. You know what I’m talking about? Yep.
Yeah. Amazing. I was like, this is a great ending. And then you hear, like, the Stone Cold, Steve Austin music and, like, the the glass break and the doors open, and you’re like, Hagrid’s back. And I’m like, okay.
Like, I’m glad I care about that. You know, it doesn’t, like, hit like they think it’s gonna hit. And then he did hit the slow clap, and it’s an awkward 30 seconds for no reason, and the movie ends. Yeah. It seems like the movie the ending of the movie was, like, this is Hagrid’s movie.
This is, like, a movie for Hagrid. It didn’t make any sense. Made no sense. They look over and see Hermione. She comes back and say, okay.
Great. Haggard comes to the door. It should be a sprint to see who can give that man a hug first, and double Dumbledore should be there and apologize to him. Why? Because he was he was sent to Azkaban.
No trial. But no one has said one word since that happened. I’m being like, this is wrong. This is unjust. Like, how dare there’s not there’s not been one word said about him.
It’s just like we forgot he’s he hasn’t been on screen Yeah. For 45 minutes. I’m like, oh, yeah. I thought you raised from the dead when they they opened the door. I was like, oh, was he dead?
Like, what? You know, like, the the kind of welcome you get, he’s just been sitting at the table being like, he’s back and, like, giving a head nod to everyone. Like, he should that should that was such a weird ending to me. I didn’t mean to say. No.
I do agree with him walking in. It was, like, such a weird thing. He should have been at the head table, and Dumbledore should have just said Hagrid is back and vindicated. Yeah. And Right.
You know, he’s got a public apology from the minister of magic, and he’s now, has his wand, and he dangles his wand out for everybody, and they, you know, then slow clap. So slow clap’s still in there. My first talk down is dueling spells. This is a big problem for me with the whole Harry Potter movies, and it starts in this book as we’re starting to get more spells happening, especially spells around fighting. A wand is a tool, but it is also a weapon, and it can be used to do things like make someone shoot slugs out of their mouth or disarm someone or do legitimately anything.
That’s the best part about magic, is a wand can do anything. In a duel, you could turn someone into a different animal. You could have ropes come out of your wand and tie them down. You could have, legitimately, anything that you can think of happen if you know the spell for it. But why does it matter?
That’s in my mind, that’s what it should So I guess I don’t understand, like, why it matters what spell you cast in these movies if all of the spells do the exact same thing. So Harry and Malfoy are at the dueling club. They cast totally different spells against one another, and they both have the same effect. There’s, like, a light and it pushes the other person away. Right?
Or it knocks them down. They cast totally different spells, so why would they have the exact same effect? And then Harry also casts a third spell, which he learns from the Tom Riddle book, The Tom Riddle Diary, against the spiders in when they’re running away in the Forbidden Forest, and it has the exact same effect that the other 2 completely different spells had. A light comes out and the spider shoots away, And that’s gonna continue to be a problem that I will bring up throughout these movies because it seems like there should be so much creativity when it comes to spell casting, but any spell that people cast is just a flash of light and someone gets thrown into something or on the ground or whatever the case is. It’s not cool.
Does that bother you at all, or is it just me? Yeah. I I I see what you’re saying. That’s the one thing where they can finally be creative and go outside the book. You can do endless things, but instead they’re, like, well, the book doesn’t really say exactly what they’re saying.
So let’s just, like, do something that’s just basic. It’s like they’re shooting laser beams at each other. Yeah. Exactly. It’s just like a gun.
All it is is it turns into a gun, which is not fun. Like, that’s not what wizarding is. Yeah. I wish there was more dynamics. Like, for instance, if someone shot something at you and it’s a strength spell and you do I mean, this is getting more into, like, RPG games.
But if someone doesn’t choose, like, a strength spell at you and you do, like, a agility spell back, they counter each other or something. You know, like, it should be like rock, paper, scissors when you go in the dueling club. It shouldn’t be, let me shoot a laser, and you shoot a laser. And and I do understand that a spell has to hit another person. So until it does, I do get that there’s some, like, targeting aspect, which I feel like should also be part of defense against the dark arts or or a class or something is, like, they just go out to a targeting range.
Because if you have to actually aim your wand and spell, like, a spell’s not a homing beacon. Like, it’s not because you’re gonna home onto the person you’re targeting. So it feels like that’s an important part of spellcasting, especially when it comes to dueling, is, like, to be able to hit a moving target or whatever the case is. But either way, before that spell hits someone and this is just my understanding of it. I don’t know exactly how it works, but it seems to make sense based on the movies and books and whatnot.
