Monday at the Movies - January 8, 2018

Welcome to another installment of “Monday at the Movies.” This week, we inaugurate 2018 with its first movie reviews as we charge headlong into the seventh year of “Monday at the Movies.”

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016) – I had real reservations about this film, the first of five in a prequel series to the beloved but occasionally laborious Harry Potter franchise. My misgivings ultimately proved unfounded, though it took me a year to surmount them; I found the film to be a self-contained narrative with a conclusion, and I found it to be immensely cheering. Returning to writerly duties, J.K. Rowling remembers to keep the whimsy in the wizard’s world with a clever and fun film to which a disservice is done when we brush it off as merely a prequel to Harry Potter. Eddie Redmayne stars as the wide-eyed Newt Scamander, whose bigger-on-the-inside briefcase full of magical creatures pops open in 1920s New York, drawing the attention of former Auror Tina Goldstein (Katherine Waterston) and biting a No-Maj (no-magic, played by Dan Fogler) on the neck. The film takes its time building a world – at once recognizable but simultaneously quite fresh in its exploration of wizards in America – and it’s to Rowling’s credit that I went from Hogwarts fatigue to genuine enthusiasm anew for the mythology. (I plied my moviegoing companion and tested her saintly patience for nearly forty minutes of exhausting detail about nifflers, no-majs, and school houses.) Moreover, the film contains at least one genuinely surprising turn, about which I am probably the last man in America not to have been spoiled. David Yates shows no signs that this is his fifth directorial outing in the Potterverse, bringing a renewed energy to the project and restoring that Spielbergian sense of awe. As someone who had previously regarded the prospect of Fantastic Beasts with cynical dread, I now say, roll on the sequel (The Crimes of Grindelwald, due in November).

Would You Rather (2012) – If the Marquis de Sade hosted a dinner party and invited the cast of Saw, it’d be something like this joyless film. Brittany Snow stars as a woman down on her luck and caring for her ailing brother; she accepts an offer to play a mysterious game on the promise of untold riches if she wins. Naturally, the invitation conceals the horrific nature of the game, a sadistic version of “would you rather.” I’ve seen this film lauded for its “restraint” within the torture porn genre, and it’s true that the film is surprisingly not gory for the number of violent acts that transpire, but it would seem that the restraint applied to Steffen Schlachtenhaufen’s script, which is the very definition of thin; everything in the film is designed solely to get bodies to the dinner table so that they can slice, electrocute, whip, and drown each other. The script sacrifices character and plot for easy scares and drops all its Chekhov’s guns for a tawdry Twilight Zone ending. If there’s any glee to be had in the film, it’s from Jeffrey Combs, who turns each line of dialogue into a fine slice of honey-baked ham as Shepard Lambrick, the game’s host, he of indeterminate wealth and profound amorality. As Lambrick’s son, Robin Lord Taylor turns up with a performance that anticipates his sociopathic Penguin on Gotham, but the film seems less interested in him as the runtime progresses. Only Combs seems to understand that he’s in a C-list horror film and elects to have the most fun possible, bathing (as Kenneth Branagh would put it) in a river of ham. By no means is this a good performance by technical standards, but it is a delight to watch in a film that is utter, utter dreck.

That does it for this week’s edition of “Monday at the Movies.” We’ll see you next week!

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2009)

After something akin to an allergic reaction to Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, I very nearly gave up on this review series. Equal parts uneven and uninteresting, Order seemed decidedly disorderly – a pun I wish I’d thought up last month. Instead, I forged on; I’ve consumed a lot of lackluster media solely in the name of completionism, but fortunately returning director David Yates seems to have learned his lesson with Half-Blood Prince, which is on the whole much more engaging and unified than its predecessor.

Now in his sixth year at Hogwarts, Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) becomes a closer confidante to his headmaster Albus Dumbledore (Michael Gambon), who brings Harry along when incoming Potions professor Horace Slughorn (Jim Broadbent) is hired. Harry soon learns, though, that Slughorn has been hired because he knows valuable information about the dark lord Voldemort. While Harry’s friends Ron (Rupert Grint) and Hermione (Emma Watson) wrestle with their feelings for each other, Harry and Dumbledore pursue the last bit of hidden knowledge needed to defeat Voldemort.

