Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

The buildup here in Tokyo for Harry potter and the Deathly Hallows (ハリーポッターと死の秘宝) was quite hyped with Posters (seen left) at most large subway and JR stations. Fuji TV also had a 4 hour Harry potter special. With this mass advertising I found it hard to do otherwise but fork out 1800yen (20USD) to see the next installment of the Harry potter franchise, however I felt that my hard earned money was not well spent. Harry potter and the Deathly Hallows had it's moments, however it did have parts where there was just no  reason to watch, nothing was really happening or that it felt like the dialogue was made just to fill time.

Most movies follow a simple pattern, introduce characters, build tension, have peak and then resolution. The Dealthy Hallows had no real tension or peak. Of course there was a cliff hanger at the end as this is part one but the movie also felt as though it wrapped up in a 2 minute segment. Overall I cannot say this was the best of the series, I somewhat blame this on the director of the movie who has come from a TV movie background with no solid films in his portfolio. My benchmark Harry Potter film is the Prisoner of Azkaban, as this had a great flow and was just overall a great movie.

My recommendation; watch this movie but do not spend 1800yen on it.