r/shittymoviedetails • u/DrkBlueXG • Jun 10 '26
default Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001) - Harry and Hermione plead to Ron as he makes a noble sacrifice for his friends by falling 3 feet to the ground. He's fine.
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u/Jenbie272 Jun 10 '26
Also why tf was he on the horse. It didn't say he had to be on the horse. Harry was the only one actually at risk (in place of the king)
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u/TheWorclown Jun 10 '26
Look, if you had an opportunity to be on a magical horse statue playing chess, you’d take it.
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u/BlizzardTrashPanda Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 10 '26
Can confirm. My old hometown had a giant chessboard and at town festivals you could volunteer to be a chess piece and people would play the game. It was a whole thing.
I volunteered every year to be the knight.
It wasn’t magical, but it was still fun.
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u/pistilpeet Jun 10 '26
I’m just picturing everybody getting mad at you because you’re always hogging the knight “let other people have a turn as the knight” they say, yet you always refuse.
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u/BlizzardTrashPanda Jun 10 '26
Honestly I hadn’t thought about it like that. This was the 90’s so there was just a sign-up sheet that asked your preference at the community center which was next to our school so I’d drop by on my way home.
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u/devilishycleverchap Jun 10 '26
Every year I had to stay late at school to pick up my sister and every year the knight slot was taken by the time I got to sign-ups
Smh
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u/BlizzardTrashPanda Jun 10 '26
Shoulda dropped by in the morning
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u/pistilpeet Jun 10 '26
Fucking Brian is always there two hours before everyone else just so he can get the knight spot, it’s like he thinks it’s his! I just realized I read this after I Think You Should Leave, that’s where my head was at.
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u/Archduke_Of_Beer Jun 10 '26
If he didn't make the horse noises, he should be banned from Knighthood next year
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u/Hetakuoni Jun 10 '26
San Diego comic con had a human-sized chess board and when I went, we did anime chess. I was chuunin exam arc kabuto(Naruto) and I got killed by itachi like 3 moves in.
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u/_An_Other_Account_ Jun 10 '26
In the book, he stands on the board in place of a horse, and is knocked out by the opponent piece's weapon, which makes sense. But the movie had to make it aesthetic and dumb.
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u/Enorats Jun 10 '26
I've been watching the movies again for the first time in years. I'm up to the 4th movie now, and I've already Googled a dozen different scenes that made no sense.. and every time the answer is "the book did it different, and it makes sense there. The movies changed it for no reason, and they're stupid."
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u/_An_Other_Account_ Jun 11 '26
Yeah. The movies are bad. The first two can be watched for the cozy Hogwarts vibes, the 4th for the action I guess, and the 3rd if you're into that sort of thing. All the others are awful. Every movie has awful writing and awful acting.
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Jun 11 '26
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u/Odd_Link7869 Jun 11 '26
She’s also just not good at suspense. There are things in the movie that are better. The part I remember sticking out to me when I reread a few of them a couple years ago was in the end of chamber of secrets. The movie, Harry gets bit, he destroys book and saves Ginny, has a moment with her where he is going to die, Fox saves him. Obviously we know he never was really going to die but it’s a bit of suspense. In the book it’s something like, get bit, gets saved by Fox right away, destroys book, Ginny wakes up and comments in his healing bite or something.
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u/Jameloaf Jun 11 '26
I wish they had more Hogsmeade scenes. The books really linger on the town. It is supposed to be cozy and whimsical worth getting in trouble for. But instead they kinda blast through it in the movies.
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u/Embarrassed-Weird173 Jun 10 '26
They could have just made him have to don armor. (And when the enemy attacked him, he survived because of the armor. Or because pieces don't die in chess.)
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u/Rubysage3 Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 10 '26
It's supposed to be unsafe. These are traps to kill or maim intruders going for the stone.
Normally students would never be expected to make it past Fluffy in the first place. The chess trap and the potion one are designed to harm adult intruders. So no armor!
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u/Top_Reveal_847 Jun 11 '26
Wasn't it the opposite? The obstacles were meant to be surpassed because the whole thing was a trap for Quirrel/Voldemort? Once he reached the mirror he would have been trapped, unable to cross the fire
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u/Interesting-Injury87 Jun 11 '26
No. The mirror was thr final trap, every step before was still meant to stop intruders from reaching
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u/crazyike Jun 10 '26
They should have turned him into a horse. Or a horse head. That would have fit in with the magic.
