Ahoy, squirts! Quint here with a ton of reviews of the upcoming HARRY POTTER AND THE GOBLET OF FIRE, including the return of our own Annette Kellerman. She hobbled into the screening all Mad-Eye Moody style and drank from a flask throughout the show... She was just getting into it! Yeah...
Anyway, let's get on with the reviews. All but one are positive and some are even spoiler-lite for your reading pleasure. Kellerman's is pretty spoiler-free. I'll alert you to which are spoiler-filled and which aren't below! I know a whole lot of you are out at midnight shows right now, but feel free to come back and share your thoughts on the movie! Here's the lovely Annette Kellerman!
Hello! Annette Kellerman here to chime in with my two cents about Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. What a fantastic film! Director Mike Newell has managed to do it all- perfectly capture the young characters as they enter adolescence, trim down an amazingly full story into a feature length film, and fully realize the darkness of the 4th installment. Better yet, Newell has created a type of Harry Potter universe that allows the students of Hogwarts to practice their own form of voluntary transfiguration-puberty.
Yes, I have to say the most obvious difference between this and any of the previous films has nothing to do with storytelling or direction style. To me, it is the transformation fo the characters into teenagers that sets the tone for the entire film. Hermione no longer hangs with the guys exclusively- Jenny and her appear practically connected at the hip during many scenes. In fact, the guys discover that most of the girl's at Hogwarts now travel in packs. This makes asking one of girls to the school dance an insurmountable task for some. I predict massive numbers of teenage girls swooning during a particular bathing scene as a shirtless Harry fractically shields himself with bubbles from the ghostly prying eyes of Myrtle. Every teeny bop magazine is sure to have a pinup of Hermione in her ball gown (complete with plunging neckline). Kids in the street will be yelling out,"Bloody hell!"
Alas, our favorite group of young wizards are not so young anymore. Neither is their audience. Aptly, neither is the subject matter. For those fans of the book worried that the darkness of the latest installment would be toned down, never fear. Voldemort, the Deatheaters, as well as the trials of the Triwizard tournament propel Harry into enough peril to make even me squirm in my seat, feeling a little bad for the parents of the 5 year olds in the audience (Harry's nephew excluded, of course). Although some of the actual gore depicted by Rowling in the book was toned down, the overall effect was still a winner. This film in no way skirts around the simple fact that bad stuff happens to us all (even kids) in one way or another. And I'm not talking about some challenge in which you prevail and everyone learns a lesson. No, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire carefully illustrates that life is not fair. At all. Sometimes it totally sucks, but it still beats the alternative...which brings me to the humor!
While it is true that the story revolves around some of the darkest subject matter in the series yet, it also deftly combines the macabre with the hilarious. Yet another benefit of the characters reaching adolescence is the fortunate arrival of some almost-adult humor. Gone are most of the creature-filled gags. In their place develops some pretty hilarious and witty (sometimes snarky) middle school banter. And the Weasley twins-God love George and Fred! And thank the movie gods that their antics didn't fall to the wayside a la Hermione's quest for house elf liberation. Every second of screen time for the mischevious identical red heads provided some of the best and most needed laughs of the film.
All in all Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire did not dissappoint and I'd recommend it to everyone!
Until next time,
Annette Kellerman
This next one is like a mullet... It's all business up front, but it's spoilery and laid back in the back. You got the review, then the spoiler rundown afterwards! Enjoy!
Harry Potter fans can rest easy. “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire,” directed by Mike Newell (new to the series and following in the footsteps of Chris Columbus and Alfonso Cuaron), is not merely the next installment of the series… it’s the best one so far.
The fourth chapter in the Harry Potter saga, as the book aficionados already know, finds Harry (Daniel Radcliffe) as a fourteen year old and dealing with all the things that fourteen year olds deal with, including hormones and his first crush. Of course, being Harry Potter, the troubles don’t stop there. His infamous scar has been aching, due to prophetic dreams involving Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes) and Wormtail. But the bespectacled young wizard doesn’t have much time to dwell. Shortly after his reunion with best friends Ron (Rupert Grint) and Hermione (Emma Watson) at the ill-fated Quidditch World Cup, the trio is whisked away to another year at Hogwarts.
Surprises are afoot at Hogwarts as yet another new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher is introduced as the eccentric Mad Eye Moody (Brendan Gleeson), and Headmaster of Hogwarts, Albus Dumbledore (Michael Gambon), announces the arrival of the Triwizard Tournament in which students from three wizarding schools, including Hogwarts, will face off against one another. Eternal glory and a hefty prize is promised to the champions competing, which include Viktor Krum (Stanislav Ianevski) from the Durmstrang Institute, Fleur Delacour (Clèmence Poèsy) from Beauxbatons Academy, Cedric Diggory (Robert Pattinson) from Hogwarts, and to everyone’s surprise, Harry Potter. But a dastardly plot is being put into place by a follower of Lord Voldemort, and the plan naturally involves Harry in a way that will affect the entire wizarding world.
