I saw the new Harry Potter movie today and it was quite good, although I wouldn't rank it as my favorite Potter movie. (Perhaps a future post will involve my Potter movie Rankings)It's still nice to see the series start to move in a darker manner now that the dark lord was Reborn, things certainly carry over from the traumatic ending of the last film. It looks like the hard times are here to stay for Harry, since now even his refuge of Hogwartz has become as dark as the real world.

The supposedly responsible people, just pretend the problem doesn't exist live their happy lives. Instead things are left to the Order of the Phoenix, led naturally by Dumbledoor and Sirius Black, who are given the blame for all the bad things going on. Even though they are trying to prevent worse things.

The Good

Harry is starting to get some combat skills as a war wizard, which is good to see. It was nice to see him actually using his magic for useful purposes. Unfortunately, none of those spells would have been under the ministry of Educations syllabus , since they might actually been useful. Also Harry's not a bad teacher, maybe if he survives he ought to take up the Defense against the Dark arts position at Hogwartz he's already doing a better job the jokers who've held the job lately.

Snape as usual was exceedingly cool in this movie. I don't know why I like him so much, but maybe because he's got a certain (if sometimes hapless style) it was nice to see more of his back story with Harry's "sainted" father, it bring more humanity to both of their characters.
[spoiler]I look forward to seeing Snape kill Dumbledore, Hopefully the movie people won't let me down.[/spoiler]

The lack of screen time for the Dursleys. I really despise those people and anytime taken up by those idiots is time taken from the important doings at Hogwartz and elsewhere.

It was nice to see the touches of insanity of the Magic ministry, such as the massive portrait, resembling something you might see in Mao's china, Stalin's Russia or Big Brother's Air Strip One.

The Bad

To some extent I think the darkness of the movie, made the film a little less visually appealing, particularly after all the bright scenes of the wizard tournament in the last move. Also wasn't the general plot of having Harry lead Voldmort to the object he desired the plot of the first movie? I seem to recall that Harry was convinced to disarm all the traps so Voldmort could get the Philosophers stone, but maybe I'm just suffering from freak deja vu.

Not much action for Ron in this movie. I suppose with all the other characters there really isn't much time left for old dependable Ron. It would also have been nice if Harry love interest had been given some character development. I have to admit that I can't say I remember a thing about her, supposedly there she and Harry went on St. Valentines day date in the book, but all I saw in the movie was one kiss. Still I fear that is the shortcomings of the medium, just not enough time to spend on all the other characters. On the other hand, since this movie is so far the shortest of the films, you think that maybe the could have spent a little bit more cash and given a little more time to non-Harry Characters. In some ways the path Lord of the Rings took, (in releasing an extended DVD version, not adding random psudo-death scenes) is probably the path to take, that way you can both make more cash and please fans at the same time.