harry potter and the Half Blood Prince

by Matthew Rodgers

Each passing year has seen more substitute directors than there are Defence against the Dark Arts teachers; Christopher Columbus let the truncated and unruly self indulgence of J.K. Rowlings early novels bloat what should have been a magical introduction to “the boy that lived”. Franchise production magician David Heyman then waved his magic wand to coax Spanish visionary Alfonso Cuaron into expelling the unnecessary exposition and creating a taught, wonderful kids film that was no longer a servant to the source material. A faithful adaptation of easily the most adaptable and exciting instalment [thus far] followed with Mike Newell’s Goblet of Fire, before State of Play tactician David Yates earned his stripes with the talky, sometimes turgid doorstop that was Phoenix. Yes, he fumbled the demise of Sirius Black in favour of a “wizard-off” in the Ministry of Magic, but he has been entrusted to see these kids through to graduation, and his sophomore year is Bloody brilliant.

At the start of term six there may be Death Eaters on the rampage through the streets of London, and the shadow of Voldemort looming large across the fates of our trio of young wizards – Harry, Hermione, and Ron – but it’s not the control of their wands they should be worried about, it’s the raging hormones, might want to reconsider that wands statement then.

Amongst the fluttering eyelids and tears of heartbreak, HP6 centres on a tatty old potions book, inscribed on the inside cover with name of the titular Half Blood Prince. Annotated by its mysterious previous owner, the book offers helpful and often dangerous advice to our scarred protagonist as he attempts to juggle flirting with Ginny, uncovering Draco’s shadowy plot, and assisting Dumbledore’s detective work, all whilst spiralling towards the first really “epic” moment in 892 minutes spent in the Potterverse.

Wiz-rom-com. Does that work? Maybe not, but it helps to conjure up the overriding sense of sprightly fun that emanates from HBP. The introduction features a surprisingly confident Potter hitting on a waitress at a tube station, just prior to being scuppered by a magical intervention, its clichéd conflicted hero stuff but has a charm that’s been missing from a cast previously stifled by script.

Everyone’s at it, so to speak, the long gestating romance between Ron and Hermione bubbles to the fore and works so well, simply because we have grown with these child actors from their first wooden delivery.

It’s said every year about these sprogs (if you can call late-teens that?), but they keep getting better and better. Grint continues to suffer [albeit amusingly] from a reliance on gurning, but gets to evolve as his feelings for Hermione develop. And everyone’s favourite Mugblood, Watson, has not only blossomed into a beautiful young woman, but also a restrained actress, straying from any histrionics associated with a jealous love-rival, it’s her tender embrace with an equally love-lorn Harry that registers most. And what of the boy wizard? Well, fresh from getting his wand out on stage in horse-loving play Equis, Radcliffe demonstrates an elevated range of maturity, never more so than in an untapped comedic performance of twitchy hilarity as a result of downing a vial of luck serum. The days of stuttering “I’m a……w……w…….wizard” are well behind him.

If this all sounds a bit light-footed for a franchise that was growing increasingly darker and complex as the pages turned, not to worry because there are moments here that are not only black, but nefariously bleak. Dumbledore’s climactic showdown see’s him morph into a wailing heap that Linda Blair wouldn’t stomach, add to that the hordes of gollumesque monstrosities that claw their way towards his suffering. In another scene a possessed schoolgirl is tossed around like a Sam Raimi deleted scene. And then there’s “that” ending.

Any complaints that the action scenes are fleeting and few and far between would be substantiated had the drama linking them not been so well constructed. Anyone stubbornly disagreeing should watch Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen instead.

With almost too much in the cauldron to recommend, this hasn’t even touched on the wondrous Jim Broadbent, this is more than the by-the-book “set-up” to the two-part finale it had been touted as, 2010 can’t come soon enough.

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