An end of an era

Rating: 8/10 (14 August 2011)

Harry Potter, the boy who lived! Every child will know, and remember that name. The worldwide phenomenon has, I regret to say, indeed finished. How did it end? Magnificently. The idea of splitting the seventh part of the book was a brilliant economic trick (prolonging the flow of money given by the franchise). The first part gave a slow-paced introduction to the grand finale of the second movie. But, not without it's negative aspects. The tension that builds up to the end of the first part and continues from the very beginning of the second part dies somewhere at the middle of the second movie! It lasts for two hours, and somewhere at the end of the first hour the movie starts to slow down to a rate that is just not adequate to the first half. With a lot of tension and suspense, the movie does quite a bad job holding on to it. I must say that this is the very best HP screen adaptation in the franchise, but I just couldn't shake the feeling that it was just 5-10 brilliant sequences (e.c. the death of Snape) combined with not so great connection sequences (e.c. the constant interruption of battle with monologues). Also, the movie lacks characters! I had a feeling that Ron and Hermione had a lot less screen time than Nagini. Characters like prof. McGonagall, Hagrid, prof. Slughorn... had an embarrassingly small amount of screen time. Yes, the idea of the movie is the battle between Harry and Voldmort (who is the best-played character in the film) but that does not give the right to literally push out everyone else out of the picture. Do not be misled by these small complaints, the movie is brilliant. The most positive aspect of the movie are emotions! The death of Snape and the talk Harry has with his deceased friends and family is just heart-breaking and made the whole theater cry (myself included). Death is the main theme of this film from the very beginning, and the dark tone in the music and environment fits perfectly with it (sometimes I wondered if this is a film for children). Harry Potter gave us quite a ride through the years, and it ended just as it had started: magically! 8/10