Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Question: I watched the scene where fake Moody takes Harry away from the crowd after Cedric Diggory's death. I noticed that Weasley twins were looking at them when it happened. Is this possible that they informed Dumbledore about it offscreen and this caused him to realise that "Moody" was an imposter?

Answer: It's not specifically known if the twins informed Dumbledore, but it's implied that they probably did, or else they told McGonagall or Snape after Harry was suspiciously absent. No one else appeared to notice Moody leading Harry away.

raywest

Question: Why didn't Harry simply refuse to take part in the Tri-Wizard tournament? Even though his name came out of the goblet, he could have said no.

Answer: No, he had to participate because the goblet of fire forced him into a "magical contract." The goblet itself is probably partially sentient and would punish anyone who didn't participate after being selected by the goblet. How this works exactly is never explained, but the tournament judges were pretty clear that he had no choice but to participate.

lionhead

What would have happened to Harry if he broke the contract?

Broken magical contracts usually resulted in death; a good deterrent for not breaking them. Keep in mind, however, Harry (in the book at least), like many students, very much wanted to compete in the tournament despite the danger, but initially couldn't because he was underage. He still wanted to compete, despite knowing the selection process was rigged.

raywest

It's never explained.

lartaker1975

Question: Given the Tasks are the main point of the Triwizard Tournament, they're pretty poor spectator sports - one is an hour underwater and another is in a dark maze. So all the overseas students spend most of a year at Hogwarts to watch three short rounds of a competition, two of which happen out of sight?

Answer: This is better understood in the book. The students were not invited there solely to watch the Triwizard Tournament. It was also a year-long educational and cultural experience. Dumbledore revived the tournament in its original form for a specific purpose - his secret goal was to build an international wizarding community to help fight Voldemort, who he was certain would return and spread his evil beyond the U.K. Bringing the Durmstrang and Beauxbaton students to Hogwarts for the school year was intended to build lasting friendships and alliances and for them to work cooperatively. Also, the original competition was never designed to entertain a crowd. It was a dangerous, life-threatening event that tested competitors' courage and abilities under extreme conditions, That is hardly boring and would likely keep spectators engaged long enough to see if the champions survived, even if some events weren't entirely visible.

raywest

Not sure where that is in the books, other than it being a genuinely good strategy, but the original question does seem to have a point - if you're going to collate three communities to watch a very spread-out version of the Olympic Games, why select two games where the action is entirely invisible to the audience other than who eventually emerges from the lake/maze first? It's like staging the Indy 500 when the crowd can only see the podium and not the track.

It is part of the book's overall plot, and, in the movie, Hermione mentions its purpose is about "magical cooperation." I don't recall that Dumbledore personally selected the events. He revived the original TriWizard Tournament, albeit with safety modifications. The real answer, however, is that this is a book/movie. J.K. Rowling crafted the plot to make it exciting and suspenseful and to allow for Voldemort's ultimate plan at the story's end to unfold, hidden from Dumbledore, the Hogwarts staff, and Ministry officials, who, naturally, would intervene. Otherwise, how could Harry be captured, Cedric killed, Harry be part of Voldemort's resurrection, and the climatic duel with the Dark Lord in the graveyard take place? Sometimes facts/reality/logic, etc. are suspended for the sake of the story.

raywest

Question: Why was Hermione being chased by Ginny in the tent? Hermione isn't the kind of person who'd do a harmless thing and make someone chase them for a joke.

THE GAMER NEXT DOOR

Answer: Hermione is a 14 year old girl, having fun with a close friend. Of course they will horse around and tease and play. Hermione might be serious as a student and quite mature for her age, but she also knows how to have fun.

lionhead

She is almost a year older than Harry, so that explains the maturity.

Answer: If you're referring to the tent scene at the Quidditch World Cup, I don't remember Ginny chasing Hermione, but the twins, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, and Harry are in high spirits after their favored team has won. All are jumping around, laughing and singing in celebration. If that's not the scene you're referring to, can you be more specific?

raywest

Ginny was chasing Hermione when Fred and George said "feet off the table"

I watched the clip on YouTube. Ginny and Hermione are excited after the group arrive inside their rented tent. The girls rush into where they will be sharing a room and drop off their gear. They then rush over to the other side of the tent, probably to where the kitchen is. Hermione is just running ahead of Ginny and is not being chased.

raywest

Question: When Harry is packing his trunk at the end and Dumbledore is talking to him about setting the curtains on fire, does anyone know what is written on the inside of the lid of Harry's trunk?