Right off the bat, Yates demonstrates a much stronger command of the visual language of film, establishing in the film’s opening shot the central theme – Dumbledore, having seen firsthand the consequences of keeping Harry in the dark, elects to trust his star pupil. After much of the confusion of Order, wondering what the central throughline was, there’s a pleasant “Aha!” at the beginning of Prince. And indeed, throughout we see Yates communicating silently with his audience, allowing us to glean from the visual that which we need to know. We have very few ponderous monologues or, at the other end of the spectrum, moments of ungraspable speculation; the film tells us what we need to know in a way natural to the medium.

It helps that you have wonderfully expressive yet subtle performances, first by the teenage cast who have really come into their own. Last time I reviewed this film, as a younger man I bemoaned the “angsty teenage romance” that pervades the film. Now that I’m older, wiser, and fresher on the franchise, I see what’s actually happening here is that the actors are (perhaps for the first time) allowed to humanize their characters and give them a few emotions besides stock tropes of “stoic,” “goofy,” and “brainy” (respectively). Furthermore, it’s a treat to see Alan Rickman as Snape and Broadbent’s Slughorn given stretching room for those fine thespians to vivify their characters.

It’s Michael Gambon, surprisingly, who ends up being something of a scene-stealer. Though I’ve never been sold on Gambon as a replacement for the late Richard Harris (I’ve always wondered what Peter O’Toole could have done with the part), he does pretty impressive work with Dumbledore, who’s nowhere near as stern and shouty as he’s been. Instead, we get a pretty close approximation of the Dumbledore from the books, much more contemplative and compassionate, which Gambon layers on as a natural role-reversal from his earlier interpretation of the character. This is the Dumbledore I wish we’d gotten all along, but in light of the way this film ends (I’m being cautiously vague, even though I’m sure this “spoiler” is right up there with Rosebud in terms of a statute of limitations) it’s a much more sobered and thoughtful performance than we might have been led to expect.

The film is overall more focused than the last one, and even though the book split its attention between flashbacks and present-day movement toward the seventh book, the film finds a much more confident identity in its present, giving Harry something very tangible for which to fight while deepening the mythology of the universe. Even the last-minute cliffhanger of sorts, which teases the narrative center of the final film(s), ties into the main theme of friendship and trust (which, actually, links up with the major twist of this film as well). What you have, then, is a much better organized Harry Potter film in which each element is deeply integrated into the main storyline and theme. It is, in short, a much more successful penultimate feature film than I’d presumed possible from Yates. Half-Blood Prince is a full-blood success.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is rated PG for “scary images, some violence, language and mild sensuality.” Spells and their occasionally bloody after-effects, as well as a few creepy creatures and a looming sense of peril at every turn (including one spectacular jump moment near the film's climax), could be objectionable as far as "scary images [and] some violence" are concerned. The snogging in this film ("mild sensuality") isn't much to write home about, though it dominates a lot of the main characters' focus.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007)

With three directors over the course of four films, the one thing the Harry Potter films haven’t had is visual continuity. Which is fine, don’t get me wrong – the thing I really appreciate about the films is how they render the same world from different vantage points. With Order of the Phoenix, director David Yates climbs aboard the Hogwarts Express, and he’ll be with us for the rest of the journey (four films down, four to go). And while we’ll have consistency of vision, I’m not terrifically excited by that because Order of the Phoenix is my least favorite Harry Potter film – not just by dint of comparison, but because I’m genuinely underwhelmed by this one.

Though the wizarding world carries on in a state of denial, Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) knows the truth – the dark lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes) has returned. The Ministry of Magic installs the stern Dolores Umbridge (Imelda Staunton) at Hogwarts, amid the vehement disapproval of headmaster Albus Dumbledore (Michael Gambon), and Harry is elected to supplement the education of his fellow students with some practical Defense Against the Dark Arts lessons.

The older I get, I seem to have less patience for the old argument “the book was better.” It seems there’s a latent old media prejudice in there, for a film can be as thoughtful as a book (albeit in a different way). And so I don’t lament the excision of particular subplots; indeed, I didn’t notice the film had cut Quidditch until it was pointed out to me. What I do lament is the excision of depth. J.K. Rowling’s prose style is very smart, very contemplative, giving us a very powerful omniscient narrator who can tell us quite a bit about the characters and their motivations.