But until it hits that person, I can understand it being like a beam of light or nothing at all, whatever the case is. But once it does hit that person, it should be like, that spell should take effect to whatever it is. So if you’re dueling, like, a rope binding thing, like, all the the spell hits the person and ropes get them. Or if you’re fighting spiders, you shoot something out, and their arms become wiggle worms, you know, like gummy worms, whatever the case is. They can’t run anymore.
It just it seems like with the movies and having a visual medium, you should be able to cast super cool spells. Yeah. And I know these kids are only in their 2nd year, but they should still be able to cast some interesting things. If you’re these kids, you would wanna learn all sorts of spells. When I picked up Mortal Kombat for the first time, I was trying to figure out all the moves that that character could do.
Back back a or hold down an a until the fight starts, then you do the crazy kicks. Like, I wanna know all of the cool things that I can do or all the funny stuff. Like, it feels like kids would be doing funny stuff all the time, and then they’d be asking their friends, oh, how did you do that? And Yeah. Yeah.
It’s an unfortunate part that’s not included in and I understand. The this movie is 2 hours and 41 minutes long, so let’s not make it longer. But but, that’s not even taking up time to just, instead of having a light that shoots something away, have something cool happen. The dueling spells, stock down. It was terrible.
What else you got for stock down? I think this is gonna be right in line with you what you’re saying, but having a wand stuck down based on the book, I kinda thought that Ron’s wand was just kinda wonky or kinda shitty. It’s like my American muscle Nissan Sentra. Yeah. Check engine light’s gonna come on at one point.
You’re just gonna ignore it. You’re not gonna worry about it. In a couple weeks, it’ll go away. Then it’ll come back on. It’ll go away.
You know, it’s just, like, sometimes it’s gonna be, like, a little janky. Sometimes it’s not gonna work correctly. Yeah. But that’s just part of that’s just part of the the fun of having the the car and the wand. Right?
For this movie, it seems like there’s, like, no point ever using the wand. Like, why is he even carrying it around? Every time he’s done anything in the movie, it backfired. It shut back in it, which asked the question, why doesn’t he just use the other end of the handle and shoot it? So it just goes forward.
Right? Hey, that’s actually that’s next level. Yeah. And someone needed to be, like, just turn the wand around, bro. But, also, I think that the fact that that Lockhart could pick it up and use it, why don’t they just have spare wands lying around?
I mean, the wand is the most important thing, I thought. That’s why I’m so excited because I don’t think it is. Because apparently, you can just go the whole year without one. Yeah. But why don’t they just have, like, random ones lying around like they have broom sticks?
So, like, someone’s wand’s not working. They lose it. They can just pick one up and, you know, it’s not gonna be as powerful, but at least they can use something. I couldn’t agree with you more. It makes no sense.
It it’s like when you’re in gym class and you forgot your gym clothes, it was like, okay. Go into the lost and found and grab some random gym clothes and play with those. Like, yeah. They’re gonna probably not fit. They’re gonna stink because they’ve been there since 1975, but you have to use them.
So it feels like Hogwarts, a school, should just have some spare wands on hand in case someone like Neville loses his or someone breaks their wand. Like, things happen. And in the wizarding world, you need a wand to do stuff. So how is Ron able to go the entire year without being able to cast one spell? Like, even McGonigal, when he tries to change the mug, he’s like, you need to to get a new wand.
It’s like, yeah. Duh. But but what? Confusing. And there should also be some sort of nonprofit organization that gives underprivileged wizards wants.
Yeah. It seems like the number 3 thing besides food and shelter would be have a wand. Very confusing and could not agree with you more on there. Also, Spello tape, what’s the point? What does it do?
What does Spello tape do? They weren’t using Spello tape. They’re just, like, Scotch tape. Right? It looked like No.
I was, like, wait a second. Spello tape, but it just Okay. They didn’t make it magical at all. Yeah. They didn’t make it magical.
But is it if it just has a tiny crack in it, you use spellotape? Because that doesn’t make a lot of sense. It makes it backfire, which you need to turn around, which you I think you just didn’t read the rule the the things on it. It was like, yeah. Just turn your wand around, and it’ll shoot correctly now.
Oh, you know, I just bought this mountain bike, and it’s like people wanted to go mountain biking with me. And I was like, alright. Cool. But I don’t have a bike, and I’m just, like, Monty Python in the holy grailing it around this mountain biking course just running around with all my gear. Sound of the the bike, though?
