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What it's about:
Harry's school holiday draws to a close when Dumbledore fetches him at a train station and together they apparate to visit an ex-Hogwarts teacher, Professor Horace Slughorn. Dumbledore (Michael Gambon) believes that Slughorn holds the secret to overcoming Lord Voldemort. The tense environment at Hogwarts gives way to much adolescent hormonal activity with Ron and Hermione still struggling to find each other amid unwanted affections from other parties. Meanwhile, Draco Malfoy has been assigned a dangerous task and with Snape being awarded the Defence Against the Dark Arts position, Voldemort's return to power seems inevitable, unless Harry can retrieve Slughorn's secret.
What we thought of it:
Despite the theatrics, Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince doesn't quite live up to the excitement of Prisoner of Azkaban or Goblet of Fire.
To be totally honest, I'm not convinced it's all the film's fault. We've reached a point in the story where there's no turning back; Harry (Daniel Radcliffe) is The Chosen One, the one destined to kill his arch enemy, and he's got to fight Voldemort and deal with all the unpleasantness that goes along with it. How can you possibly enjoy being a teenager when the fate of the Magical World rests on your tiny shoulders? And they are tiny compared to Ron's! Rupert Grint, who plays Ron Weasley, has developed into a very dapper young man.
Romance is a new character in this latest adventure, and it's made quite an entrance. While Harry is grappling with mortal issues, Hermione (Emma Watson) and Ron aren't letting their youth escape them. Hermione's feelings for Ron are developing, much to her discomfort, while Ron's hormones are taking the forefront in his life. The almost chav-like Lavender Brown throws herself at newly crowned Quidditch hero Ron, and who is he, as a hot-blooded teen, to refuse her? First it was Viktor Krum (in Goblet of Fire), and now Lavender stands in the way of Ron and Hermione's affection for one another.
Harry also has his fair share of romance to throw him off course. In the opening scene of the movie (definitely not found in the book), a pretty, older waitress chats Harry up at the train station. If it wasn't for Dumbledore, Harry might've had his first muggle date. Later, Hermione warns Harry that a fellow Hogwarts student is trying to feed him a powerful love potion. Hermione tells him that it's simply because she thinks he's The Chosen One, to which he smugly replies: "But I am The Chosen One!" And then there's Ron's younger sister Ginny Weasley. Let's just say Harry doesn't have to do a lot of spading when it comes to girls these days…
We meet the pompous yet shameful Horace Slughorn, superbly portrayed by Jim Broadbent (Moulin Rouge, Bridget Jones' Diary).The casting has always been spot-on in this franchise, and Alan Rickman is no less impressive this year as the tortured, elusive Professor Snape. Crazy takes on a whole new look with Bellatrix Lestrange (Helena Bonham Carter), who's much more vocal in this installment and provides much of the fear in Voldemort's absence. Surprisingly, the Dark Lord (as portrayed by Ralph Fiennes) is on a hiatus in this movie as we get to know him as the young Tom Riddle during his days at Hogwarts. The young actors portraying Tom are phenomenal. Fiennes' real-life nephew Hero Fiennes-Tiffin is eerily sinister for an 11-year-old boy, while Frank Dillane plays the teenaged Riddle with magnetic confidence and manipulation. One has to wonder if dark magic isn't at work here after all…
Perhaps that is why there's something a little lacklustre here. Our antagonist is missing but no longer mythical, and Dumbledore has realised he can't hide anything from Harry anymore. What's left for us to wonder about? However, as mentioned earlier, this is how the story goes. It's just a case of not translating well on screen.
Highlights include an almost vomit-inducing camera-ride through London and fantastic special effects, as well as adorable humour from the three BFFs. If you're a HP nutter, then you have to see this out of pure curiosity. However, it's really just made me want to read the book again.
