Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1

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Plot: Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes) grabs control, and seeks to kill Harry and his other opponents. Harry (Daniel Radcliffe), Hermionie (Emma Watson), and Ron (Rupert Grint) take to the wilderness to hide, and to work on destroying Voldemort's Horcruxes. 

Review:  Deathly Hallows makes no pretense of bringing along non-fans who would undoubtedly be lost. The movie dispenses with silly spells, school-boy games, and father figures from the earlier movies. Here our heros are struggling adolescents who must rise to the challenge to save lives and save the world.

The best parts are the subtle interactions between our three heros, and the fighting is just a side plot. All of the main actors have matured and are good actors, with Emma Watson delivering some great lines and reaction shots.

The wilderness scenes were beautiful, but there were too many of them -- this section is too long in the book too.

The end was not satisfying; it needed cliffhanger or a major turn in the story to punctuate the ending.

I am sure the five hour combined version of this movie, when it is eventually done, will be more satisfying. I want to see it that way next summer when part 2 comes out.

Cast: Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint

Directed by: David Yates

Rating: 2.5 stars; This is a worthy effort. Enjoyable but it falls short in funness.


More: The opening sequence is unforgetable when Hermione, calls her parents, and then erases their memories of her saying "Obliviate."

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Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

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Plot: Dumbledore (Michael Gambon) and Harry continue to track down Voldemort, and they enlist the help of Horace Slughorn (Jim Broadbent), who has a clouded past. Draco Malfoy (Tom Felton) hatches a plan to kill Dumbledore, while Harry, Hermione, Ron and Ginny flirt. This movie pushes the relationships forward and foreshawdows the climatic attack of the "Death Eaters" at the end of the movie.

Review: Harry (Daniel Radcliffe) and Hermione (Emma Watson) have developed into solid young actors that are able to carry subtle emotions that make the flirty product lines possible. Director Yates stresses these story lines and slights the action and backstory plotlines -- which gives this film more of a romantic comedy flavor.

The viewer needs to be familar with the story-line as the story is not free-standing, but you don't need to be a dedicated fan to follow the story. They do a good job of setting up how Draco is going about his plot.

This movie was fun and worthwhile, but it did not have the sense of wonder of the first two movies. The art direction has gone on vacation. The biggest talent was writing a screenplay that caught the whole plot while fitting it into 300 minutes.

This movie resists genre classification. A little rom-com, a little dramatic mystery, and a bit of gothic horror. The darkness makes these movies more adult and dramatic, and the emotions are more thoughtful -- the wonder and the funness of the first movies is gone.


Cast and crew: Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rubert Grint; directed by David Yates; based on the book by JK Rowling.


Rating: 3.0 flasks



More:
I'm a fan, and I liked it. It is not my favorite Harry Potter movie, but it was solid and enjoyable. I would not have missed it.

Even More [MAJOR SPOILER]: Seriously you should not read this yet, if you have not seen the movie. The movie goes out of its way to preserve the question of whether Dumbledore's death is an assisted suicide or a murder. That is, is Snape good, or is Snape bad? In the movie, Dumbledore seems to know he is about to be attacked, and even asks for Snape to be brought to him. He also says "Please Severius," which could mean please kill me or please don't. Earlier in the movie Dumbledore and Snape are discussing some sort of agreement that Snape wants to back out of. This could be an agreement to work as a spy, or it could be an assisted suicide. On the murder side, Snape makes a vow to kill Dumbledore at the beginning of the movie, and seems to be acting it out. Snape is shown without any emotion regarding the murder.

Secondly, Dumbledore's death is for no purpose -- unlike a Christ-figure or Obi-Wan Kenobi -- the death does not save someone else or advance a larger purpose. Even in the final book, there is little reason for Dumbledore to die.