You mean I don’t know. Whatever a chain is. A car bike? No. You know that.
You have a chainsaw you’re riding with? No. It’s like the sound of the chain going around the the gears. I don’t know how to make that sound. Sorry.
Click click click click click click click click click click click click click click click click click click. That’s good. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. I’m not the guy from Police Academy. I noises.
My last stock down, and you had a good one earlier, which which burned half of it, but professor McGonagall stalked down. I didn’t love her in this movie, and it’s no fault to the acting. It was more of the direction and the the screenplay, I guess. Like, her lines didn’t make a ton of sense to me. They give her professor Binns’ speech about the Chamber of Secrets.
So professor Binns notoriously not included in Harry Potter movies. His character is completely taken out, which I understand. There’s no reason to include professor Binns. He has a few moments, and this is one of them with his Chamber of Secrets speech, which I talked about in in our last pod. And it’s understandable they give it to McGonagall.
I got that. But she just doesn’t do his speech justice. I don’t I’d never felt like, oh, this is cool lore that I’m learning. It seemed like she was just kinda talking. But more importantly, if there is a chamber of secrets opened and there is a monster in this school and you’re addressing 12 year olds, you probably don’t want to incite or inflame.
And the whole time, all she’s doing is being like, yeah. So, the Slytherin heir has unleashed a terrible monster that’s gonna kill all of the muggle born wizards as she’s looking at Hermione and, like, smiling and nodding. It’s like, what? Like, maybe downplay a bit. Not to worry about.
And then she ends it with just like, yeah. We looked at the skull and we never found it. But she pretty much tells them that all the muggle born wizards are in for it. So I just thought her, her bedside manner perhaps wasn’t the best in the movies. She goes a she goes a little hard in the paint, and it’s probably not necessary, although I was was laughing the whole time.
What about favorite scene in the movie itself? I really just liked, once again, a lot of this stuff in the first act, pretty much from the Weasley house, which was super cool, until Knockturn Alley through Diagon Alley and meeting Lockhart. All that stuff, I found to be wonderful. It was, like, another great back integration into the wizarding world. I did kind of like how they made the whole car scene more of, like, an exciting scene as opposed to just, like, Harry and Ron Yeah.
Getting bored of it. Driving around. Granted, it was pretty quick in the book. I’m interested little on its own. But at the same time, it it was fun.
They turned it into little much Mission Impossible type stuff. So, yeah, I think that first part kinda tickled me in a good way. Okay. Yeah. I’d say the the spider scene.
I I think the spider scene, every scene that there’s action, I think they did, outside of like the magic stuff you’re talking about, like the spells though. They did amplify every scene where like the spider scene was a quick scene where they like and they escaped, you know, and they got they ran out of there. The car helped them. But that seemed like lasted, like, 15 minutes, 20 minutes. I was like, oh, this is much longer and like more scary than the book made it.
So I do think they did a really good job of having more impactful or more memorable action sequences. Yeah. There’s not a lot of action sequences necessarily in the books. And if you’re gonna make this a cinematic blockbuster, I think having super fun action scenes makes sense. So stretching it out to include that, I thought was good, and and I agree with you.
That scene was fun. Just the all the spiders and whatnot and Aragog himself. Pretty cool. I I got a couple studio notes for you. We got this movie is an 8280 on Rotten Tomatoes, which I think is fair.
I think that’s fair. Yeah. It made 878,000,000 worldwide, so I think that’s less than the first one, but but pretty close. It’s the longest movie of the series at 2 hours and 41 minutes even though it’s the shortest book. I don’t know who made that decision, but, that is the case nonetheless.
Filming for this movie began 3 days after filming was concluded for Sorcerer’s Stone, so that’s why the kids look pretty much the same. But I do wonder if that was a cognizant decision because the kids are in potentially, like, the prime of their puberty where they didn’t want them to age too too much going into the next one. I thought they actually looked old a lot older. Like, did most of them seem like they have puberty already? Malfoy, I thought Yeah.
Malfoy definitely must have hated it a little earlier because he looked he he looked a little older. But I guess maybe they just wanted to release these movies back to back years, and so Oh, gotcha. Yeah. Needed to do it. Like, you know, they wanted, like, Christmas release and then another Christmas release or Thanksgiving, whenever they did.
And probably because they had Chris Columbus on as to direct the first 2. It was, like, easy enough for them just to turn around, and it probably reduced production cost just to be able to, like, leave the sets, leave everything, and just run it back. Mhmm. This movie is also the Chamber of Secrets is also the only Harry Potter movie with a post credit scene. I I don’t know if you caught the post credit scene.