This isn’t your little sister’s Harry Potter anymore. The movie’s tone is darker and a little more frightening, earning its PG-13 rating. This is appropriate, as the novel is written along the same lines. In fact, screenwriter Steve Kloves is finally a success as this film adaptation is the most faithful so far. While much of the novel has to be cut (734 page book into a 2 hour 45 minute movie), nothing feels “missing,” unlike with the other films. The film is fast paced and everything is very fluid and intelligible. Also, this is the first Potter film that even comes close to addressing the comedic elements of the story. Fan favorites Fred and George (James and Oliver Phelps) are utilized much more as comedic relief, but it doesn’t stop there. Everyone is given their fair share of humorous one-liners, but it never takes away from the film’s darker moments.
The performances by the adults are magnificent per usual, especially from Maggie Smith as Professor McGonagall, Alan Rickman as Professor Snape, Jeff Rawle as Amos Diggory, and Miranda Richardson as Rita Skeeter. Ralph Fiennes is a worthy Voldemort, approaching the role with a menacing confidence.
However, it is the younger cast that really shines. They are far less awkward and stiff than in the previous three movies. They’ve grown into their roles and it shows. Radcliffe and Grint are absolutely believable as best friends, whether they’re on speaking terms or not. Both young actors are much more confident in their roles, and it’s very evident in their body language and line delivery. However, young Emma Watson may turn off Hermione fans. She delivers almost every line either by yelling or by crying. These mood swings seem to come out of nowhere and are often un-motivated. It appears the actress has decided to be much more dramatic, and the role suffers for it. But the relationships between the trio definitely evolve in this story, and the actors are portraying that quite well.
Also deserving of mention is Matthew Lewis as Neville Longbottom, Katie Leung as Cho Chang, and Robert Pattinson as Cedric Diggory. Lewis has been in every film so far, but now he’s actually noticeable. His performance is both humorous and touching at times, playing the Neville from the novels pitch perfectly. Newcomers Leung and Pattinson are also very well cast. While their parts lean towards the small side, both are integral to the plot and are acted sublimely.
For the first time in the Potter epic, you do not have to have read the books to enjoy this movie. It is very much a well-made fantasy film, along the lines of “Lord of the Rings” or “Star Wars.” The effects are extremely well done, particularly the dragons and the hedge maze, and the dialogue is far less clunky than in previous installments.
“Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” is interesting, dark, poignant, faithful, well-acted and even comical. In short, it’s the film Potter fans have been waiting for.
“Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire” bows in theatres everywhere Friday, November 18th.
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Other things that would have been extraneous in the review:
(DON'T READ IF YOU DON'T WANT TO BE SPOILED! Not plot-spoiler, obviously. You know all of those. But FILM SPOILERS LIE AHEAD!)
Ready? Okay.
- Emma Watson really is that bad. It's like she's PMSing throughout the entire movie. She was very irritating and generally unappealing. She doesn't even seem intelligent anymore. The movie seems to gloss over that huge detail of her character. Except when they randomly give her a big word to say, which is obviously supposed to indicate to the audience that she's still very intelligent.
- Michael Gambon is better than he appeared to be in the trailers. I still miss Richard Harris. But Gambon is acceptable.
- You honestly do not miss the Dobby and Winky subplot. Nor do you miss the Dursleys. The film is stronger without them, I'd say.
- It's actually funny. Parts of this movie are actually funny. Imagine the last movie, when pretty much the only funny part was when Ron was dreaming about the spiders and Harry had a one-liner. Now imagine that dispersed throughout the whole movie and given to other characters as well. Ginny, Fred, George, Arthur, Harry, Ron, Neville... all have funny moments. It's great.
- The graveyard scene is very good. I would have preferred more Voldy interaction with the Death Eaters, but I understand that things had to be cut. Still, it felt like Fiennes was rushing it a little bit. His lines are on top of each other, allowing little to no room for reaction from anyone. That whole scene seems a little rushed, now that I think of it. Wormtail cutting off his hand is great though.
- There is no Quidditch World Cup. We have all been had. Honestly... the players come onto the field. And then we cut almost directly to the post-game celebration and then chaos.
- The Moaning Myrtle bathtub scene is great. Myrtle is kinda pervy! Hilarious.
- Ron and Harry's very long hair did not bother me. In fact, it grew on me until I thought they looked quite fetching.
- Krum is great in that he doesn't say much. Very true to the books. I was disappointed that no one mentioned him being "Vicky."
