A very enjoyable film. I'm glad that it cuts the crap and gets straight into the action. Within thirty minutes we're in Hogwarts and preparing for battle.
The battle is when it manages to fall apart. David Yates has never been my favorite directer but this is his sloppiest yet. It's almost like he gave up after five minutes and decided to let the film be a success because of the franchises popularity, as opposed to making it a good film in itself. The script was absolutely brilliant as was the acting, Daniel Radcliffe actually managed to look like a proper actor at some points! Direction and editing were the only things that ruined this one. The first couple of scenes were brilliant but as soon as the HP logo appears it all goes downhill.
The Battle of Hogwarts wasn't very well done in the book. But that's because we were following Harry and his quest. It did slightly annoy me when there was one point that we got little more than "And Harry entered the hall. By the way, here's a list of people that are dead..." The film however was built up to have some kind of epic LOTR style battle, even skipping the slightly smaller battle in Hogwarts during Half Blood Prince to increase anticipation. This however never seemed to materialize beyond a couple of lazily thrown together montages with Neville seeming to gain the whit of Roger Moore's Bond, I was almost expecting a 'wand' innuendo. What we did see of the battle was a total letdown. After half an hours worth of setting up, enchanting statues and Voldemort preparing his army for the march on
in Deathly Hallows Part 1.
One thing that really bothered me was how obvious it was that Robbie Coltrane was never ever in the same place as Daniel Radcliffe during shooting. Usually some effort is made to hide it, but yet again the post production process seemed to be so lazy that they just didn't bother trying. Something that also affected the final and infamous 'nineteen years later' sequence. When I heard that they were using CGI to make the cast look older I was skeptical. It seems that wearing more adult clothes now passes as CGI as that was the only real visible difference. As sad as it is to say, people in the cinema were laughing at what was supposed to be the sad and emotional scene at the end because of this.
Despite all of this however it was a very enjoyable film. It's a Harry Potter film so it's fair to say that it was almost definitely going to be a huge success. The source material is of course fantastic so they couldn't really go wrong with the story. The smaller scenes between the three main characters along with the Harry/Voldemort scenes were brilliantly done. There were a few nice additions, such as Voldemort massacring Gringotts after the trio get away.
It was also nice to see faces from previous films, such as Professor Sprout. However they tried so hard to fit everyone in that it seemed to turn into yet another lazy montage of poor cameos. When you consider that these are some of the best actors going, a cameo seems a bit underwhelming. None the less, it was a good idea and I'm glad that it did happen. One character that they did give a good deal to was McGonagall, who's almost demented attack on Snape once she hears that he killed Dumbledore is one of the highlights of the film. Julie Walters as Molly Weasley also manages to steal the show in the very little time she has onscreen.
So a very good film flawed by poor direction and editing. It was very fun to watch and it manages to give the 'end of an era' feeling exceptionally well. A welcome addition to the HP series and certainly one of the better ones. It's sad to see it end. Again.