Oh, it’s with, yeah, Lockhart being, like Yeah. Lockhart’s new book with it’s a who am I? Which I don’t really care for. He’s still making money off of stuff. That’s kinda bullshit.
I’m like that. Yeah. Same. But it’s it’s Lockhart. You know, it’d be like James Patterson or something like that turning out to be a total fraud, which most of those guys ghost have, like, ghostwriters anyways.
So Easy. Easy. Where’s the book podcast? I’m just saying. But it would turn out like that guy being a total fraud and then forgetting who he was or something like that.
So, yeah, I I of course, people would still buy his books if he came out with a new one. If he got amnesia, people would be interested. Yeah. I had some fun facts too. If you wanna throw some in there, I can definitely do that.
Yeah. Yeah. The blue Ford Anglia with JK Rowling and her best friend used to drive around that when they were young. And Oh. So they, she included it because of that, and they crashed it or destroyed 14 of them while making the film.
What other what else do you have for, these fun facts you got? Well, one of my loves which we could get into later but was the the Quidditch scene. And if you could rewatch it because I was like, when I was watching it I was like, this it seems so familiar. This is so cool, but it seems really familiar. And I realize if you just listen close your eyes, it it’s a Star Wars scene.
It’s literally John Williams’ blasting music and you people are flying by, but it sounds like laser shooting and, like, ships going by. It’s like, where are you? 2222. I’m, like, wait, what the hell? So I was writing that down.
I was, like, oh, this is it seems like that. I look it up. I think he did use it. Yeah. It it used the same score in Attack of the Clones.
So Yeah. It literally was the same scene. I was like, no wonder I like this so much. So but it was it was kind of crazy they’re using, like, laser beam sounds for when they’re playing quidditch. So I did like and that’s in one of my loves as well.
You know, if we’re we’ll just kinda jump into that as as you have your, your fun facts, and you’re more than welcome to keep releasing them. We got another long Quidditch scene. Love that. I’m in my own Star Wars universe with, who’s the guy Adam Driver plays when he’s like, more. More.
That’s We don’t talk about the the last three movies. Yeah. Not not canon. I get it. But that that was great for me when the the the long scenes.
I’m I’m all always in. If you wanna put this movie to 3 hours long and include 20 more minutes of Quidditch, I’m down. Yeah. For sure. Cool.
Yeah. No. And then I always think about this all the time is how this book is translated into a bunch of different languages. And I always thought, well, what what do they do with Tom Riddle since that has to be Yeah. Tom Marvallo Riddle.
Yeah. It has to say and so apparently, all the language is just like, they just figured out they just changed his name. So, like, in Spanish, it’s Tom Servolo Riddle, with a y for riddle, and that’s soy lord lord Voldemort. In French, it’s like Tom Elvis Husador, which is Elvis? Yeah.
J Suisse Voldemort. So, like, you just can do that for everything. It’s all them are saying. Voldemort. I think they keep Voldemort for everything, but they changed all the other names.
You’d have to. Which I thought was pretty cool. So they’re, like, all the movies are the same thing. When they they release the movies in those other countries, they changed it to, the the the writing to that. Interesting.
Interesting. My next love is I just love Lucius Lucius Malfoy. I thought he’s so good and hateable, like, the perfect father to Draco. Jason Isaacs, I think he did a phenomenal job. I mean, I guess I guess he wasn’t too keen on the job because it was so similar to his role as Captain Hook in the Peter Pan movies.
Oh, I was thinking, yeah, from The Patriot. No. It’s the Peter Pan movies. Yeah. He’s exactly like the guy in The Patriot.
I guess he was gonna like I said, he was gonna turn down the role because it was too similar to his Captain Hook in the Peter Pan movies where you thought it was the Patriot. I fucking love the Patriot, by the way. I I wish if there was if we had our own version of the rewatchables, I would talk about the Patriot more. Yeah. He didn’t wanna take it.
His family convinced him similar to Dumbledore. Richard Harris has convinced him to take it, which I’m I’m glad they did. I don’t really think any other person could have done as well as either. I think all a lot of the other roles, I think other actors could have done them and fine. That one, I think, like, he needed he needed to be him.
And Edmund Snape, I think, are the 2 most crucial. Yeah. I think it was Gilder Lawcourt. Hart was supposed to be Hugh Grant, but he I think it would’ve been fine. Couldn’t do it.
