Deathly Hallows: A review of the one-but-last Harry Potter Film

.

The Harry Potter books are most certainly literary works; they are not screenplay wannabes.  As we move from one volume to the next, one notices no increasingly cinematic flavor; I attribute this to the fact that Ms Rowling really did outline all the books at the outset, and had them mostly written before even the third movie was made.

The movies based on the books are varied in their faithfulness to the books, whether their departures from the books improved them or made them worse; the atmosphere; the representations of magic; the representations of the non-magical world seen through the eyes of Harry Potter's fellow-wizards.  Underlying all this variation, too, are the enormous variations in the style of the books, though I must confess that Ms Rowling has been admirably consistent in many ways.

When I read the last volume, I began to wonder how it would make the transition to the screen.  The central character is Hermione Granger, while Harry Potter becomes so much the creature of his imperatives that one is thankful when he just barely makes the right decision on a number of different occasions.  Harry Potter is characterized by determination, bravery and courage ---and to some extent a willingness to protect the innocent--- while Hermione and Ron are motivated by the warmer characteristics of wisdom, patience, and concern.

The movie starts out firmly driven by the need to find and destroy a number of "horcruxes", which are artifacts in which Voldemort is known to have stored fragments of his soul.  When all of them are destroyed (and they don't take lightly to being destroyed, either), Voldemort will be finally dead.  But in the course of the movie, it turns out that there is another set of three things that Voldemort might be after: the three so-called Deathly Hallows, which when united in one man's ownership, grant immortality.  So the searches for the horcruxes and the hallows proceed simultaneously.

All the young actors do try their best, and though I personally felt that Emma Watson was a little out of her depth, other writers have said that she did an admirable job.  She did not let down the team, certainly, but in moments of stress, her dialect becomes impossible to follow.  That certainly makes for realism, I suppose; British youth is becoming increasingly careless in speech.  But it does contrast strangely with the beautiful diction of some of the adult wizards.

The light level of the entire movie is very low indeed, giving it a nightmare-like atmosphere.  This is rather a cheap device, in my opinion; it is hard to see what is going on.

Last of all, the magic is rather a pain!  Magical effects are most delightful when they're inessential things, such as the goings-on at dinner in the great hall, or Quidditch games.  But the magical fights and chases are just a little boring, but necessary, I suppose.  The movie is well worth seeing.  If you've read the book, though, you know that tragedy awaits in the second part.

Arch