Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson, Robbie Coltrane, Michael Gambon, Maggie Smith, Alan Rickman, and others star in this epic fantasy film based on the fourth novel in the Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling.
This movie was tremendous! In my opinion, it was the best of the series. The acting was very good on the whole. The story was excellent and captivating. It explored some more complicated themes than the previous films: true friendships, the rigors of dating, choosing between “doing what is right and doing what is easy.” (I suppose our heros are growing older, so that goes with the territory). The movie made me laugh, and it almost made me cry. However, it is not a movie that I would take young children to see as it is much darker than the last few films (hence the PG-13 rating).
The problem with the film is not really even a problem with the film; it’s a problem with the book: the book is long…very long, and it’s tough to sqeeze everything from a long book into a 3 hr. movie. I had heard rumors that the people making the film wanted to split it up in to two movies so that everthing in the book could get covered, but I think that would have been a mistake. However, at the end of the movie, I found myself wishing I’d gotten to know all of the new characters much better, especially: Fluer Delacour, Cedric Diggory, and Victor Krum. None of these people had very substantial speaking to do, and their characters were not very well developed at all (and they seemed like such cool people too). Also, I wish some of my favorite people from prior films would have played a more substantial role: Snape, McGonagal, etc..
I felt like the movie had the potential to be 6 hours long, but that would not have been a pleasureable experience for your average movie goer; I, on the other hand, am a big nerd, so I could have handled it .
Most of the complaints I have heard in other reviews are from disgruntled fans who are upset about things from the book that have been left out of the movie. I can understand those feelings…but length is a luxury that books have that typical movies don’t. Even though some parts of the movie seemed abbreviated and many characters were left underdeveloped, the movie is already 2 hrs. and 40 min. long: give them a break.
Overall, this movie was very entertaining, and I recommend it highly.