- Fleur is good, just not pretty enough to be a veela. But she's very much the character.
- The score is terrific. You don't even miss John Williams. Very appropriate for this movie.
- I shed a few tears for Cedric. I won't lie.
- Katie as Cho really is good. I liked her a lot. Can't wait to see her in OotP. If she does it right, I'll end up disliking her.
- Just the right amount of Snape. Love love love LOVE Alan Rickman.
- The Hagrid/Maxime thing is great. No giant-racism subplot, thankfully.
- No blast ended skrewts. THANKFULLY.
- In my opinion, the scene where Hermione shows up at the ball and is beautiful and everyone is shocked lacks that surprise and coolness because... well... Watson is already cute. Her hair hasn't been frizzy since the first movie. She shows up at the Ball all pretty and it's like, "duh. all you had to do was stick her in a dress."
- I liked the Yule Ball. The live music is very cool.
- Viktor/Hermione is SO CUTE. A little more checking-out of Viktor on Hermione's part than is canon, though. But still cute.
- OMG. ELOISE MIDGEN.
- No Bertha Jorkins.
- Frank Bryce is cool. Nagini is cool. Barty Crouch and Crouch Jr. are very good.
- The Rita as an Animagus thing is never addressed.
And here's our negative review. I completely disagree with it, but there certainly will be a few who side with theomniguy... you know, in the dark evil recesses of humanity. I keed! I keed! Light spoilers!
Hey Harry,
First time reviewer here. I'm lucky enough to have bagged a job in a cinema a few months back and, even more lucky as today I got into a special late night screening of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. As staff screenings go it was quite packed and most of us had been in the bar beforehand waiting with geeky excitement.
I'd already decided that I was going to a write a review after but, despite my mixed feelings about the last three films I really had high hopes for this one after all that I'd read and the definitely above average trailers. Even though I knew it would be flawed, I was pretty sure it would top the lists of Potter films and be a sure favourite, after all, I adore the book.
I'll keep this review as spoiler light as I can but it's entirely possible I'll veer off into the tirade of anger and frustration that is welling up inside of me. Even if I'd never read the books and had no vested interest in Harry Potter, I couldn't escape the fact that this film is absolutely awful. Let's have a quick run through...
After a rushed and confusing introduction, somehow, the Quidditch World Cup is missed out with only a couple of minutes spent on it, mostly introducing us to Victor Krum (somehow, we feel he'll become important later). Suddenly, we're at Hogwarts and events unfold at a blink and you'll miss them rate. The book is obviously huge so condensing it to a film that won't send kids to sleep was always going to be a hard task but it appears almost all plot has been removed to make way for the BIG SET PIECES littered all about. These BIG SET PIECES make up the Tri-Wizard tournament which is what the film has become solely based upon. What is the Tri-Wizard tournament? Well, unless you've read the books, the film really doesn't give you much insight whatsoever.
It might seem odd that there is not much to say about events other than the tournament but the Yule Ball, Sirius Black and even Mad-Eye Moody (the only real positive characterisation for the majority of the film) are given little more than an after-thought with much more time being wasted on bad romance dialogue and completely inappropriate humour. I enjoy double entendres, especially in this new breed of film that appeals to both adults and kids but in Goblet, all subtlety is thrown out the window and replaced with full on sexual remarks which, whilst very funny, seem completely out of place.
It's not until the final BIG SET PIECE that the film finds its feet and Harry is catapulted into his big confrontation with You-Know-Who. Ralph Fiennes is perfect with a sinister speech pattern and devilish makeover. Sadly, his screen time too is cut woefully short as the film veers into an incredibly over the top emotional end which would have been perfect had the rest of the movie reflected this tone. As it is, by the time you reach this point, you're so flustered at the ridiculous pacing the emotional pay-off is nearly nil.
The three leads have all improved in their acting ability somewhat but the woefully inadequate script (have I managed to portray how bad it is) gives them little to do than bicker with each other and fail to find romance. On top of all this, the score is so bland and toned down compared to the other Potter films it may as well not be there. When the teaser trailer was released, shivers ran down my spine as John Williams excellent music ran out over the images. Now, the potter theme is all but relegated to the closing credits whilst the in movie music is ruined by absolutely awful orchestral inserts from this new school band (no, they don't explain where that came from either). That said, Jarvis Cocker and co. as the Weird Sisters were very funny but that's probably more to do with my love of their music than them actually being given anything good to do.
The CGI was brilliant at times and almost painful at others (yes, I'm talking to you Mer-People). It just seemed like they'd rushed quite a lot of it and the film will most certainly date very quickly because of this.
