Hmm. My copies of Half-Blood and Hallows are exactly the same length. I guess that means that the Half-Blood movie will be the same crap that Order of the Phoenix was. If you hadn't read the book, you couldn't follow the mish-mash of disconnected events. If you had read the book, you hated the way it was all chopped up.

...Order of the Phoenix.

If you're reading this in the first place you'll certainly be aware that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was split into two cinematic outings "as it was impossible to cram its 608 pages into a single film", as the BBC puts it.

Yeah... its impossible to squeeze that much crap into a single dvd box.

I'm an unashamed Harry Potter fan and I am saving up watching the movies until they all come out so that I can watch them all in one long film fest weekend (sad for a 47 year old I know). I'm obviously going to be waiting some time but there again JK Rowling kept us waiting with the books.

A pal of mine does the cooking for the film crew and apparently they have another 18 months filming left. If anyone wants any autographs I can get them :-) .

Well hopefully, Warner Bros. decided to cut all the Riddle/Gaunt familly history filler that was both a waste of time in the Half Blood Prince book, and yet took up over half the book. If so, that would explain why they are able to fit Half Blood Prince into one movie instead of two.

The backstory was entirely relevant as it helped the reader understand the motivations of the 'bad guy' and understand that he wasn't just born pure evil.

Know your enemy, as they say.

I read a comment like this:

>>A pal of mine does the cooking for the film crew and apparently they have another 18 months filming left. If anyone wants any autographs I can get them :-) .

and a little involuntary shudder escapes me....

IIRC, Half-Blood Prince was shorter than book 7. Of course, if "608 pages" is to be the reasoning to split book 7, well, they should've split book 5 as well!

Agreed with some commenters though, J.K. Rowling did seem a little ... tired in the last books; book 6 was kind of a sleep-through in a lot of parts, and well a good chunk of book 7 was kind of dull as well.

The CEO for warner bros whilst his hand was in his pocket holding his "magic wand" invvoked the time honoured spell of all movie studios ' maximius profitus"

Oh, there are a LOT of 'sheep' watching HP just because 'everyone' says it is the best thing since sliced bread!

Don't get me wrong, I like the books, but there is a huge dose of 'Right Place, Right Time' and media spin to their success - there are a lot of far better books sitting quietly on shelves, unread, because they are not the book of the moment.

Having "deathly hallows" as 2 films has, I think, less to do with the length of the book and more to do with the fact that Warner paid for the rights to make 8 films out of the HP books ... I think the original rationale was that they were covering themselves in case JKR decided to start an 8th book despite her continual statements that the HP series was 7 books, no more and no less. As a result they've got the ability to make one more film than than there are books so a bit of post hoc rationalisation has come up with the "its too long for one film so we'll have to make two" argument.

I don't hate the Harry Potter books. I even managed to read up until 'The Order of the Phoenix'; unfortunately that was such a meandering mess of self-indulgant timewasting I didnt get any further.

I have always had a soft spot for a good adventure and enjoyed the preceding books up to a point. I find the series' success a bit confusing though. They don't really do anything new as the vast majority of ideas in the books being recycled from elsewhere. Rowling has just borrowed liberally from other works to create a universe and written a fairly classic 'heros journey' story against that backdrop.

I suppose their main attraction is that they are easy to read and for that reason I would put them in the same category as 'The Davinci Code' - Another book that uses interesting ideas developed by others as a backdrop for a fairly unremarkable adventure story that became incredibly popular due to a combination of zeitgeist and ease of accessibility.

As others have said the books were 'written for children', but so what? Phillip Pullman managed to write a set of 'childrens books' that still felt fresh and challenging for readers of all ages and intellects. If I had kids I would definitely read them 'His Dark Materials' in preference to potter books - I think they would enjoy them more and would benefit more from listening to them.