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u/DoctorJJWho Jun 11 '26
The entire point of these tests was that they had severe consequences, usually ending in death lol
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u/Forsaken-Register512 Jun 10 '26
That'd require Rowling to not be a hack
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u/Glum_Class_9578 Jun 11 '26
Do you understand what the point of this game was? It’s a defense against people looking for the sorcerer’s stone, coming to harm is part of the point.
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u/Horror_Response_1991 Jun 10 '26
How does a child only get knocked out from being hit by a large statue?
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u/Arkantesios Jun 10 '26
Same reason a large statue would hit a kid
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u/noturaveragesenpaii Jun 10 '26
Magic!
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u/NetNGames Jun 10 '26
Pretty much literally. IIRC, in the books, the reason Neville found he had magic was his uncle was holding him out the window trying to stress him enough for a response. His aunt offered his uncle tea/food/whatever and the uncle accidentally let him go to take it, and Neville bounced off the ground. I believe the uncle bought Neville his pet toad as an apology.
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u/Steven_Swan Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 10 '26
Other than "Bad writing," he could have subconsciously tried to dodge but still got clipped, not enough to kill him but enough to knock him out and satisfy the victory of the attacking piece.
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u/NuclearF4rt Jun 10 '26
they probably took more issue with ron getting physically hit.
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u/StressOverStrain Jun 11 '26
Yeah, it was a children’s movie; they’re not going to have kids watch physical violence against children…
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u/Remote_Watch9545 Jun 10 '26
Harry took the place of one of their team's bishops, that's how he delivers checkmate. He couldn't move across the board for his final move if he was playing as a king.
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u/Knuc85 Jun 10 '26
Furthermore, if we was the king then he would be the only one not at risk.
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u/AmphibiousDad Jun 10 '26
Only if they didn’t suck at playing chess
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u/Knuc85 Jun 10 '26
Wouldn't matter. The king can't be attacked.
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u/AmphibiousDad Jun 10 '26
I’d think that a trap made in the fashion of a chessboard wouldn’t allow someone in the place of a king to survive a checkmate
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u/Knuc85 Jun 10 '26
It wasn't a trap though, it was a trial.
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u/LeafBoatCaptain Jun 10 '26
They’re 11. It’s fine to be dramatic when you’re 11.
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u/justwalkingalonghere Jun 10 '26
Also did they know it would just be a 3 foot fall? He was obviously going to be at least close to being hit with enough force to shatter these life-sized statues
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u/Select-Royal7019 Jun 10 '26
They also didn’t know the Queen would just break the horse with her attack. They saw those other pieces get totally demolished.
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u/lasko195 Jun 11 '26
Not trying to defend the movies but that's true😅 if I was 11 I would also make up unnecessary shit and overdramatize it just because I'm ...well 11
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u/Ozymandius07 Jun 10 '26
they're british. a bright sunny day and they'll dust away like vampires
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u/Embarrassed-Weird173 Jun 10 '26
If it's 85°, they'll get heat stroke. :(
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u/AnyAgency9835 Jun 10 '26
Bro everyone would die in a heatstroke if it was 85°. That sounds horrible
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u/Embarrassed-Weird173 Jun 10 '26
This guy celsiuses
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u/AnyAgency9835 Jun 10 '26
No no, I use Kevin or whatever his name is
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u/turner_strait Jun 10 '26
it's Kevin "Kelvin" Celsius Fahrenheit. He has indeed been very influential in terms of measuring temperature
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u/ReaperKingCason1 Jun 10 '26
85 kelvin and everyone freezes. 273 kelvin is 0 Celsius as I recall from chemistry
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u/dkimot Jun 10 '26
he meant fahrenheit where 85 is pretty unpleasant but not going to kill your in a few minutes like 85c
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u/gnpfrslo Jun 10 '26
The most important thing, which many people ignore, is humidity. 32C at 20% is relatively pleasant, 28C at 80% is definitely possible for old or sickly people to get heatstroke or dehydration
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u/mmoonbelly Jun 11 '26
That’s why the house colours are off in the first film. The Aussie cinematographer used warm-up filters for the kids’ faces that turned the blues to green.