Answer: It's hard to say what was written on the inside of the trunk. Sometimes they write the company that made the trunk so it might have had the manufacturer's name inside of it and maybe even the year that it was made as well. It seems like everyone at the school has very similar trunks so it may have his name written inside of it so as not to confuse it with anyone else's.

Answer: It looks like information for Harry's trunk in case it was ever found by someone. Probably had his phone number and address inside of it.

You wouldn't put that information on the inside.

lionhead

You would if you didn't want to display your personal information everywhere but also expected that if your trunk was lost, the finder would open it to see whose it was. Yes it is more practical to have an ID tag or similar in modern luggage but the Harry Potter stories are deliberately written as quaint and old fashioned.

You don't open luggage you find. Name of the owner is always on the outside.

lionhead

Sure you would. Presumably, it's very difficult to lose a trunk that big, given the modes of transport that Harry uses. Info on the inside would be a last resort.

Answer: Barty Crouch, Jr, masquerading as Mad-Eye Moody, put Harry's name in. He explicitly tells him so at the end before being captured by Dumbledore et al.

Question: When Harry, Ron, and Hermione are on the train to Hogwarts, the trolley of food comes by and Ron asks for two items but then changes his mind and only gets one. Was there something specific that made him not want the second item?

Answer: Ron realised he didn't have enough money to pay for both. The Weasley family was poor, and Ron often had to do with much less than his peers. This sometimes caused friction between him and Harry, whose parents had left him a small fortune.

raywest

Answer: They probably think Cedric is cute and look at each other to see if the other one thinks the same.

lionhead

Both definitely think Cedric is cute and are acknowledging that to one another, possibly hoping he will be interested in return.

raywest

Question: How exactly does Crouch Sr. Recognize his son disguised as Moody after the second task? Was it a scar or other facial blemish?

Answer: Crouch Jr. had a particular habit of flicking his tongue in an unusual way when speaking. When the fake Mad Eye Moody (Crouch Jr) did that, Crouch Sr noticed it and became suspicious. This is actually an overused plot device where a character has some odd manner or trait that gives away their true identity.

raywest

Answer: Plus the fake Moody said to Crouch, "not trying to lure Potter into a ministry internship are we? The last boy who went into the department of mysteries never came out."

Answer: Because she's afraid Harry might die. The Triwizard Tournament is extremely dangerous and champions had been killed during it in the past. Only students 17 years old and over were allowed to compete, but due to the unusual circumstances, Harry was forced into the competition, even though he was underage. Hermione also suspects that there is an evil plot going on, further endangering Harry.

raywest

Question: Why was Ron angry with Harry for allegedly putting his name in the Goblet of Fire?

MikeH

Answer: Ron was becoming a jealous of Harry's fame and, feeling inadequate, was tired of being in his shadow. He (wrongly) believed Harry had entered his name into the Goblet for the attention.

raywest

Why does he think Harry did it? Ron was with him when the others put their name in and he couldn't have done it overnight because prefects roam the grounds.

Ron knows that Harry had the cloak, and that Harry can generally get away with a lot more than other students.

Ssiscool

Answer: Harry has an invisibility cloak and the Marauders Map, easily undetectable to anyone but Mad-Eye Moody. I'm sure Ron thought that Harry could have slipped away; surely they aren't together every second of the day. Ron was jealous, it doesn't have to make sense.

Question: Anybody who puts their name into the Goblet and is selected is bound to a magical contract to participate in the tournament. Since Harry never actually put his name into the Goblet, shouldn't that void the contract?

Answer: The selection process was corrupted by Barty Crouch, Jr, who cast an exceptionally powerful "Confundus" spell on the Goblet of Fire. The Cup was somewhat sentient and wrongly sensed that Harry was a student from a (non-existent) fourth school who'd entered his own name, even though someone else submitted it. Once a name was entered, a student was magically bound to compete in the tournament.

raywest

Answer: I watched the clip on YouTube, stopping and enlarging the image to scan it, but I did not see Cho sitting among the other students at Cedric's memorial scene. She may have been sitting in an area in the back or off to the side where the faces were less visible or else she was too distraught to attend the ceremony.

raywest

Question: Why did Barty run away, letting Harry go at the world cup? I know he heard the voices of Hermione and Ron but he's smart enough to know that he could've killed them and then just taken Harry. After all, isn't that why he was there in the first place?