On film, however, Yates doesn’t seem able to capture that narrative depth. Instead, we have a lot of characters, including many new ones, who all seem terribly interesting but who don’t have the opportunity on screen to prove it. Take for example the titular Order of the Phoenix, a collection of powerful witches and wizards who hide out in a magical house doing... well, it’s not actually that clear. It’s obvious to the readers of the book, and that’s a problem, because the film and the book ought to be tangentially complementary experiences. There are so many intriguing characters in the order – the werewolf Remus Lupin, back from Prisoner of Azkaban; his shape-changing paramour Nymphadora Tonks, and the criminally underused Gary Oldman in his third role as Sirius Black.  But the film touches these only briefly, and moviegoers may find themselves wondering why book-readers have grown so attached to characters who appear on screen with minimal weight.

Yates, it seems, is not terribly interested in the Order, even if I am. What intrigues him more about the plot is its political statements about governance in a time of fear and the place of centralized authority in education. These are weighty issues, and Order of the Phoenix is the most political of the Harry Potter movies because of them. The analogy to Neville Chamberlain is perhaps less obvious to American audiences, but it’s quite clear that Yates dismisses the right of any government to interfere in a student’s education, and he does so with the wonderful casting of Imelda Staunton. As Professor Umbridge, Staunton is delightfully detestable and a fine adversary for Harry and his friends. Though she never rises to the level of Voldemort in terms of pure evil or clear motivations (other than reveling in literally torturing her students), she’s a fine fill-in while the Dark Lord schemes off-screen.

Order of the Phoenix introduces two more new characters, Ravenclaw classmate Luna Lovegood (Evanna Lynch) and mad mass murderess Bellatrix Lestrange (Helena Bonham Carter). Of the latter, little need be said – if ever perfect casting existed, it’s HBC as a killer lunatic with Tim Burton’s hair. Lynch’s Luna, though, is the real find of the film, enchanting in a deliriously dreamy sort of way. Sadly, the film doesn’t give her much of an arc (nor does the franchise, as I recall), but her scenes with Radcliffe are so good, the chemistry between them so strong as the two bond over the losses they’ve endured, that I believe – and here I’m about to say something book readers will judge heretical – the films should have departed from the books and had Harry end up with Luna and not Ginny Weasley, who’s been undercooked since Chamber of Secrets.

At the end of the day, a disappointing Harry Potter movie is still a step more interesting than a lot of what’s out there. Yates has an interesting visual style, and I especially like the way he crafts the Ministry as this austere brick building with inverted colors, illuminated primarily by magic wands. But the storytelling on display in Order of the Phoenix is nowhere near as strong as it’s been in previous installments, and the film does a disservice to most of its characters by narratively shortchanging them. Put another way, Order of the Phoenix treads too much water where it ought to be gliding, losing too much momentum by attempting to tell us what’s important when it ought to be showing us.

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is rated PG-13 for “sequences of fantasy violence and frightening images.” You have a lot of scenes of wizards silently casting spells, propelling each other across the room, and flying around in smoky forms. One character is killed by magic, while another is tortured.

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005)

Although it takes a veritable meat-cleaver to its source material, pruning more than 700 pages into 150-some minutes of film, Mike Newell’s Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is a strong contender for my new favorite Harry Potter film. I’d always maintained that Alfonso Cuarón’s Prisoner of Azkaban held that rank, and although Goblet of Fire isn’t as moody or as visually striking it’s a tight and engaging film that gives us the most spectacular (emphasis on “spectacle”) Harry Potter film yet.

When the fabled and dangerous Triwizard Tournament unites three wizarding schools at Hogwarts, Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) inexplicably finds himself the fourth contestant for the Triwizard Cup. While his friends Ron (Rupert Grint) and Hermione (Emma Watson) work to keep him alive during the perilous games, Harry learns that the Dark Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes) is once again plotting his return.

Goblet of Fire is, in a way, the Willy Wonka of the Harry Potter world, in that it consists of a very episodic movement from event to event while a grander story is being told. But where a Willy Wonka adaptation runs the risk of feeling somewhat obligatory, shuffling its audience from set piece to set piece, Goblet of Fire manages to maintain a level of tension throughout, compounded by the fact that Harry isn’t necessarily the best competitor in the Triwizard Tournament. He might lose this thing, and it might kill him before Voldemort can.

