The best Harry Potter film yet.

Rating: 8/10 (11 July 2007)

I've been reading some pretty exaggerated, ranting, angry reviews about this film and it's making me frustrated. I just went to see HP5 last night at midnight and I was more than pleasantly surprised. I'm a huge, huge fan of the books, the 5th and 6th books being my favorites, so I was very skeptical about how Yates would fit the biggest Potter book (864 pages) into a two hour movie. I almost wondered if I should go see the movie at all, since past HP movies have ruined the image of the books in my head. I've been pretty indifferent to the past movies; I thought the first two were good adaptations of the books but still only mediocre. I remember seeing Prisoner of Azkaban opening night and walking out EXTREMELY disappointed, and the Goblet of Fire was only OK in my opinion. After seeing Order of the Phoenix, however, I was relieved. Yates does an excellent job fitting the majority of the story into a mere two hours, leaving out only minor story lines or scenes from the book, which is to be expected. The three main child actors (Harry, Ron, Hermione) did much better in this film. I remember one of the things that made me angry in the 4th movie was how Hermione acted like a 30 year old biotch and over-acted almost all the time. I thought Dumbledore was much better in this film as well, I thought in the 4th movie he was a bit out of character, frequently getting angry and yelling at Harry. All in all this was by far my favorite Potter film yet and I highly suggest seeing it to anyone who reads this and who is a fan. I think it's important to realize that if you are a true HP fan, the movies will never compare to the magic of reading the books, so go into the movie with an open mind and you'll be very satisfied. Luckily Yates is already signed on to direct Half Blood Prince.