Post by Eric T. Jones on Jul 15, 2009 12:22:46 GMT -5
RATING (0 to ****): **1/2
Honestly speaking, I should have seen this coming. Unfortunately, I was blinded by what were undeniably the best and most promising trailers of the year, and each new snippet of "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" made it look more and more promising! How could the least memorable book of the franchise contribute to such a powerful, exciting, rousing, climactic epic?
The answer is, the film version of "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" is true to the spirit of its source material. Although the last offering, "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix", felt like an extremely simplified but thoroughly-enjoyable adaptation, I looked as the minutes lumbered by and remembered absolutely nothing from the novel (but then again, it could be the book's incompatibility with my memory as well)... except the bits about Dumbledore's memory cabinet, one of the few, precious pieces of magic left.
Although delayed eight months, it hardly seemed to have been worth the wait. Much like this year's other extremely overrated disappointment, Pixar's "Up", "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" won over the critics and appears to have won over most of my audience by its few poignant minutes. If you've read the book, its most infamous bit is present and powerful; it almost redeems having to sit through the extremely slow first hour-and-a-quarter. Almost.
The primary intrigue while we're waiting for a professor's last memories on You-Know-Who's discovery from the library's restricted section is Ron Weasley's bizarre placebo effect from a luck potion. As it turns out, he's making out with-- I'm sorry, "snogging"-- girls left and right, everyone but Hermione... and in one of the film's many disappointing bits, the return of Quidditch. It's been gone for three films, and while it brings back fond memories, it perhaps should have stayed missing. As the franchise grows dark and more serious, that playful magic seems out-of-place. What passes off as fun in "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" are a series of disappointingly stale jokes. Even Luna Lovegood can't save this one.
One of the film's few successful scenes is a bit of dessert with Harry, Hermione, and Professor Slughorn (Jim Broadbent). Although I cannot even remember the reason why for that one.
All of the previous "Potter" flicks, warts and all, have provided for entertaining diversions once they've reached their HBO premieres, and were all enjoyable enough to watch over and over again. "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" is one you need only tune to the last half-hour of, if you even do need to watch it more than once.
Like the much more enjoyable "Order of the Phoenix", director David Yates is at the helm, and his disorienting sense of shot composition is back. Although it improves somewhat, you still can't help but direct your eyes towards some completely irrelevant part of the shot. Think of it as the anti-"Star Trek", which did direct you to look in all directions but inspired a sense of three-dimensionality. Yates' way with a camera is off-putting, and he's apparently shot the two-part finale, "Deathly Hallows", in shakycam. God help us all.
Honestly speaking, I should have seen this coming. Unfortunately, I was blinded by what were undeniably the best and most promising trailers of the year, and each new snippet of "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" made it look more and more promising! How could the least memorable book of the franchise contribute to such a powerful, exciting, rousing, climactic epic?
The answer is, the film version of "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" is true to the spirit of its source material. Although the last offering, "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix", felt like an extremely simplified but thoroughly-enjoyable adaptation, I looked as the minutes lumbered by and remembered absolutely nothing from the novel (but then again, it could be the book's incompatibility with my memory as well)... except the bits about Dumbledore's memory cabinet, one of the few, precious pieces of magic left.
Although delayed eight months, it hardly seemed to have been worth the wait. Much like this year's other extremely overrated disappointment, Pixar's "Up", "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" won over the critics and appears to have won over most of my audience by its few poignant minutes. If you've read the book, its most infamous bit is present and powerful; it almost redeems having to sit through the extremely slow first hour-and-a-quarter. Almost.
The primary intrigue while we're waiting for a professor's last memories on You-Know-Who's discovery from the library's restricted section is Ron Weasley's bizarre placebo effect from a luck potion. As it turns out, he's making out with-- I'm sorry, "snogging"-- girls left and right, everyone but Hermione... and in one of the film's many disappointing bits, the return of Quidditch. It's been gone for three films, and while it brings back fond memories, it perhaps should have stayed missing. As the franchise grows dark and more serious, that playful magic seems out-of-place. What passes off as fun in "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" are a series of disappointingly stale jokes. Even Luna Lovegood can't save this one.
One of the film's few successful scenes is a bit of dessert with Harry, Hermione, and Professor Slughorn (Jim Broadbent). Although I cannot even remember the reason why for that one.
All of the previous "Potter" flicks, warts and all, have provided for entertaining diversions once they've reached their HBO premieres, and were all enjoyable enough to watch over and over again. "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" is one you need only tune to the last half-hour of, if you even do need to watch it more than once.
Like the much more enjoyable "Order of the Phoenix", director David Yates is at the helm, and his disorienting sense of shot composition is back. Although it improves somewhat, you still can't help but direct your eyes towards some completely irrelevant part of the shot. Think of it as the anti-"Star Trek", which did direct you to look in all directions but inspired a sense of three-dimensionality. Yates' way with a camera is off-putting, and he's apparently shot the two-part finale, "Deathly Hallows", in shakycam. God help us all.