The greatest best-sellers in history deserved better movies!

Rating: 5/10 (1 December 2010)

We are now just one movie (or half a book) away from the end of this franchise, and looking back at the entire series, I would say that apart from the first movie, Harry Potter has been a big mess on screen. The first movie was truly magical and the second was passable, but after that it has been a sore disappointment for most of the die-hard HP fans like me. The movies do not even come close to creating on screen the magic what J.K.Rowling has created on paper.
The theme of these movies, especially part 4 onwards, has been to delete the best-described action sequences from the story. You could feel the adrenaline rush when you read the description of the Quidditch World Cup final, but where did it go in the movie? In part 5 they reduced Umbridge from an evil, devil-incarnate to a caricature merely providing comic relief, and the battle at the ministry was over before it began. Part 6 covered Dumbledore's 'classes' well but again, the students versus Death Eaters duels were cut out. All these are unpardonable crimes committed on the books, the author and more importantly, on the fans.
Despite all this, I was excitedly looking forward to Deathly Hallows Part 1, because having divided the book into two parts, there was immense opportunity to transfer all the excitement of the book on to the screen, but the end result while being marginally better than the previous few movies, was still disappointing.
Most of the movie was turned into an advertisement for British tourism, as we were shown endless vistas of the landscape as the trio wander across forests, hills and swamps. In the book, the period where Harry stays with the Weasleys is charged with emotion and could have been a true test of the director's abilities, but it barely lasted five minutes (including the wedding!). When Ron returns to rejoin the other two, Hermione looks mildly irritated, and not demented with rage as in the book.
The Godric's Hollow sequence began well, but once Bathilda turned into a snake and attacked Harry, the action was cut out again, and there was no Voldemort appearing here! The ending was a sore disappointment as usual, because here was another opportunity for some more dueling and displays of bravery, but we hardly had half a dozen curses being cast. The Life and Lies of Dumbledore was just mentioned in passing.
What gives the movie a 5/10 instead of a 1 or a 2 is the Tale of Three Brothers animated sequence, the break-in at the ministry, the graveyard scene at Godric's Hollow and marginally improved performances by the trio. I feel the best-selling book series in history deserved the best directors in Hollywood. Peter Jackson could have worked his LOTR magic here. Christopher Nolan could have best recreated the much-talked about "dark, gloomy pallor" of the last three books. Even somebody who loves loud wham-bam action and overdoses of CGI, like Roland Emmerich of 2012, could have given us some breathtaking action sequences. But all we had was David Yates and I dunno who else. All of them effectively ruined a series of books which will be read and loved and worshipped for generations to come. I can only hope the franchise at least gets a finale it deserves. We will be finding out in July.