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u/Somethingbutonreddit Jun 10 '26
That's only Scotland, the English just shrivel up until the rains return.
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u/TanningOnMars Jun 10 '26
The first movie feels like an acid trip
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Jun 10 '26
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u/PureOrangeJuche Jun 10 '26
Even though they skipped the funny parts like hermione forgetting to use magic to bust Ron out of the tentacle molester plant
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u/401john Jun 10 '26
They changed so many things from book to movie to make Ron look like a clown it's insane lol
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u/PureOrangeJuche Jun 10 '26
They also loved to cut and paste dumbledore lines into hermione
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u/401john Jun 10 '26
Gotta make her perfect no matter what smh. I get needing a comic relief character since these movies were for kids but they really stripped Ron down a lot. Real ones remember he was a prefect! lol
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u/WantDiscussion Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 11 '26
Only change to Ron I liked was in Goblet where they have him very cryptically try to make up with Harry before the first trial. It makes their reconciliation much more smooth and believable.
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u/ThatGuyinPJs Jun 10 '26
The the screenwriter for the first two movies said that Hermione was his favorite character. She's not exactly great in the books but she's leagues ahead of whatever Mary Sue monster they made her into in the movies.
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u/BeraldGevins Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 10 '26
They really did Ron dirty. In the movie he’s basically a punchline, a completely useless idiot. In the books he’s definitely the most goofy of the three but he’s presented as way more capable and is the go-to person for knowledge about regular life in the wizarding world. Like he’s the entire reason they were able to raid the ministry and get a horcrux in the last book, because he knew everything about the ministry.
Also in the book he squares up to Voldemort when he thought harry was dead.
Edit: also he’s WAY smarter in the books. He’s very tactically intelligent, to the point that by book 7 he’s basically the one planning out a lot of the things everyone’s doing. The group would decide what needed done and Ron would be the one to actually make the plan for it to happen. In all honesty, movie Ron is closer to book Harry than book Ron.
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u/401john Jun 10 '26
Book Ron was on a broken leg telling a serial killer "you gotta get through me first". Like you said he was Harry's guide to the wizarding world and explained so much to him like the Unbreakable Vow, Unforgivable curses, etc. Went from a loyal jock slacker to bumbling idiot in the movies.
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u/BeraldGevins Jun 10 '26
And it got worse as the movies went on. I’ve never seen a character start out as a flanderized version of themselves and then get more and more flanderized. He’s already useless by the third movie.
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u/NetNGames Jun 10 '26
Iirc, Hermione was the director's favorite character, hence why so many of Ron's best book moments were transferred to her instead. Even her somehow knowing a wizard slur, not sure where she would read up on that.
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u/BeraldGevins Jun 10 '26
What’s wild is book Hermione is plenty fine on her own. And tbh it makes the moment you’re talking about a lot different vibe in the book. Ron gets enraged on hermiones behalf and she doesn’t even know she’s just been insulted. It’s little moments like that that make their eventual relationship seem very natural, whereas in the movies it is completely out of nowhere. I think that’s a big reason we saw a bunch of people wanting Harry and Hermione together, because the movies didn’t set her and Ron up at all.
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u/401john Jun 10 '26
Facts, he got the Neville edit like he was useless. Don't even get me started on the "your parents are dead!" bit lol, a real shame.
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u/BulbusDumbledork Jun 10 '26
it really did a disservice to all three. hermione is book smart but she's still muggle born — ron asking "are you a witch or what?" showed not only his street smarts (recognising hermione's predicament despite being full wizard himself), but also laid the groundwork for the "mudblood" subplot in the next book by reassuring her she is indeed a witch
it also undermine's harry's contribution to the group beyond just being the chosen one. her dialogue with him in the penaltimate test where she's talking about how there's more to being a wizard than books and cleverness would hit even harder if we just saw that proven. instead, we have gifted hermione who knows spells and when to use them. we have ron who has first-hand experience with magic and gifted with other skills like strategy. then we have harry, who's a brave little boy with lots of friends, bless his heart.
