These last two weeks I've immersed myself in Harry Potter. I started re-reading the fourth book, then I watched the first, second and third movies. Then I finished the fourth book, started the fifth book, and watched the fourth movie. I was trying to remind myself of all the plot intricacies in preparation for the latest movie and book, but it was sort of a confusing order to do things in.

The first time I saw the fourth movie, last year, it was two or three years after I had read the corresponding book, so I didn't realize how much they left out or changed. Neville isn't a good dancer in the book. The movie has no Bertha Jorkins, Ludo Bagman, house elf drama, or mention of giants. Also, the dialogue's a shade cheesier in the movies. I think I'd prefer if the movies were five hours long and stuck to the books exactly. What can I say, I'm a purist. 

I'm also in the middle of  a book called The Curtain, by Milan Kundera. This book is only about 170 pages long, but I've been reading it since before starting the Harry Potter stuff and it's two weeks overdue. It's not even that hard to read; it's just not verbal crack like Harry Potter. The book is an essay about the significance of the novel. I'm pretty sure Kundera would hate the Harry Potter books- maybe he'd even call them "kitschy." Why do I like reading them? It's fun to get lost in the Harry Potter world, but what then? I come out of reading and watching this stuff feeling like I just drank a lot of mountain dew two hours ago.

Incidentally, Kundera loves Don Quixote (which I appreciate too, but probably not to the same extent since I'm not quiiite as well read or educated or brilliant as he is...). He uses that book as a role model for novels all over the place in The Curtain. I also recently watched a documentary about Terry Gillian's failed attempt to make a movie about Don Quixote in which Johnny Depp plays a guy who gets tossed from the present back into Quixote's time. The documentary is called Lost in La Mancha, and I found it pretty boring. (I think the movie would've been called The Man Who Killed Don Quixote.) I'm trying to wrap my head around this- it was a documentary about the making of a movie based on a novel that I'm reading an essay about. And here I am writing about the whole thing in a blog. The movie would have added some plot components outside of what's actually in the novel. The documentary was trying to draw parallels between the character of Don Quixote and Gillian himself. The original novel inspired someone to rip it off and write a sequel before Cervantes had a chance to. Then when Cervantes did write his sequel, he made fun of the fake sequel. Feels kind of meta.

Harry Potter, on the other hand, doesn't make my head spin. I just wish the movies didn't end with dialogue like:
"You'll write letters, won't you Harry?"
"Every week."

That crap is NOT in the book and why would anyone feel the need to remedy that? Jeez, there's enough nausea out there as it is.