Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

I went to see Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince movie on a business trip recently and thought that I would blog my thoughts since I have shared so much about Harry Potter on this blog.

I had not read the book in quite some time so I read it again before seeing the movie. I make my kids do that so I felt like I needed to follow my own rules. Overall, the movie was very entertaining but I walked out pretty disappointed and hot over them changing some of the key elements that gave the book (and series) spiritual significance.

This isn't necessarily everything, but I was disappointed by:
* No huge discussion with Dumbledore after recruiting Slughorn and before arriving at the Burrow.
* Harry, Ron, and Hermoine's lack of compassion for others throughout the movie. When Katie Bell was cursed by the necklace, the movie showed them all just standing there! In the book, they rush to her side and console Leanne and try to help Katie. When Harry used sectumsempra on Malfoy, he looked shaken in the movie but in the book he was truly horrified , tried to help Draco, and was obviously merciful to his nemesis.
* Dumbledore's lack of training Harry throughout the movie. I think they only showed 2 lessons and they were very brief. No real development of the intenional mentoring that Dumbledore gave to Harry.
* Lack of mention that Harry's greatest protection is his love and his purity of heart. That would have added a lot to the spiritual significance of the movies.
* The fact that Harry wasn't petrified by Dumbledore in the astronomy tower. It adds a whole new meaning to the tower's significance and I don't like the new meaning -- Malfoy is really able to disarm a fully ready and undistracted Dumbledore? Harry is really able to contain himself as his mentor is killed?
* Also in the astronomy tower, Dumberdore's lack of discussion of his mercy saving Draco Malfoy was very frustrating. This is a key to spiritual significance that again was just ignored when it would have been very easy to insert that dialogue into the script.

In the end, I believe that one very important lesson in the Half-Blood Prince comes from Mark 8:36 -- "For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world, and forfeit his soul?" I won't expound on this too much for some who may be reading the series and aren't quite up on the whole plot, but it's a key difference between Harry and Voldemort.