Here I’ve got to step aside and breathe a sigh of “Finally...!” at the arrival of Ralph Fiennes as Voldemort. Finally, the series has its Darth Vader, its Sauron, its inimitable force of evil to match the inherent goodness of the Potter gang. While Newell does a fine job humanizing the Hogwarts crew, giving them opportunities for a range of very human emotions and quintessential teenage experiences, Goblet of Fire really ought to be remembered as Harry Potter and the Amazing Fifteen Minutes with Voldemort. While we’ve heard tales of Voldemort’s evil and seen incarnations of his ghostly lingerings, it’s something else entirely to behold Fiennes in all his glory, offering a master class in malice and demonstrating for the viewer exactly why the very thought of his name terrifies the wizarding world. If the rest of the films can capture the character as well as Goblet does, we’re looking at the franchise’s Empire Strikes Back moment.

As much as I want to spend this review lavishing praise on Fiennes’s Voldemort, there are other things in the film, and the other things are really quite successful. In streamlining the novel’s plot to focus less on the academic calendar (Hogwarts is, lest we forget, first and foremost a school), Newell instead focuses on the spectacle of the Tournament and all its task-based adventuring. We have colossal dragons, ephemeral mer-people, and a spooky maze populated with fewer horrors than in the book but with an impeccable visual style that makes the sequence a compelling lead-up to the graveyard climax. Much as I loved Cuarón’s Burton-lite visuals, Newell has a flair for the visual that is less stylized than affective. Goblet is full of small successes, moments when the film surprises you by how well it’s working. (Take, for example, the occasion of the death of a character; the plaintive wail that accompanies said character’s passing is more moving than half of any given year’s Oscar nominations, a powerful moment from a bit performer that sells the film’s pathos.)

I started this rewatch-and-review for the Harry Potter films because of how fun the Lego video games have been, but I’m sticking with them because of how well-crafted these movies have been. Removed as we are from the hype surrounding the books when they debuted, it’s comforting – and refreshing – to see thoughtful and well-made adaptations that offer something cinematically engaging for devotees and dilettantes alike.

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is rated PG-13 for “sequences of fantasy violence and frightening images.” You have your run of the mill magical hijinks, although this one amps up the tension by including dragons and beastly mer-people, as well as the arrival of Lord Voldemort and the on-screen abrupt (but bloodless) killing of a fairly important character.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004)

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, the third of eight films in the Harry Potter series, represents in a lot of ways a changing of the guard:  Alfonso Cuarón takes the directorial reins from Chris Columbus, Michael Gambon assumes the role of Albus Dumbledore, and a general mood of darkness falls over the franchise.  And really, only one of these things is less than ideal, because Azkaban feels the most accomplished of the three Harry Potter films thus far.

Though the wizarding world at large is content to conceal the truth from Harry, Ron, and Hermione (Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson), the recent escape of Sirius Black (Gary Oldman) from the wizard prison Azkaban puts them all in great danger – Black was imprisoned for betraying Harry’s parents and facilitating their deaths at the hands of the dark lord Voldemort. With soul-sucking Dementors prowling Hogwarts in search of the escaped convict, Harry must confront the untold secrets of his past, while new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor Remus Lupin (David Thewlis) teaches him to repel the Dementors.

Cuarón, who struck gold two years ago with the breathtaking Gravity, is perhaps an unlikely choice to take the helm on a major kid-friendly franchise; though well-known at the time for his hard-R Y tu mama también, he had already acquitted himself well with the fantastical The Little Princess (the VHS tape of which still holds fond memories for my sister and me, worn out though it may be). In fact, one might be forgiven for thinking that Azkaban was directed by Tim Burton, for Cuarón replaces Columbus’s austere candlelit corridors with dark and angular shadows, winding passageways, and a color palette more night than day.

It’s a marked difference from the style Columbus worked to cultivate, a style that fit the source material quite well, but I appreciate Cuarón’s decision to innovate visually and take Hogwarts in a moodier direction. It helps the franchise feel less like a kiddy-movie and moves it into a more mature and, I think, more interesting direction. As much as I appreciated it in the first two films, there is only so much wide-eyed wonderment that Harry Potter can be allowed before he grows up and accepts the wizarding world as his new normal. Cuarón’s play with shadows and his modified colors give us the sense of a world being lived-in, being inhabited.