Answer: Taking Harry and killing Ron and Hermione at that time would have made it too obvious that Voldemort was behind it. Voldemort's plot hinged on abducting Harry in a way that no one would immediately know what had happened to him. The TriWizard Tournament was traditionally extremely dangerous, resulting in students in past events being killed while competing. Harry's disappearance in the maze would initially be attributed to some tragic mishap, giving Voldemort time to complete his resurrection.

raywest

Yeah, the ritual needed to be made ready too I think, for Voldemort's revival.

lionhead

Question: When Harry became the champion, why did Dumbledore get mad? I know in the book, he doesn't get mad, he asks Harry calmly. Why did the screenwriters change this?

DFirst1

Answer: It's typical for scenes taken from a book to be depicted a bit differently in a film adaptation. Movies are visual and in this instance, the filmmakers were going for a more dramatic, ramped-up effect. Dumbledore was never mad at Harry, but upset by the turn of events and he had to be certain Harry was not in any way involved.

raywest

Answer: He's not mad per se, he is concerned that Harry did it himself and that he put himself in danger. He felt it was careless of him to do that, that's why he asked so furiously.

lionhead

Question: When Hermione tells Harry and Ron that Neville has a partner for the dance, why doesn't she tell them that it's Ginny, Ron's own sister?

Answer: Because it's not really her place to tell them anything. She probably enjoys keeping them guessing, particularly Ron, and wants them to find out for themselves, which will surprise them even more. I don't remember how it was in the book, but for the movie, it sets up the scene for the audience to be surprised as well.

raywest

Question: The 'shooting off sparks in the maze' at the end feels particularly clumsy...was the book the same way? Like, if this is all magic, why would the maze not be able to recognize who shot off the sparks, and make sure that person was ejected from the maze? Otherwise, it seems like you could use this to sabotage a competitor (e.g, if Viktor knew Cedric was coming around the corner momentarily, then he could shoot up sparks and run away, so that Cedric would be in place to be sucked up by the maze).

Answer: In both the book and movie, the contestants sent up sparks. However, all were pre-warned of the dangers and that they were pretty much on their own upon entering the maze. In the book, the maze is filled with hazardous objects and creatures that each contestant had to overcome. In the movie, the hedge itself is the danger, and it appears Voldemort (aided by Barty Crouch, Jr.) manipulated it to ensure that Harry reached the middle while it sabotaged and controlled the other competitors. Therefore, the maze would not protect the contestants. The four were unaware the maze was corrupted and were so focused on winning that they ignored the dangers. All were determined to continue as long as they could.

raywest

Question: Why was Molly Weasley absent in this movie? Did her actress, Julie Walters, get sick or was simply too busy with another movie?

Answer: Walters wanted to be in it. "Goblet of Fire" is a fairly long story with many new characters added. In the book, Molly mostly appeared early on in scenes confined to the Weasleys' home. She did not attend the World Quidditch Cup or play a significant role in the overall story arc. To trim its running length, the movie starts later in the story as Harry and the Weasleys, minus Molly, set off for the match. There was really no reason, plot wise, to add her character into the already complex storyline. Harry's family, the Dursleys, were also left out.

raywest

Question: I was just wondering why the Death Eaters were so eager for the Dark Lord to return, but the moment he's resurrected (which happens in this film and in the book), they are suddenly really afraid of him. I mean they go on and on about how they can't wait for him to return but the moment he does, it's almost like they wish he hadn't e.g. the scene in this film in the graveyard where Voldemort calls out Lucius Malfoy or the scene at the start of "The Deathly Hallows part 1" where they're all having a meeting at Malfoy Manor and Voldemort is walking and talking amongst them and they're all fearful of him.

Answer: Voldemort works on fear and hate. His minions are full of that. They hate muggles and wish they could dominate them, to crush their world. Voldemort promised them that, so they follow him, to reach that goal since he is a powerful dark wizard with followers and the ambition to go as far as he can. But Voldemort likes people being afraid of him, even his minions, so he is harsh on them, punishes any tiny mistake severely, does cruel things to them. So they fear him, are very submissive in his presence because of his cruelty and magic prowess. but he does lead them to their ultimate goal.

lionhead

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire mistake picture

Continuity mistake: After Wormtail performs the Avada Kedavra curse and then raises the "bone of the father," he places Voldemort's wand inside the left side of his coat, before he slices off his right hand. When Voldemort says, "My wand Wormtail," Wormtail retrieves the wand from the right side of his coat. (01:56:00 - 01:57:40)

Super Grover

More mistakes in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Harry Potter: What's with the flower? Hagrid... Did you comb your hair?
Hagrid: You might want to try the same thing yourself now and again.

More quotes from Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Trivia: There is an actual band in Canada called the Wyrd Sisters who tried to stop the November 18th release of 'Goblet of Fire' in Canada because there is a band of the same name in the movie, but they lost their case.

More trivia for Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

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