Review:
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1

JK Rowling’s megabucks Boy Who Lived franchise has long since ended in the printed medium. However, the lucrative film series still hasn’t quite finished and it seems that Warner Bros wants to squeeze just a little more money out of this franchise, splitting the final chapter into two whole films spread out by a few months. They claim it’s to keep the finale in line with JK Rowling’s original vision, but considering the butchering that’s happened to some of the previous films (with the exception of Order of the Phoenix), it seems odd that a book with enormous pacing problems is being allowed to transfer perfectly to the screen.

It’s destiny time for Harry, Ron and Hermione. While the three of them should be in Hogwarts, preparing for their final year, they must leave the comforts of everything they know and love and head out into the wilderness. Alone, afraid and unsure of what to do next, they have to somehow find and destroy the remaining Horcruxes that are allowing evil Lord Voldemort to remain alive – before they are caught by any of the spies roaming the country.

While the novel might have been a taught and satisfying pay-off to the biggest event in book history, it wasn’t without its problems. The pacing was all over the place, with a few excellent set pieces early on and a jaw-dropping climax, but between the two were rafts of scenes where Harry, Ron and Hermione camped in the woods and wondered aloud what to do. If there was surely one thing that would have benefited from being cut out, it’s those scenes. Nope, they’re all in there, and the pacing flags noticeably throughout the film.

To be fair to screenwriter Steven Kloves, it is almost word-for-word identical to the novel and feels more a part of the book’s universe than ever before. Having said that, those who haven’t read the books (yes, both of you) will probably find this film to be the most disorienting of the lot. Mostly this is due to the fact that the previous films have done a diabolical job in setting up the final chapter – far inferior to the novels, anyway – and partly because now every other word out of the character’s mouths is something magical.