I thought that would’ve been fine, like, whatever. And it was also Jason Isaac’s idea for Lucius Malfoy to have long, blonde hair to, like, differentiate him from Draco, which is iconic. I don’t know. I’m sure you’ve seen photos and stuff of it before, but now when I read the book, I cannot picture Lucius Malfoy looking any other way. Game of Thrones then just, like, stole that, ripped that real quick.
Vibe. But it was also his idea for Lucius to carry this cane that has his wand as the handle, which is not only super badass, in my opinion, but also iconic for Lucious Malfoy, and I think fits so well with that character. So I just love everything he did with the character. Big fan of Jason Isaacs in general. Just Yeah.
He’s just a really good bad guy. Yeah. Perfect. Although and I think we’ve talked about this before on on the pod. I I think it was for that that Providence gang movie or gang book that we read, but he plays, like, Providence Irish gangster in that show that’s on, like, Showtime or whatever way back in the day.
But he was really good in that too, doing accents and whatnot. Really? Wow. I thought, yeah, they’re gonna say he’s not very good. No.
He’s he’s good in everything he does. It’s Alright. Respect. I almost wanna go watch that Peter Pan movie, which I’m sure is terrible, just to see his take on Captain Up. Yeah.
Yeah. Let’s get into hates, which you ever hate. Myrtle and her voice, which Oh my god. And number 1, moaning Myrtle’s voice for me. Well, I think I actually am a 100% correct about my take was for the book was that she almost deserved to die.
If I heard that voice one more time, I’m like, let’s just kill this chick. Like, but what what’s going on here? Like, it’s so annoying. I’m gonna stay Stan Patton and say that was a good call by me, but it was a hate for for that. It’s so bad.
The choice is so bad. And once again, I don’t know if it’s the actress’s choice or, like, the direction. It’s it’s 37 year old actress playing a student. I’m not really sure Yeah. So is Shirley Henderson that was.
Like, do ghosts age? I don’t think they do. Right? No. They don’t, which is why they cast her because she’s gonna be in future movies, so they didn’t want Oh, I didn’t know.
A child actor who’s then going to age Actually, that’s not that’s not bad. Alright. Although, couldn’t you just make the child actor younger? Or the you know what I mean? I don’t know.
Like, cast a Baby? What do you mean? No. No. I’m saying, like, you cast someone that’s 15, they’re now 21.
Can they not play a 15 year old? Like, is is that imposs why does it make more sense for a 37 year old to play like a ghost forever. They’re not, like it’s it’s hard for them to be exact, you know, like, seen as much, you know, because they’re somewhat opaque. But either way, the reasoning makes sense to me. It’s just why they decided for her to go with her voice.
It’s it’s it’s so bad. It’s it’s honestly, every time she’s on screen, I wanted to mute it, like a commercial in between a a couple plays of football. I wanted to mute it. Yeah. So, yeah, that that was mine too.
Well, I guess it was the one a to my no hands being thrown by arse Arthur Weisel, Flourish and bots. But, my other one for hate, talking about voices, was there’s no voice change with the polyjuice potion in the movie. Like, in the book, they take on their full form, and in the movie, they don’t. And it honestly makes zero sense. It doesn’t make scientific sense, because if you were to change into somebody, you would presumably change your vocal cords.
You know, everything would change, not just the outside. Everything would change. What I do understand is that Ron and Harry would not be able to fake Crabbe and Goyle’s voices to Malfoy to make him think that they were actually them. They’d be doing these voices. I think that just shows that he doesn’t, like, listen or care about them at all, though he doesn’t even like he doesn’t register.
I thought about that too. Like, okay. Malfoy is so narcissistic and self involved and just talks and these guys listen that he doesn’t even know what they sound like because he doesn’t pay attention. But at the same time, it still doesn’t make sense. So I really just don’t understand why.
Like, our the only thing I could come up with was that the actors who play Crabbe and Goyle are so bad that he like, the director didn’t wanna give them any lines. Mhmm. Because because with Hagrid’s character, when they do the flashback, you know, releasing Aragog and talking to Tom, they use a different actor, but they have Hagrid do the voice over. So I don’t really know why they decided to do a voice over with Harry and Ron’s voice when Crabbe and Goyle are there. The easy reason is because as, like, an 8 year old, it’s hard to understand the body changing thing.
Right? Like, someone’s in like, oh, they just change into these people. So and especially since they have very short tension spans. So in order to make sure they know they keep their voice there. So it’s like, oh, yeah.
This is this person, but they’re dressed up as that. That’s what would think. That’s an interesting thought. Yeah. So it’s like, oh, I know that’s still Harry.
