Movie Review: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
Posted by Jack Deus on July 28, 2009
*Warning, this review may contain some spoilers, so if you haven’t seen the movie, proceed at your own risk.*
My first impression after Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince ended was “That was a good movie, but why did they change a crucial part at the end?” I won’t mention the specifics of the scene I’m talking about so as not to spoil the ending, but if you read the book and have seen the movie, the scene where Harry and Dumbledore return to the clock tower is what I’m referring to.
I know comparing movies to the books on which they are based is often a pointless, fruitless, and meaningless exercise, but I can’t help wondering why certain themes are changed or left out, when they can easily be brought into the movie. I especially don’t understand when some of the themes are brought into the movie, but only done so half-heartedly, or are changed by the end of the movie.
The clock tower scene I was referring to before was guilty of both theme faux pas mentioned above. Very early on in the movie, a spell, Petrificus Totalus, is introduced that causes the person struck by the spell to become frozen, unable to move or speak. In the book, this spell comes into play in the clock tower scene, but they completely leave it out in the movie, changing the dynamic of the whole scene. This change in dynamic causes the second theme faux pas. “Hot-headed Harry” is an overarching theme of all 7 books, and of the first 5 movies. Even in this movie it comes into play. About half-way through the movie, some Deatheaters (bad guys for you non-Harryphiles) attack where Harry is staying, and he blindly chases them into a corn field, with no concern for his safety or the safety of anyone around him. But in the clock tower scene, because the PT spell isn’t used, Harry’s whole demeanor changes without any good explanation.
That scene had the most glaring theme changes, and it was also towards the end, so it was the one scene that stuck with me when the movie was over. But, thinking more about the movie a couple of days later, I am noticing more and more themes that were changed, left-out, or thrown in as an afterthought that are fairly vital to the overall progress of the plot of the story and the actions and decisions of the characters.
Without spoiling too much of the movie, here is a brief list of just some of the themes not done well, or at all in the movie: Dumbledore not being at Hogwarts for most of the year despite the imminent danger of all the students (especially Harry) at Hogwarts, the ongoing and growing feud between Draco Malfoy and Harry, how engrossed into and obsessed with the Half-Blood Prince’s potions book Harry became, and the back and forth questioning of who Severus Snape is really working for-Dumbledore or Voldemort.
Despite all of my quibbles over the themes of the movie, I still thought it was a very good movie. The acting has done nothing but get better as the movies have progressed. Most notably, Emma Watson does a good job of showing a good range of true emotion as needed (and it is needed in this movie a lot), but doesn’t ham it up. The action and magic scenes are superbly done (oh, to be a movie fan during the age of computer awesomeness!). I can’t really comment on the progression of the plot, because I remember too much of the book, so my subconscious may have filled in any holes in the movie, but my wife is notorious for forgetting books she’s read and movies she’s seen and she didn’t mention anything that didn’t make sense, so that must have been done well. I can say, however, that the pace of the movie was well done. Despite it being two and a half hours long, I didn’t find myself looking at my watch once, and more of a sign that the pace was moving along well, my wife only looked at the time once during the whole movie, and stayed awake during the whole thing.
As far as a stand-alone movie, this one was probably the best of the six so far. I just wish they would have split the book into two movies, like they are doing for the final one, The Deathly Hallows. That way they would have been able to flesh out a lot of the themes they stubbed their toes on.