The elephant in the room here is, of course, the recasting of Dumbledore after the unfortunate passing of Richard Harris. It’s important to recognize that Gambon is doing something different with Dumbledore – a more knowing, more wearied headmaster to Harris’s kinder, gentler Dumbledore – but I have to concede that it is not to my liking. I’d have preferred Peter O’Toole inherit the role (as, I understand, Harris’s family lobbied), for there is something about Gambon’s temperament that strikes a false chord for me, something almost perplexingly youthful in a character who shouldn’t be. Gambon isn’t patently bad as Dumbledore, and for that reason the revolt will have to wait for now.

I’d also like to levy a modest complaint about the underuse of the always commendable Gary Oldman, whose turn as Sirius Black amounts to little more than a cameo. This is a minor grievance, a clash of the role’s smallness in the book juxtaposed with the screen presence of Oldman. He is, of course, cast as a guarantee for future films, but one can’t help but wish Prisoner of Azkaban had just a bit more of said prisoner in the film.

These are, though, as I’ve said, small nits to pick in a film which is otherwise highly enjoyable. My personal favorite of the series (at least, on memory – I’ve only seen the next five films once each), Prisoner of Azkaban is well-crafted and engaging, with a central mystery that holds up on rewatch and a visual style that sells the film even without the ever-capable score by John Williams. On the whole, I’m feeling rather good about reviewing the Harry Potter series.

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban is rated PG for “frightening moments, creature violence and mild language.” There are some jump scenes in this one, including an attack from a wolf-like creature and an enormous dog, to say nothing of the appearance of the Dementors (ghostly, soul-devouring prison guards) in a few scenes. The film also includes a hippogriff (half eagle, half horse) which is meant to be gentle once one sees past the gruff exterior, the threat of execution, and an escaped demented prisoner.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002)

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets could go, as a sequel, one of three ways – as good as the first one if not a little better, leaps and bounds better than the first, or a dreadful second coming. The first one, Sorcerer’s Stone, was actually quite good, but the second one improves on the first by jumping straight into the plot, which is:

Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) ignores several warnings not to return to Hogwarts for his second year at the wizarding school, even hitching a ride in a flying car owned by the family of his chum Ron Weasley (Rupert Grint). But upon arrival and reuniting with Hermione Granger (Emma Watson), Harry finds that a dark secret from Hogwarts’s past has resurfaced, and students are beginning to fall now that the “Chamber of Secrets” has been opened.

First of all, I lightly complained that much of Sorcerer’s Stone felt a little plotless, meandering and reveling in the world-building until the somewhat plot-heavy third act. Chamber of Secrets immediately rectifies that and dives headlong into the plot – revealing, in fact, that we’ve already been in the midst of the plot because of the long history of Hogwarts. The film’s opening scene finds Harry being told by the house elf Dobby that he must not return, with the movie containing a dual mystery of the identity of Salazar Slytherin’s heir and what it means for said heir to open the Chamber of Secrets. The mystery angle here is perhaps sharper than in the first one, foregrounded as it is through each of the character interactions and classroom sequences, as when Maggie Smith’s Professor McGonagall provides a mini-exposition lecture on the stakes of the attacks plaguing students.

As a result, the atmosphere is grimmer the second time around, though returning director Chris Columbus doesn’t make it unbearable or inconsistent with the first. There remains the sense of wonderment amid great danger – something key, I think, for a film which is ostensibly a children’s movie but wants to retain that adult audience – and there are several shots of the castle interiors that are frankly beautiful. Additionally, the film is wisely aware of the need to do things differently while retaining many of the familiar trappings; for instance, there’s another Quidditch match (as, I expect, there is in every film), but it’s satisfyingly different from Harry’s first outing on a broomstick.

The best addition made by Chamber of Secrets, about which I cannot say enough, is that of Kenneth Branagh as new professor Gilderoy Lockhart. In what feels a bit like a caricature of his own often self-aggrandizing Bardolatry, Branagh is uproariously funny as the infinitely conceited Lockhart, who quotes liberally from his own collected works, citing his own marvelous deeds, and blustering his way past anyone who so much as intimates he might be slightly full of it. I’ve talked about scene stealers on this blog before, but Branagh practically reinvents the concept and walks away with the film entire with this performance. It bears repeating, because I’m not exaggerating here; every sequence with Gilderoy Lockhart had me in fits of hysterics.  Chamber of Secrets is worth the watch, if only for Branagh’s exceedingly delightful performance.