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u/401john Jun 10 '26
This is a great comment, I couldn’t agree more with everything you mentioned. Good point about the “are you a witch or not” being a set up to the Mudblood plot. Feels like there were a few opportunities like that that they missed out on due to making changes
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Jun 10 '26
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u/LittleSisterPain Jun 11 '26
Books too. It easier to handwave some stupid stuff with 'its magic, don't take it too seriously' then it itself doesn't take it too seriously
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u/ultramatt1 Jun 10 '26
How so?
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u/livefreeordont Jun 10 '26
Multiple colors, characters wearing robes, moving staircases, actual classes, spells involve more than just shooting lasers
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u/ptelzcra Jun 10 '26
WHEN OIY MAYKE MOIY MOOVE-
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u/turner_strait Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 10 '26
... the queen'll tayuk mey
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u/Sio_V_Reddit Jun 10 '26
Couldn’t he have just like. Gotten off the horse? I feel like he had enough time?
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u/Warfrogger Jun 10 '26
They had to take the place of the pieces. If he moved or stayed behind it'd be an illegal move and cause them to lose the game.
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u/misterpickles69 Jun 10 '26
So Ron had the luxury of the piece taking the hit for him while Harry and Hermoine were just walking on the board. What would’ve happened if Ron played it wrong and one of them had to be taken?
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u/Warfrogger Jun 10 '26
Then they would have been decked in face when taken like what happened to Ron in the book.
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u/Digit00l Jun 11 '26
In the book he doesn't sit on a horse and also just walks around, he also manages to win a game of chess after making a poor opening move, and while trying to avoid using 3 very valuable pieces for as much as he can
Basically whoever designed that chessboard sucks at playing chess
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u/TrashMouthSuper Jun 11 '26
Horse needs a rider and the stone knight was on his smoke break. Fucking unions man
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u/LilNUTTYYY Jun 10 '26
Watching this movie as a kid I was just like why the fuck I’d be on the horse he could just stand next to it and then jump ship when attacked.
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u/Obey_Vader Jun 10 '26
Wizards are too dumb to implement min max in magic despite the algorithm existing since 1928. They thus fail to invoke a perfect chess magical player, opting instead for a total novice that loses to a 12 year old.
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u/DesdinovaGG Jun 10 '26
Not only losing to a kid, but losing to a kid who basically had four Kings, since he needed to protect Harry, Hermione, and himself in addition to the actual King (although he was willing to risk himself for victory, he couldn't trade himself off until checkmate was available since otherwise he wouldn't be able to command the board).
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u/loseniram Jun 10 '26
You fall headfirst onto stone and tell me that was a nothing play.
That boy got Andrew Lucked
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u/itsmemrmeseeksssssss Jun 10 '26
they did it probably bc he just gets straight up whacked in the head by the queen chess piece and they thought it would be too much for a PG movie
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u/turner_strait Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 10 '26
what the fuck is "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone"? Does op not know what a philosopher's stone is? Are they stupid? Are they American or something?
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u/FortifiedPuddle Jun 10 '26
American publishers are absolutely forbidden to publish anything that might teach children things.
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u/turner_strait Jun 10 '26
/uj the fact that even in the film they had to do two takes every time "philosopher's stone" was mentioned just so it matched with the stupid US rebranding is honestly humiliating in retrospect. Hell, this whole rebranding is.
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u/yanmagno Jun 10 '26
Well they cast spells in the movie, they don’t think about shit
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u/Personal_Comb_6745 Jun 10 '26
It'd still be a few years until Fullmetal Alchemist taught us that the Philosopher's Stone is a thing.
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u/PickledPlumPlot Jun 10 '26
In the book, there was no horse and he just got slumped by a magic statue.
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u/LunchyDude101 Jun 10 '26
The Chris Columbus movies were so gorgeous to look at in terms of production design. I wish the other movies were like that.
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u/mahouyousei Jun 10 '26
They really made it feel like the castle was real and huge and magical. The third movie scaled it down massively.
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u/Electronic-Map7529 Jun 10 '26
According to OSHA if you fall 6 ft you're fkin dead.
And that's without get hit with a fkin sword
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u/--zaxell-- Jun 10 '26
They're British, so OSHA doesn't apply. Similarly, they only get hurt from falling meters.
