Harry Potter, Reveiw I: Deathly Hallows, the movie

I went to an opening midnight showing of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" with my best HP buddy.   We had great fun. We were both big fans of the books, less so of the movies, especially critical of the later ones.  Being with a good movie companion, added to a full, enthusiastic and engrossed theater, probably makes the experience at least 5x better. Our general consensus was that this movie was about middling for its overall cinematic quality and for its ability to convey the Harry Potter story. It was much better than that clunker Goblet of Fire, and compares reasonably with the last two movies.  So if you just want to know whether or not to see it: if you are at all a fan of the books or movies, or if you are into big screen extravaganzas, yeah, go. If you have no special affection for HP...eh, you could wait for the video if you don't want to spend the $10 per person.

Now for a more in-depth critique, with these caveats:
1) SPOILER WARNING. I don't know how much I'm actually giving away, but I'm certainly not holding back.
2) I'm a harsh critic, so it may sound like I hated the movie. But as I said, overall I liked the movie and thought it was a lot of fun.

I seem to disagree with most people by preferring the first three movies to the later ones, with the forth, GoF, being my absolute least favorite, I thought it was a complete bomb.  The early movies made the best use of the human talent, even if the kids were pushed to the ridiculous a couple times.  They were full of characters that were really great to watch.  By GoF, the director seems to have forgotten they even bothered to hire actors, and consequently dropped the idea of developing interesting characters (Fleur doesn't even get any lines!), preferring to rely completely on special effects (with some teenage goo-goo eyes thrown in to fill a little more time.) Ironically, they drop Dobby, handing over his part to Neville, for some reason deciding the CG elf was too hard or just not worth recreating.???

Before taking out the scalpel, let me point out a couple things I (we) really liked in DH.  There were a few scene I especially remember. The early Harry, Ron, Hermione on the run made a sweet allusion to the first boo with Ron's line, "I always liked those little fires Hermione makes in the jars."  And my companion liked when, a moment later, Harry turned that "little flame" into a jet of fire; "No Hemione, nothing's going on in here."  I appreciated the Harry/Hermione dance scene, even though it was not in the book.  It helped create the sense of a long, difficult, lonely autumn on the run.

The Horcrux Harry/Hermione scene was quite derivative of the "All Powerful Galadriel" scene in Lord of the Rings.  But I don't say this as a critisism.  It was the right effect, and gave a properly ethereal feel to the phantom lovers.

We were both impressed with the actors who portrayed the polyjuiced Harry, Ron, Hermione in the ministry. They did a wonderful job of mimicking Radcliff, Grint and Watson, while bringing a freshness to the characters.  I'm afraid this may indeed be a critisism of the original actors and/or the way the y are directed, that has left their portrayals of the trio feeling old and flat.

Overall, I got the feeling that the movie makers were trying to translate the book onto the screen rather then reinvent the story as in the previous movies. This pleased me, and probably many, many other fans who had such affection for the original series.  It felt that the producer/ director/ screen writer/ whoever also had an affinity for the books.

I suppose its no mystery why the movies were so light on the character development and plot nuances. In a world where the book fans are a guaranteed audience and an average 400 has to be fit in under 130 minutes, the producers will go for glitz to attract the widest possible audience. The mystery to me is why they decided to cheat themselves out of the glitz as well. By ebbing away from the magical costumes, enchanted oddities and mystical glamour, they are left with a pathetically mundane world. Even Bill's and Fleur's wedding looked like a bit of a dump full of muggle ragamuffins.

I think the fate of the house elves epitomizes the downfall of the movies. It's "common knowledge" that the director wanted to cut house elves entirely for Order of the Phoenix, but this idea was nixed by Ms. Rowling. who informed him that the characters would be essential in the final book. In fact, the house elves have two of the most passionate parts in the book, with Kreacher's redemption and Dobby's death. But adequately evoking that passion with these "special effects" was so difficult that the first event is almost completely skimmed over and for the second I believe they substituted a puppet to provide a mediocre rendition. (my buddy says "she's wrong wrong wrong") Can someone confirm or disprove this? Character expression is sacrificed to special effects and everyone loses.

Finally, I don't see how anyone who has not had the benefit of already learning the plot could possibly follow the movie.  As just one example:  do any neophytes understand what's with that glass shard Harry keeps waving around?  But I hope I'm wrong, and you are all loving the movie.

Coming next: critique of the books. (please, come back it'll be shorter! maybe.)

(and my buddy may be join in to give you the truth. To see more of the truth check out his vlog www.youtube.com/ultimatewhodat. "I might start posting to it again. If I get enough hits. Click subscribe to get a free email signed by ultimatewhodat. I'm legally required to state that the opinions stated here are the opinions of individuals and do not necessarily represent the views of Sweet Profusion, J. K. Rowling or WB Films.")