Fortunately, there are many other elements worth enjoying in Chamber of Secrets. Columbus’s swan song for the franchise is a fine note on which to end for him, the rest of the supporting cast are quite charming in their own way, and the world of Harry Potter feels deeper for all that the film contributes to the larger mythology of the character.

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets is rated PG for “scary moments, some creature violence and mild language.” The plot is darker than the first one, with students frozen in death-like trances; several scary creatures, including giant spiders and an enormous snake, haunt the castle this time around. Again, “bloody hell” is invoked.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001)

Next year the Harry Potter films turn fifteen; the books themselves are four years older, set to turn twenty in 2017. Now’s as good a time as any for me to take stock of the film franchise, which I’ve only reviewed in patches here and there. The first film, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s (née Philosopher’s) Stone, is still a remarkably engaging film, even if its magical meanderings leave much of the narrative drive until only the third act.

A young orphan named Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe), taken in by his vile aunt and uncle, discovers upon turning eleven that he is of magical heritage, and he’s been admitted to the prestigious Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. There he develops his magical abilities, befriends Ron Weasley (Rupert Grint) and Hermione Granger (Emma Watson), and uncovers a plot to use the alchemical Philosopher’s Stone to resurrect a great evil.

British film critic Mark Kermode has accused Chris Columbus of “direct[ing] like a bean counter,” which I don’t think is an entirely fair assessment of Columbus’s directorial abilities – at least, not as on display here. What I do see from Columbus is a very respectful approach to the wildly popular J. K. Rowling novel, one that is almost slavishly faithful to the source material but deftly managing not to feel exorbitant or devoutly bloated. Instead, Columbus directs with the ocular equivalent of “gee-whiz,” marveling at the lightly soft-focused fantasies of the film and allowing the audience to feel that same sense of wonder.

It’s not a perfect film, however, because there’s a strong sense – particularly around the second act of the film – that Sorcerer’s Stone is, for lack of a kinder word, wasting time. I don’t mean that there are things that need to be cut, but the film is much more interested in world-building and character development than in furthering the plot once Harry gets to Hogwarts. It isn’t until the third act that the mystery of the Philosopher’s Stone is revealed and the clues are assembled, giving Sorcerer’s Stone much less of a sense of being plot-driven than its subsequent installments.

Fortunately, both the characters and the world are immensely fascinating; the leading trio of young actors are superbly chosen, and each takes to their characters brilliantly. They’re helped by a virtual who’s-who of fine British performers, including Alan Rickman’s delightful sneering Severus Snape, Maggie Smith’s prim and sharp Minerva McGonagall, and the late great Richard Harris as headmaster Albus Dumbledore. I’ll have more to say on these folks as the films go on, because the show undeniably belongs to Radcliffe, Grint, and Watson, and their performances are largely note-perfect. The film's visuals, too, are especially dazzling, particularly the Quidditch match (think magical rugby on brooms), and it's to Columbus's credit that the sequence feels imperiled without losing any of the wonder in the film.

There’s one last element to the film that absolutely makes it a success after fifteen years, and that’s the unmistakable score by John Williams. I don’t know if a film score has ever so totally dominated the public’s connection with a particular musical instrument the way that Harry Potter has taken over our relationship with the celesta, but it’s impossible not to associate the franchise with “Hedwig’s Theme” as composed by Williams. It’s Williams at his undeniable best, conjuring up instantly iconic melodies that fit the film effortlessly while remaining distinctly listenable in isolation. As I said of Attack of the Clones and other Star Wars films, Williams’s score is so compelling that the rest of the film could be on mute and rest comfortably on the shoulders of the soundtrack.

As much as I remembered enjoying the films as a child and in spite of my recognition now that some of the plotting here is a little bit uneven, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone is charming enough that I have no qualms about continuing on to review the rest of the series.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone is rated PG for “some scary moments and mild language.” There are a few creepy looking creatures, the occasional fantastical peril (such as a broomstick chase, a troll, and a large chess game), and one moment of particularly intense magical combat in which a two-faced man is apparently disintegrated. One of the characters says “bloody hell” a few times.

Monday at the Movies - January 9, 2012

Welcome to Week Two of "Monday at the Movies." On the docket for this week, four films adapted from popular novels (an unintentional link), including one where The Cinema King reverses a decade-long antipathy toward a particular fantasy film!

