They finally got one right

Rating: 9/10 (15 July 2007)

This is my first review on IMDb.com I am a huge fan of the Harry Potter books, but to be honest I was very disappointed with the first four films. Although they have been true to the story most of the times, they never really caught the atmosphere of the books. The Order of the Phoenix changes that. It is by far the best film in the series and director David Yates and screenwriter Michael Goldenberg have done a great job turning the 800 pages of the book into an entertaining movie.
It has been said that the storyline from the book has changed, and that is true. Goldenberg had to, otherwise we would have a movie of at least 6 hours. But the way he shortened the story is brilliant: he manages to shorten the story without leaving holes in the storyline, and every change he made still leaves the storyline intact and even true to the book. That is a huge improvement over Goblet of Fire, which left left people who did not know the book with loads of riddles.
Another thing that has wildly improved over the previous book is the performance of the actors, which now actually shows what the cast is capable of with a competent director (well, I still do not like Michael Gambon as Dumbledore, but even he improved).
But the hugest improvement over the last movie is actually that David Yates got the pace of the movie just right. While the movie stays relatively true to the book, it manages to be an entertaining movie on its own, which for me was the biggest surprise in the cinema since it is based on the Harry Potter book with the most complicated storyline to date. Overall this movie might actually please book-readers and book-ignorers alike.
9 out of 10!