Harry Potter And The Great Big Disappointment

I went to go watch Harry Potter And The Half-Blood Prince early this morning at the big theatre in town to beat the lunch-rush. Soda in hand and a darkening theatre filling in around me, I was bracing myself for what was going to be another dark, thrilling ride film from the Harry Potter franchise. But what I saw was not a tale of the Half-Blood Prince, but a big, fat disappointment. The first Harry Potter film to be rated PG since The Prisoner Of Azkaban, the reduced rating really did stick out like a sore thumb. Just when the film series had grown to its' darkest with The Order Of The Phoenix, the director pegs it back a notch to make for a more family-friendly movie which for those who have grown up with the characters, is a big let-down. If you are like me, a teen who has grown up with the books and early films and was enjoying the intuitive leaps the franchise was making in keeping up with the maturity of its' viewers, this film will disappoint.

From the opening frames, the film fails to capture its' audience. The first hour or so barely entertains, stringing together only the bare minimum of dialogue and plot to lay the foundation of the movie, jumping from one scene to the next with a furious pace and little cinematic joy. The second half of the film gets markedly better, although it consistently fails to keep up the dark themes from its' predecessors. Forget monsters and high action, The Half-Blood Prince focusses more on relationships, intrigue and churning the plot out before anything else. The acting of the leading three impresses, but some of the supporting actors disappoint and they only serve to water-down the maturity level further to a point where five year olds in the audience were laughing uncontrollably. 

As the lights rose in the theatre after nearly three hours of movie, a pebble of disappointment grew in my stomach. What I had just seen was a major step back in the Harry Potter franchise which will take some work to be undone. If the plot of The Half-Blood Prince did not end with a lot of loose ends, I'd probably be thinking twice about seeing the next installment. And now I hear they producers are splitting Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows into two parts, undoubtedly to milk the franchise for all it's worth. I really hope that the final Harry Potter films return to their original fan base, the now late-teenagers and early twenty year olds who have grown with Harry through the years, because The Half-Blood Prince has strayed so far from the sinister and dark film they deserve. Although I've heard some argue that The Order Of The Phoenix was worse than this latest installment, I think we can all agree that if the final films are anything short of a near R-16, or at least an M, the franchise will undoubtedly end in an anti-climax.