>>>Went to see the latest Harry Potter t'other day with the family. Man, I struggled to keep awake at a few points. There was the final showdown, as usual, but I didn't recognise it for that. I thought, "ah, that was quite exciting - the finale should be good" - then the film was over!
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>>It seems that with every film in the series, it gets more difficult to cram all the details in the books, into a two or three hour film. Especially in the Order of the Phoenix, I had the impression that, while the story basically was true to the books, many important details would be missing for anyone who didn't read the books, and that the storyline would be quite confusing for such people.
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>I've found that by reading the books to the kids at bedtime, over a long period, by the time I've got to the end of any of them, they make ref. to incidents or things near the beginning, and by that time I've forgotten what the hell she's talking about. She's not so hot on supplying little recaps, to remind you (they ARE quite thick the books). In short, I've no idea what's been missed out from the books when I see the films (and it was a few years ago I read this last one). BTW, still got the last 2 to read yet, but I'm not breaking my neck to get there.

In my case, I read the books by myself, and rather quickly. The last issue (Year 7 - Deathly Hallows) took me about 4 days to read. This was because I was quite busy with other things, otherwise I would have probably read it in 2 days.

It still helps to re-read, because some details become a little confusing.