Very good, but... well, it's not the book.

Rating: 7/10 (25 November 2010)

I can't help being very strongly biased about this film; I am a huge fan of J. K. Rowling's original work. I felt so excited about my favourite story coming to the big screen that, as a true fan (in all the worst senses of the word), my judgement is impaired in two ways: I am both over-enthusiastic and extremely difficult to satisfy.
Let's be fair: it is a good movie, "good" meaning entertaining. You don't want to loose a second of it, and it really feels like a quarter of the actual runtime - but that might also just be my "over-enthusastic" side. The fact that I had watched all of the other Harry Potter films half a dozen times each in preparation for this one, and also that I knew the Deathly Hallows book almost by heart, made me enjoy immensely this opus, whether it'd be only out of "newness".
But, and maybe I am being less subjective here after all, it is not a film of great quality - nor were we to expect one. The idea of splitting the last HP in two is convenient ("Convenient? More like awesome!"), but this leaves the first part fairly empty in comparison to, say, the other HP films. Moreover, it has to try to compensate for all of the (plot)holes the other films had left it with. Those who haven't read the book would therefore find a lot of continuity mistakes that are difficult to forgive. Although most of the story is well-elaborated, suspenseful and imaginative, the lines are so much reduced to basics that you can't help the feeling that the screenplay must have been revised and rewritten a lot. Yet, we get a few extremely enjoyable moments - some funny, some sweet - every now and then.
As for the acting, well, we're only sorry to see so little of Alan Rickman, Helena Bonham Carter, and company. But the main trio's acting skills have improved again, and although I still wouldn't hire them if I were to make a movie, I have to admit that they do their job all right (at least, as far as Rupert Grint and Emma Watson are concerned...). Very funny, also, to recognize their manners and mimics in the three older characters they are supposed to be impersonating.
All in all: it's not the book, but it's still magic :)