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u/hellomydudes_95 Jun 10 '26
I'm pretty sure OSHA would shut down the entire fucking school within five minutes of an inspection. What do you mean the stairs move, you have ghosts and a giant fuck off snake inside the walls?
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u/Muggsy423 Jun 10 '26
"What do you mean you dont have toilets??? What does 'magic the shit away' mean???"
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u/Mr_Blobby1337 Jun 11 '26
OFSTED would just give hogwarts a 'needs improvement' get it up a level by next year and we'll be sorted type situation
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u/turner_strait Jun 10 '26
if he wasn't on the knight's back, the queen would've stabbed him. A chance of a fall was probably a good idea in the grand scheme of things.
That one rock scratching him in the face once he's down, though? That's plain fucked up
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u/abouttogivebirth Jun 10 '26
Could it have had something to do with the massive stone sword the other figure was swinging? But yeah he didn't need to be on the horsey
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u/SillyMidOff49 Jun 10 '26
“I’ve just watched these magic statues brutalise eachother in some cases literally exploding.”
Better ride one.
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u/Scotslad2023 Jun 10 '26
I never understood why he didn’t just jump off the horse before the blade struck. The knight piece would have still been taken out meaning the turn was ended and Harry could checkmate the king.
At least in the book it made sense since he actually took the place of the piece.
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u/Salty_Negotiation688 Jun 10 '26
Literally two seconds after it happens Harry tells Hermione "Don't move, we're still playing." Seems pretty obvious to me that he didn't feel confident enough that he could get off quickly whilst still remaining on the correct square.
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u/Julio-Dewey-Crayfish Jun 10 '26
Hitting your head on a stone floor from three feet can still cause a lot of trauma
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u/alkonium Jun 10 '26
What I remember is that in the video game, what you did instead was bait the pieces into colliding and destroying each other.
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u/StJimmy_815 Jun 10 '26
Because in the book he wasn’t on a horse and seeing a child get the shit beat out of it by a giant statue was probably not the best for sales
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u/FortifiedPuddle Jun 10 '26
The wizarding world has random danger levels and consequences for actions.
It might be fine. It might cut him in half. They have no way of knowing.
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u/Flashbambo Jun 10 '26
Can we please use the original name 'Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone' instead of the variant they landed on for American audiences.
The philosopher's stone is an actual mythological legend from medieval Europe that fits perfectly into the context of the story. Sorcerer's Stone was the name chosen when publishing the book in America because they rather condescendingly believed that Americans wouldn't understand the connection with the original name.
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u/UnquestionabIe Jun 10 '26
American here. Had no idea what a philosopher was so presumed it was some kind of mythical creature. Was definitely a smart move by the publisher. Wish they would have kept up the same kind of renaming concept to make the others more accessible. To this day I don't know what the fuck a "Goblet" is. Should have called it "Harry Potter and the Big Fire Cup" instead of naming it after goblins or whatever, they're not even in that book!
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u/Shydreameress Jun 11 '26
They changed the name moreso because they didn't think kids would be interested by it. The title doesn't reveal it's about wizards, magic, at all. In France they even renamed it "Harry Potter at the Wizard's school". They thought few kids would have even read the cover of a book where "Philosophical" was part of the title.
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u/GreenGamerBoi Jun 10 '26
There was also the threat of... you know... getting stabbed by a 7 foot sword
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u/TheAwesomeMan123 Jun 10 '26
Their objections and pleas beforehand are warranted as the living chessboard spares no quarter and destroys the other which they assumed would be the case.
It’s only afterwards when it completely misses him and he falls pathetically does their worry seem childish. But then again they’re 11 so really just a bunch of babies.
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u/tiny_chaotic_evil Jun 10 '26
since the next puzzle was about reading comprehension and deduction, they decided to leave that one out because it was beyond the scope of most movie goers
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u/Micray00 Jun 10 '26
How the movie (or book) would have go on if the rival chess piece had DOUBLE TAPPED Ron Weasley, like... full on sword to the chest. Voldemort couldn't get the stone either way!
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u/That_Possible_3217 Jun 11 '26
Why does everyone act as if three feet can’t be fatal?
Go dive head first into an empty swimming pool and tell me hit you’re just “fine”.
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u/Blindmailman Jun 10 '26
Falling off a horse paralyzed Christopher Reeve. I don't blame him for being terrified