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2 (2011) – I’ve never been overly captivated by the Harry Potter franchise. That is, I’ve never fallen head over heels in love with the movies, but I’ve taken them for what they are – well-done and imaginative but otherwise unremarkable fantasy adaptation films. And this film (affectionately dubbed 7B by myself and others) had to do a lot to win me over, mostly because I couldn’t approve of paying to see it after my now-legendary attempt at a midnight show of 7A. Now that I’ve rented it (for free), I’m ready to say that 7B was a well-done close to the franchise, but I think a lot of reviewers fell over this movie in a dead faint by overstating the film’s good attributes – chief among them a strong cast of England’s Finest (including a great turn from Ralph Fiennes as Lord Voldemort) and exciting action sequences. This is an effective second half of a film, but as a film in its own right 7B doesn’t quite work. There were plenty of moments where the film faltered by standing on its own, including moments where a quick expositional memory jog would have filled in gaps or even moments where the film didn’t clearly articulate what was happening (i.e., the moment when one character dies – but it’s not clear which of two characters). I liked it, and I wouldn’t unsee it, but it didn’t quite live up to the hype. Fans and devotees, though, will gobble this up.

The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001) – Mark it, loyal readers. The Cinema King has to reverse policy. The first time I saw Peter Jackson’s adaptation of the Tolkien series, I fell asleep. After a rousing introduction narrated by Cate Blanchett, the film faltered for me. But after ten years of decrying the film as “The Wizard of Oz without ever actually getting to Oz,” the browbeating of literally everyone else who saw it induced me to give it a second shot. And honestly, I’m kind of glad I did. Fellowship is much more exciting then I remember, with plenty of great cast members and a plethora of well-directed rousing battle scenes. I’ve also tried reading the Tolkien novels, but those I find completely impenetrable because the story takes a backseat to the mythology and the linguistics; fortunately, Jackson makes knowledge of each creature’s name nonessential and wisely prizes the narrative and character interactions. The best of these is Sean Astin’s level-red dedication to and compassion for his friend Frodo (Elijah Wood, who’s nowhere near as amiable as his traveling companion). I was glad that I opted to rewatch this film and moved toward the second one with eager anticipation.

The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002) – After a good experience with the first film, I was incredibly disappointed with The Two Towers. Here is the glacial pace I remember, the problems of divergent focus, the not-much-happening mood pervading most of the whole film. After a promising first installment, the Lord of the Rings franchise starts to fall apart for me. Where the first film had strong character interaction, here Peter Jackson loses track of many of his key players every so often without a thematic link to bind them together. The film’s only significant action sequence comes at the end, much like in Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End; here, though, the two hours of buildup are nowhere near intriguing enough to merit a three-hour runtime. While new characters Gollum and the Ents are entertaining and well-performed, they’re not given much to do other than tease things to come in the third installment. And my problems with Frodo continue here; he’s generally unlikeable, frequently misled, and more than a bit condescending. And a closing monologue about the nature of endings alludes to the problems of this film as a story – there isn’t one. But the promise of an ending is enough, I believe me, to do something I never thought I'd do - watch the third film.

Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) – Knowledge of the cast alone (Gary Oldman, Colin Firth, Tom Hardy, Toby Jones, Ciaran Hinds, Mark Strong, and John Hurt) was enough for me to pick up the John le Carré novel before even seeing a trailer, and I’m pleased to report that the film lives up to the book’s reputation and does a classy, thorough job of adapting the source material. Gary Oldman plays the uber-collected mole-hunter George Smiley, pursuing a double agent at the top of British intelligence during the height of the Cold War. The performances here are solid, as expected, although the atypical nature of this spy story (nothing blows up, and more relies on what is not said than what is actually done) might alienate some. Additionally, the plot is obtuse, although like Inception the right amount of mental calisthenics will prevent audiences from getting too lost in the details. But director Tomas Alfredson does an extremely solid job creating a very 1970s vibe throughout the whole movie, juggling flashbacks and multiple settings with great visual cues (such as the color of Smiley’s trademark specs). If Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy doesn’t net Oldman the Oscar he’s deserved for so many years, it might be time to hang it up as far as the little gold man is concerned.

That does it for this week’s edition of “Monday at the Movies.” We’ll see you here next week!

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2009)

Though accusations and worries fly in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince as to whether or not Albus Dumbledore is "asking too much" of those around him, it seems the film isn't; rather, it seems to be doing just right.

