Oh, dude, shit is going DOWN. V-mort is totally taking over the Ministry of Magic. Hermione just obliviated her parents’ brainz. Snape is wearing more eyeliner than ever. Ron drank too much Muscle Milk and Hedwig is dead and wandlore is confusing and Dobby is gross and I sincerely hope you read the book because otherwise I’m basically Gary Busey speaking Esperanto right now. You’re fucked. (Also, why didn’t you just read it? It’s really good. You think you’re better than me? You think you’re better than WIZARDS? Muggle, please.)

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 has a lot going for it and a lot going on. Too often the film feels like it’s scrambling to play catch-up: new characters introduced and abandoned every five seconds; awkward, short scenes of rapid-fire exposition; dialogue like “Hey, Hermione, I had a dream about Gregorovitch, the famous wand maker we’ve never mentioned before, and he had something that Voldemort wanted, probably because our wands have twin cores from the same magic phoenix, which means something important but I’m pretty sure even J. K. Rowling is only pretending to get it, and also something about basilisk venom!!!” Accio CliffsNotes, AMIRITE??????

A book is not a movie, and I’m still pissed that they didn’t hire Alfonso Cuarón (Prisoner of Azkaban) to direct every one of these suckers. You can feel the holes where the book’s richness is missing, replaced with special effects and cheap scares instead of Cuarón’s warm cleverness. But overall, director David Yates does an adequate if imperfect job, and he has an especially sure hand in the teen-angst department (although there is a dancing scene so uncomfortable you will pee yourself to death).

Plus, it’s Harry Potter! Wizards! You love it! Shut up! There are exciting parts (infiltrating the Ministry of Magic), corny parts (Dobby-related emotions), terrifying parts (Bathilda Bagshot’s reanimated corpse vomiting up that anaconda [who is maybe kind of Voldemort’s wife? Let’s talk about this some time]), and snogging parts (SNOGGING). Once you get past the bumpy nuts and bolts—once Harry, Ron, and Hermione begin their slow, frustrated, frightening journey, apparating aimlessly from one lovely lonely place to the next—Deathly Hallows becomes the immersive magical funtime you’re looking for. If you’ve read the book. If not, you’re still totally fucked. recommended

Lindy West was born an unremarkable female baby in Seattle, Washington. The former Stranger writer covered movies, movie stars, exclamation points, lady stuff, large frightening fish, and much, much more....

33 replies on “Concessions”

  10. @3, yeah, Goblet of Fire has dragons but it makes almost no sense. It’s more like “Unconnected Scenes from HP & the Goblet of Fire.” And the Quidditch World Cup had no quidditch in it! I know it was the first of the BIG books, but they cut out way too much while making us go to the Winter Ball in pretty much real time. Sorry, it is the weakest link in the filmography so far.

  14. Look, I’m just saying what they were reporting at some of the back east news sites, @7 … this film is way less dark than the last one – or at least it FELT like it to the reviewer.

    I’ll tell you what I thought on Friday night after I see it.

  17. Oh, come on! Awkward school dance? Professor Snape lurking around as Harry and Ron agonize over who they’re going to ask? The glorious beauxbatons backsides? WORTH THE PRICE OF ADMISSION. You people are fools. “Goblet of Fire” is where it’s at.

  20. They’re breaking the last book into two films? Is this awful franchise never going to die? The moment I heard the words “Occulous Repairo!” uttered as the “fix broken eyeglasses” spell in the first film, I lost all respect for J.K. Rowling as a writer. And don’t give me that crap about not being in the target audience; that’s objectively awful.

  27. @11 How old is too old? I’m 41 and my wife and are seeing the film tonight. May your children be condemned to reading Nick Kristof editorials and watching Frontline documentaries if they’re “too old” for HP.

  28. YES LINDY! You win for all eternity with “muggle, please”.
    However, you are very, very wrong about numba three being the best. Harry and the gang were in their robes for about THREE SECONDS. No one wants to see harry running about doing magic in street clothes! Robes make it all g.
    I can’t wait to see it. I AM SO EXCITE. I wish I could go see movies with you, Lindy!

  30. @27, my kids are teenagers; they outgrew the books about the time they left elementary school.

    They tell me Harry Potter is desperately uncool now, and I’m mostly relieved to not have to sit through the crappy movie adaptations with them anymore.

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