LTTP - Harry Potter 6 Movie Review

Day 9 of NaBloPoMo finds me at home with the kids, so not much chance for a tech topic today. Instead, I focused on our Saturday evening entertainment, a movie we finally saw, only about 6-7 months late.

Today was a Saturday and, as most Saturdays are, it was a blur of diaper changes, mini-tantrums (the kids had a few too) and endless circuits around the first floor, picking up a menagerie of stuffed animals, a shopping cart full of fake plastic food and tripping over wooden train sets. One of the highlights of my day? Escaping the house for a peaceful hour of grocery shopping. Yes folks, banging carts and fighting over deals with the old ladies at Shaws ranks up there on my list these days.THE highlight of the day, however, was the viewing of the movie version of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince my wife and I shared after the twins went to bed.

Now I've long since given up being disappointed with what nuggets of story or scenes from the books that I felt should have made the translation to the big screen. It was a losing battle that ultimately made me think less of some pretty well done adaptations of source material that would have been impossible to cram into a movie. This movie clearly carried the ominous and 'this isn't kiddie stuff anymore' atmosphere directly from the book, which made for a rather sad experience overall. There were some brief moments of levity, mostly focused around the inevitable teens discovering the opposite sex and the joys of snogging all the time, but not enough to lighten the mood at all. In my opinion, they handled the entire climactic scene very tastefully, capturing the essence of the mood and characters well. I will give a specific nod to the actors cast to play young Tom Riddle. Even though I knew it was just a movie, the intense looks they gave the camera in their scenes gave me the creeps, and that's the mark of good casting and framing the scene.

The only part of the book which didn't make the screen version, and I wished had, were the scene where Harry and Ginny kissed for the first time. In the book, it was after a Quidditch match, and it felt probable, as harry was on such a rush from the victory that he just 'went for it'. It felt believable, and most of all (at least for me), it shined a ray of good feelings and hope through the dark cloud of impending doom hanging over the rest of the book. This movie could have used that hope and good feeling, although to be fair it's dealing with very dark events.

Long story short, I enjoyed this movie. It will be interesting to see how the material in the final book is handled, because let's face it, there's not a lot to be happy about there. It could be tough to ask audiences to sit through two multiple hour installments of dreariness and death without some levity. We'll find out later this year.

So, with that off my chest, I'm off to bed to dream about iPhones and dirty diapers. Leave a comment on what you thought of HP6, if you'd like. I'd love to hear what others have to say.