From Laremy Legel at Film.com:
Where the film falters is through the calculated exclusion of anyone not already steeped in Harry Potter lore. You'll need to come in emotionally invested, though the chances of that are solid if you've read this far. Newcomers need not apply, as the whole affair would likely come off as a blustery exercise without prior knowledge of the books or films.
Yes to all but "if you've read this far", you're emotionally invested.
From Anthony Lane in The New Yorker:
The trouble with Harry, as becomes clear from this seventh and penultimate installment, is not that we have lost the plot—the film is as tangled and as corkscrewed as Bonham Carter’s hair—but that we are in danger of losing everything else. The first words of the movie, which is directed by David Yates, are “These are dark times, there is no denying.” Actually, there is denying—that was the gist of the comic fantasy that used to prevail in Hogwarts, a place notably unvisited by our heroes on this occasion. Even allowing for the fact that we have followed Harry (Daniel Radcliffe), Hermione (Emma Watson), and Ron (Rupert Grint) into the slough of puberty and out the other side, the whole thing does seem preternaturally stained with Weltschmerz.
Yes, again.
From Peter Travers at Rolling Stone:
Like a virgin's padded bra, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part I is all tease, zero payoff. No investment banker left standing could fail to applaud the studio's initiative in halving the seventh and last book in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter series to squeeze the goose for more gold. But a movie that plays like a 146-minute trailer for the actual final chapter — Part II opens next July in 3D! — is a definite cheat.
Once again, yes.
Last night, Tom and I went to see the latest Harry Potter film. I'd read the review in The New Yorker and was not enthusiastic about going, but we had not been to a movie together in quite a while, so since Tom wanted to go, I went along.
We'd missed
Before I read the second book in the series, I saw the movie, "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets", and did not care for it nearly so much as the first. I didn't read any of the other Potter books, and, as I've said, we missed the next
I knew that Dumbledore had died, but Tom and I were pretty thoroughly lost in the first scenes of the movie. Although we never really caught up, we tried to follow along with the intricacies of the plot, as best we could. Tom enjoyed the action and special effects, but I was mostly bored.
I discovered that Daniel Radcliffe is short, 5'6" as best I can discover, since a good many of the other actors in the film seemed to tower over him, and not just Hagrid. I got caught up in the scenery, some of which was quite beautiful. According to Wikipedia, "The crew also shot on location, with Swinley Forest and Freshwater West as two of the main outdoor filming areas, along with the village of Lavenham in Suffolk and the streets of the city of London."
One scene that I loved was of Harry enticing the mournful Hermione (Ron having left them) to dance, in an attempt to lift her spirits - a sweet moment to savor for a romantic such as I.
Near the end of the movie, I had to make a run to use the facilities, and I missed all but the very last scenes of the film, which led to a to-be-continued ending. That I didn't mind not seeing the scenes I missed, says a lot about how much I cared about the movie. I missed the fun in the first movie, which was perhaps more due to my expectations than a fault in the movie.
On the plus side, we were given MovieWatcher rewards of two free small bags of popcorn, but, on the minus side, the theater discontinued discounts for seniors.
The wrath of true-blue Potter fans will probably descend on me for what I've written, but, what I have written, I have written.
UPDATE: See Bishop Alan's review of "Potterdammerung".