I feel that I must try to dig some positives from the film but with the exception of Miranda Richardson's pitch perfect Rita Skeeter (discarded from the plot after BIG SET PIECE No. 2) and Alan Rickman's Snape who plays a decidedly understated role compared to the last three films but steals every single camera shot he is in. He created what was the only really funny scene in the film (which didn't rely on innuendo) and I do wonder what happened to the rest of the supposedly laugh out loud script.
So, there's my view. Maybe I'm being too harsh but the people who were sat around me looked just as pained and upset as they left the screen too. Believe me, I wanted this to be great. I love Goblet of Fire. It's the book where J. K. Rowling really fledged out and explored the darkness of Harry's world. When the darkness appears in this film, it's excellent but it's barely given a chance. The only real hope left for this franchise is that there will be a new director for Book Five who can pull it back on the course that Alfonso Cuaròn created in Prisoner and Azkaban. For now, I'm off to bed to dream of a much better version of this movie. If you use this, I'm The OmniGuy.
Thanks
And here's the final review!
Saw this last Sunday in Saint Louis, Harry - thought I'd send it in to you.
Y'know I heard J. K. Rowling's final book will be entitled "Harry Potter and the Film Critic From Saint Louis Who Spent Too Much Money on ButterBeer."
Anyway, I give this one Four outta Five Stars, given that it's without question the best of the Harry Potter films thus far.
It is rare for a series to get better with age, but that's exactly what the Potter films are doing. Just as J.K. Rowling's books get progressively adult and sophisticated, so go these films, and it's a delight to see. Consider yourself warned - this is the first Potter film rated PG-13, so you may not want to take the very young ones to see this. The overall vibe of this picture is dark....and with good reason.
"Goblet of Fire" is the "Empire Strikes Back" of the Potter series. Not because of any big twist, ("Hagrid, I am your Father!") but because this is when the mood shifts, when things get serious, when people start dying, when Harry and the gang grow up. There is much unrest in the Wizarding community as word spreads of evil Lord Voldemort's impending return to power. This is the first time we really get to see Voldie on screen, (I can call him Voldie, we went to boarding school together) and Ralph Fiennes does a slithery, slimy, scary good job.
But before we get to Voldemort, Harry (Radcliffe) is selected to compete in the 'Triwizard Tournament' - an international competition that pits him against older and more experienced students from Hogwarts and two rival Wizarding schools. (And Dragons! That's right, I said DRAGONS people! Fire Breathing Dragons!) While Harry is trying to figure out who entered him into the contest and why, he faces all manner of teenage angst, such as fighting with friends and trying to find a date for the Hogwarts Yule Ball.
From the Underwater Mer-People to the Fire Breathing Dragons, the special effects are a triumph all around, with nothing looking fake or too cartoony. But it's not only the action, but the ACTING in this chapter that far exceeds the previous films.
A far cry from the delicate way the late Richard Harris informed the role, Michael Gambon's portrayal of Hogwarts Headmaster Albus Dumbledore is unnervingly forceful, even more so than in "Prisoner of Azkaban." It serves the character well, given what will happen in the coming films. (No spoilers here.) A new chapter in the Potter series means a new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, and Brendan Gleeson does a wonderful job as the surly former Auror, Mad-Eye Moody. (For you Muggles, Auror = Dark Wizard hunter.)
And the kids, well, the kids just get better and better. How fortunate they were to find these three child actors, who are growing into their roles beautifully. Rupert Grint thankfully does more than just mug for the camera as Ron Weasley this time, adding some pathos to the role, while Daniel Radcliff's Potter seems more sure of himself, more at home with the part. Only Emma Watson is a little shaky as Hermione Granger, although she does some excellent work during the Yule Ball scenes.
I like the idea of a new director for each film, and I believe Mike Newell is the best pick yet. Bringing in the director of the hard hitting "Donnie Brasco" was an inspired choice - he is the first director to truly show the dark and dangerous side of the world of witchcraft and wizardry, and the first I believe, to truly 'get' Rowling's vision. I found myself wishing Newell would stay on for the rest of the Potter films, but they've already got Brit TV Director David Yates lined up to do "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix." (Bring on Umbridge!)
If you're not reading the books because you think they're 'kid stuff' you're missing out on some excellent writing, and you haven't seen the movies because you don't want to 'waste your time' than you're really missing cinematic history. If they succeed in filming all seven of Rowling's books with the same principal cast, (and it looks like they're going to) it would be the first time in film history such a massive 'mini-series for the multiplex' has been attempted and completed.
It will be an amazing achievement for the actors, Warner Brothers, and Rowling, and so much fun for us to watch.
So there's a take from someone who actually dressed up as Professor Severus Snape two years ago...for Halloween, of course. Not just on a Wednesday or something.
Thanks,
