captaind's Full Review: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is the first of the Harry Potter films I’ve seen, and is based on my second-favourite of the series so far (coming just behind the previous book, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban).
Everyone must know who Harry Potter is by now. The boy who lived, despite an attack by the most powerful magician (evil, of course) to have lived. The boy who attends Hogwarts school of Witchcraft and Wizardry, whose friends Hermione and Ron are always arguing, whose Potions teacher, Serverus Snape, hates him with a passion, whose main enemy at the school is Draco Malfoy, etc, etc. None of this is actually particularly necessary to know in order to watch the film, of course.
In fact that’s part of the trouble here – as always, reading the book first is a bad idea, but we’ve all done it – well, most of us have. Thus we all have our own idea of what the characters would be like, and obviously our idea of them and Director Mike Newell’s aren’t going to be exactly the same. In fact some of the characters did seem quite how I imagined them – importantly, Harry himself and Hermione were almost identical to the characters that had formed in my head from reading the book. Ron was reasonably similar, others not so… in particular, Snape was almost absent and Fleur was a real wet blanket… but no real matter. All the actors did their job admirably here, it wasn’t the performances that left me feeling slightly disappointed by this film.
The plot revolves around the “Tri-Wizard Tournament” – an ancient competition that hasn’t been held for quite a while due to its dangerous nature. Hosting the revived event is Hogwarts school, who will provide one of the contestants, along with two foreign schools. Being too young to enter doesn’t stop Harry’s name popping out of the Goblet of Fire, however, thus forcing him to compete in the events. The fact that he never even tried to put his name in is another worry…
Apart from these events, the boys and girls are of an age to start to actually notice the opposite sex now, and of course all hell breaks loose because of it. Add in the Yule ball and there are going to be plenty of tears shed by the look of it – but will it have any bearing on the tournament? Who is behind the sinister events that have happened recently, such as the reappearance of the Dark Mark in the sky? Of course, suspicion naturally falls on the former “Death Eaters” – the name given for those who served Lord Voldemort, a real baddie who just happens to be trying to take shape again after the damage he took when trying to kill Harry Potter, aged 1. All may not be as it seems, however…
The first 100 or so pages of the book are skipped over in about 5 minutes of the film, with the Quidditch World Cup being almost completely bypassed. (There are many changes from the book, so if that would seriously put you off then avoid.) Somehow the whole thing gave me a sense of anticlimax – scenes that should have been powerful seemed to shoot by in the blink of an eye while laborious minutes were spent on what seemed like inconsequential matters. Many of the lines in the film seemed either pointless or simply fell flat, and much of the music seemed extremely derivative of some found in the Lord of the Rings films. In fact I got the distinct impression that this film was trying to emulate the epic nature and grandeur of that film – which wasn’t a good idea as the storyline and setting can in no way compete. The book is, like it’s predecessors, simply good light-hearted entertainment, with a little depth on occasion. The film would, to me at least, have been more effective, and more fun, if it had tried to be the same thing.
Of course converting a book to the big screen is a notoriously difficult business, and to be fair most of the more important plot elements were there. I couldn’t help thinking though that this film could have been so much more, and the only real feeling I had when it finished was, “oh well that’s over”. Not particularly glad to have seen it, but not especially sorry to have seen it. Among the things that helped it to get a “recommended” along with its 3-star rating are the brilliant special effects when Harry’s godparent, Sirius Black, is talking to him via a fireplace (his face appears in the embers), and the wonderful performance of Miranda Richardson as love-to-hate-her journalist Rita Skeeter. Matthew Lewis’ performance as unconfident Neville was also superb.
I was quite happy that there was no appearance of the house elf, Dobby, who I find extremely annoying in the books, but there was no lack of comic relief as that seems all that Ron and his 2 brothers are there for – even more so than in the books. The sets and effects were brilliant for the most part. There was one completely unnecessary use of bad language, and some fairly intense action scenes, which are what earns the film its MPAA rating of PG-13. I can quite imagine some younger children might be a bit alarmed by one or two scenes. The runtime of 157 minutes seemed about right, not particularly over-long for the content but it still felt like important scenes had been left out in favour of somewhat pointless ones. There were also some incomprehensible actions (or more often lack of) by various characters – in a dark maze where you can hardly see, would no-one have thought of using Lumos, one of the very first spells anyone ever learns, to shed a bit of light on the subject? Er… apparently not, they just go on blundering around in the dark... Hmm... Also the new teacher for the Defence Against the Dark Arts being rebuked for using transfiguration as a punishment while apparently performing an unforgiveable curse at the same time seemed a bit odd (can't remember if that was the same in the book). There are occasional moments of humour (intentional ones, I mean) that work about 80% of the time.
Overall, I think it’s a case that Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is aimed exclusively at its target market without much thought for everyone else. Pre-teens and those just into their teenage years (and Carl, apparently) – will be very happy with it, but for the rest of us it falls a little flat. Lose the attempts at being epic and give it a bit more light-heartedness, and it would have been a much more enjoyable film. Not exactly bad, but don’t expect a great film when you go to see it. (Notwithstanding the fact that almost everyone else on the planet probably saw it before me!)
Cast
Daniel Radcliffe - Harry Potter
Emma Watson - Hermione Granger
Rupert Grint - Ron Weasley
Mark Williams - Arthur Weasley
James Phelps - Fred Weasley
Oliver Phelps - George Weasley
Bonnie Wright - Ginny Weasley
Timothy Spall - Wormtail
David Tennant - Barty Crouch Junior
Robert Pattinson - Cedric Diggory
Jason Isaacs - Lucius Malfoy
Tom Felton - Draco Malfoy
Stanislav Ianevski - Viktor Krum
Roger Lloyd-Pack - Barty Crouch
Katie Leung - Cho Chang
Matthew Lewis - Neville Longbottom
Robbie Coltrane - Rubeus Hagrid
Michael Gambon - Albus Dumbledore
Frances de la Tour - Madame Olympe Maxime
Maggie Smith - Minerva McGonagall
Alan Rickman - Severus Snape
Predrag Bjelac - Igor Karkaroff (as Pedja Bjelac)
Brendan Gleeson - Alastor 'MadEye' Moody
Miranda Richardson - Rita Skeeter
Gary Oldman - Sirius Black
Ralph Fiennes - Lord Voldemort
Mark Williams: Apart from The Fast Show and numerous TV appearances, he was of course Lister’s mate Olaf Peterson in Red Dwarf. Timothy Spall also made an appearance in that series, though is better known for being the Brummie in Auf Weidersehen, Pet.
Jason Isaacs played the duel role of Mr Darling / Captain Hook in Peter Pan
Robert Hardy played Dr Parnell in the BBC adaptation of Gulliver’s Travels. (He was also Seigfreid Farnham in All Creatures Great and Small.)
Several other veterans of BBC sitcoms are there if you look hard enough (it almost looks like a "Who's Who in British TV"!), look out for Eric Idle in the opening sequence, Robbie Coltraine (Cracker) as Hagrid, and Only Fools and Horses’ Trigger (Roger Lloyd-Pack). The new Doctor Who is also in there somewhere…
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