It's kind of interesting to read this thread because it's one of the few where I've seen multiple people saying they liked the third movie more than the first two (for the record, so do I). A common complaint I saw on other message boards about the third movie was that it was disjointed and lacked character development. Hmm....
Anyway, I liked the fourth movie, and I think it's probably the best adaptation that could have been made. Remember, the original book was
huge. I can only wonder how they'll handle the upcoming books because they're even longer. Yeah, some scenes were disjointed, but with a book that long, what else are you going to do? They dropped bunches of side plots as it was already.
Mike Newell's strategy for dealing with this was to throw in lots of small little moments that were charming and rang true. Things like the expressions on Harry's face when Hermione yells at him to go to bed or the way Fred (or was it George?) Weasley asked a girl out to the dance or Ron's reaction when Professor McGonnagall tells him to put his hand on her waist. These kids are in the process of growing up, and like all of us, they sometimes do it clumsily. If some scenes are awkward, I think that's because they're supposed to be. And I can tell you right now that most of those moments weren't a part of the book. They're purely Mike Newell's additions.
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if you're going to kill off a character, and want a big reaction, maybe let us get to know him first. There was a lot more emphasis on him in the book.
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I've got to disagree with you there. I suppose I should spoiler tag this, but come on now. You really shouldn't be in this thread unless you've seen the movie.
Anyway, Cedric was even more of a non-entity in the book. Not only was he not around very much, he basically had no personality whatsoever. And I think the actor who played him managed to actually impart something to the character so that we could recognize that he was basically a good and honorable person instead of simply thinking of him as, well, just some other guy.