It started so well.
There were wonderous effects. Okay, they weren't as good as Lord of the Rings, and they served a simple plot, but the makers of the Harry Potter series had a fully realized notion of what the world of Hogwarts should be like. The early movies were fresh and exciting and morphed over time into fare like "The Prisioner of Azkaban" where discrimination and childhood fears became themes that drove the fantasy.
That is now over with.
The latest Harry Potter installment is a vapid, slowly paced bore where our characters discover teenage love, and then proceed to begin caring more about who is going with whom to the Christmas party than the pesky little matter of the Dark Lord who is trying to kill them all. For two and a half hours, not much happens. Then a little happens, and then credits roll.
This is it? This is the training that Harry Potter has received from Hogwarts over the last six years? For this we sat through Order of the Phoenix, where it appeared as if Harry was actually about to, you know, do something about his situation? Instead we are treated to such thrilling scenes as Harry deciding who gets to be on this year's Quidditch team.
At this point we should be past the simple patterns of high school life: people have died, and Hermione has turned back time for crying out loud. But this installment has our players back to the mewling magical infants of the first movie. There is nothing wondrously magical here--only poor timing, cheap gags, and characters who have moved two steps backwards.
The set design and effects are better than ever, but only a shell of the former greatness remains for this series.
2 out of 5 stars.
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