Director David Yates [who joined the series with Film #5] continues his streak of adapting J.K. Rowling's wildly popular Harry Potter series with the sixth (and penultimate, taking Deathly Hallows as one entity, though it's being split in two for 2010-11) entry in the franchise. Here, Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) and his maturing buds Ron and Hermione (Rupert Grint & Emma Watson) find themselves embroiled once more in the conflict between the wizarding world and its mortal enemy, Lord Voldemort (an unseen Ralph Fiennes, who appears elsewhere in the series). New potions master Horace Slughorn (an always-effervescent Jim Broadbent) takes up a post at Hogwarts as suspicions loom about shifty Professor Snape (Alan Rickman, effortlessly ominous). But Harry's main focus is taken up by Headmaster Dumbledore (Michael Gambon) and his quest to learn Voldemort's past in order to finally defeat him.

I won't bother with comparisons to the book - other online commentators have nobly taken up that gauntlet (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Potter_and_the_Half-Blood_Prince_(film)#Differences_from_the_book for a fairly comprehensive overview) - mostly because the book was so long ago I can recall only the most significant plot details. Suffice it to say that Yates's adaptation seems to stand on its own as a creative work, indebted to the source material but not slavishly so. Instead, the globe-like burden of carrying the film rests on the Atlas-shoulders of the cast, particularly our three young'uns, who all do an able job of growing into the roles and comfortably becoming the characters. (Watch out for typecasting, kids.) Radcliffe is fine as the lead, oscillating comfortably between dramatic moodiness and comic levity. Grint is a sight as the goofy one of the bunch, looking lovelorn like nobody's business, and Watson might as well be a young Keira Knightley (props to my grandmother for spotting that one) for all the talent she's got. Perhaps the standout in the youth cast - already getting plenty of media attention - is Tom Felton, who as Draco Malfoy is charged with converting his character from a prototypical schoolyard bully into a real potential menace with more demons than Dementors hiding in his closet. He does more brooding in an hour than Christian Bale does on a good day, and he does it well, keeping a terrific air of mystery surrounding his character (for the novel's novices, that is). The adult cast isn't slouching, either; Broadbent is a fantastic pick for favoritism-prone Slughorn, Rickman is glorious as always, and Gambon continues to create his own weighty Dumbledore as distinct from the late Richard Harris's more aloof and endearing one. (It's a shame, though, that the filmmakers didn't choose Peter O'Toole as Harris's replacement.)

That said, the film is, simply put, a little long. At 2.5+ hours, the film can afford to take its time with the mythology surrounding a Horcrux or the backstories of characters like Voldemort or the mysterious "Half-Blood Prince" (whose potions book falls into Harry's hands), but the movie also gets bogged down in a lot of angsty teenage romance, humorously awkward but somewhat gregarious in its omnipresence. It's as if we want to grab the characters by the school-spirit scarves and give them a good shaking until they finally agree to snog [British for "kiss"] the lad or lass of their fancy. (Oh, yes, there's a great deal of snogging and preparing to snog.) Everyone does a fine job eliciting laughs with the awkward situations of teenage adulation - particularly Grint, whose sloppy grin only gets more uneven when he's duped into taking a potent love potion - but there is such a thing as "too much of a good thing."


But the film does fine work with the unspoken. Yates is a master of my favorite cinematic technique: visual language - that is, letting the film speak for itself without clumsy narration or heavyhanded dialogue addressing what's being depicted. Watch carefully as Yates directs Felton into the Room of Requirement and toward a mysterious cabinet; take note of how Yates uses cuts between Felton's expression and the apples and birds he puts into the cabinet, and be sure to pay attention when Yates cuts away from Hogwarts and into a shop in Diagon [or is it Knockturn? I myself can't keep all the mythology straight.] Alley. Without saying a word, the film masterfully tells us everything we need to know. I for one am glad Yates is staying on to finish out the franchise with a two-part adaptation of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, since he's proven here that he can handle weighty source material while still churning out a film that's fun for newcomers.
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is rated "PG for scary images, some violence, language and mild sensuality." Spells and their occasionally bloody after-effects, as well as a few creepy creatures and a looming sense of peril at every turn (including one spectacular jump moment near the film's climax), could be objectionable as far as "scary images [and] some violence" are concerned. The snogging in this film ("mild sensuality") isn't much to write home about, though it dominates a lot of the main characters' focus.