The the jokes hit a little better. Yeah. The freaky Friday ish hits hits better. Okay. I I still don’t I still don’t like it.
It’s more of a lingering question, but can Tom Riddle and and also Harriet the for the same reason look into the Basilich’s eyes? Because how is Tom Riddle able to open up the chambers and see the snake not die? Great question. Honestly, the best lingering question. So I assume, like, if you’re if you’re can speak parceletongue and you’re, like, basically half snake, you can Well, obviously Harry can’t look at it.
Otherwise, Fox wouldn’t have came down and blinded it. Well, we don’t know. Well, that’s what I’m saying. It’s one of those things of it’s the chicken versus the egg. Can you look in the if you look in the eyes, you die.
But if you don’t how would you ever know if you don’t look in the eyes? Yeah. Well, I mean, yeah, Tom released it. So one would assume yeah. Don’t know.
Great question. Great question. My last hate is at the end with the House Cup, and they decide to end with the Hagrid slow clap, which I we don’t understand, is, additionally, they took out Dumbledore giving Harry and Ron each 200 points for Gryffindor, which lets Gryffindor win the House Cup for the 2nd year in a row, which in the books, like, the House Cup is like a thing. You know? You really wanna win the House Cup.
So Gryffindor winning 2 years in a row and Harry being the reason why, I think, is important because it just makes me angrier in the later books when people start questioning Harry or thinking Harry is putting his name in the Goblet of Fire or whatever the case is. It bothers me because it makes sense that these guys should win the House Cup. So you would rather that than that 5 minutes of giving Hagrid a slow clap standing ovation, like, he came in last place at a race? Okay. Yes.
Exactly. Just making sure. Did you have any other lingering questions? Did not. 2 for me.
How does Aragog speak English? Like, he’s just a giant spider. His children don’t speak English. Right? He was grew up with Hagrid, so he probably was learned learned from that.
So there’s all sorts of magical creatures that don’t speak English. A unicorn doesn’t speak English. If it grows up with a person Yeah. You know? That’s how it works.
That’s how language works. Hedwig doesn’t speak English. That is a good question. Are the owls not magical? They are.
Right? They are. Yeah. Hedwig. I mean, Hedwig goes all sorts of places.
Like Yeah. I don’t really know why certain animals speak and others don’t. That’s a good question. What what is that? What is that?
And then we forgot in your this isn’t necessarily, like, a lingering question, but more of a a check-in. But we forgot when you gave Hermione the house cup Mhmm. In the last episode. It was pretty much, for those that didn’t listen, shame on you. But you gave her the house cup primarily because, like, she didn’t get the accolades she was due from the things that she did in that book, and she wasn’t in it a ton.
Correct. But we forgot that she got petrified. Like, your best friend, Harry and Ron’s best friend, got petrified. She’s in the hospital. Yes.
I understand. It’s like if if someone was in a coma or something, and they may or may not be able to hear you. But you would presumably still go and visit them just to be near them, talk to them even if they couldn’t hear you, you know, just to show them that you were there. But Harry and the boys, Harry and Ron, don’t even go and visit her in the book on their own accord when she’s petrified. Like, we for we forgot to mention that.
They only go when they get caught by McGonagall outside of the dormitory, and they use that as an excuse. They’re like, oh, we were going to see Hermione. And she’s like, oh, of course you guys would wanna do that, which they don’t wanna do. They just use that as an excuse. So somehow Harry knows that he should be wanting to do that, which is then how they find the note in her hand that, the basilisk is in the pipes.
But kinda shame on them for never checking in on Hermione. Yeah. That’s tough. That’s a tough look. Just another reason why Hermione deserved that house cup.
Well, that pretty much does it for Chamber of Secrets. Do you have anything else that you wanted to add before we get out of here? Read book 3. We got, Prisoner of Azkaban coming up, book 3, then the movie. We’re on a roll.
Hopefully, they’ll be coming to you shortly here. Yeah. Azkaban coming to Max, and I think we’re gonna have a a special guest or a returning special guest. Yeah. So it should be exciting.
So that was Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets movie, 2 hours and 41 minutes long. I watched it in 2 cities because I’m old. I could not handle it in 1. And coming up next, we got prisoner of Azkaban, which I am very excited about. Have you finished?
No. I’m pretty close. That’s what she said. I am about halfway there, which is what I said. So, I’ll catch you for that one probably next week.
Alrighty. Alright. Good stuff. Bye now. Bye now.
