I've read all the Harry Potter books and seen all the movies to this point, and yet for some reason the details of the stories absolutely don't stick with me. Maybe this has to do with the complexity of the narrative and the fact that I never obsessed over the minutiae nor re-read any of the books. Still, I do thoroughly enjoy the universe that Rowling created and have found the movies, by and large, to be enjoyable distractions, if somewhat banal. This sixth installment is no different.
This movie is mostly about 16 year-olds having sex. They're horny and want to do it in their parents' home, on the train to school, in the dining hall, in their castle houses, in potions class, in the face of imminent death or suffering. The movie is basically a magical version of Larry Clark's Kids, but with fewer homeless dudes on the subway.
Harry has a thing for Ron's sister Ginny; Ron has a thing for Hermione and Hermione has a thing for Ron; Lavender has a thing for Ron; McLaggan has a thing for Hermione; Dean Thomas has a thing for Ginny; Ginny has a thing for Harry and Dean; Romilda has a thing for Harry. When they're riding their brooms in quidditch, the boys look like extras in a John Holmes movie with gigantic...er, broomsticks standing erect between their legs. The sex is not subtle.
Other than sex, there's also the story of how Billy Zabka look-alike Drako Malfoy has been tasked by Voldemort to perform some gigantically evil task that many don't think he is capable of doing that will shake up the magic world when it happens. At the same time, Dumbledore has Harry try to get a memory from Professor Slughorn (wonderfully played by Jim Broadbent) that will be some key to the Dark Lord's ultimate demise. That's basically it - oh, and more teeny sex!
Director David Yates (who also did the last Harry Pooper movie and will do the last two) has a very easy style that moves the story along smoothly. I never felt bored or that scenes were especially dull,but that is mostly because there are only about three non-frenetic scenes (dealing mostly with kids screwing or talking about screwing). I like the use of new parts of the castle - like the horary tower - and the buildings in general looked great.
The biggest problem with the film is the script, which includes some scenes that are unnecessary or wasted and also never explains the need for some details well enough. Once Harry is able to get Slughorn's super-duper important memory from his brain and he and Dumbledore are able to see it (magically, of course), it feels like a big rip-off when we find out what it is. On top of that, it seems that Dumbledore already knew the important detail in the memory as he was already ten steps ahead of Harry. Once this happened, I realized they could have cut 20 or 30 minutes out of the picture and come to the same end.
Overall this is fun, but should only be seen if one has seen the other films. It moves nicely and looks great as always (the Hogwarts castle looks especially great here). It's not totally amazing and fabulous, but it will do.
Stars: 2 of 4
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