I was one of those obsessed “Harry Potter” fans who, book by book, went to midnight parties each time the latest installment released in order to get my hands on a copy virtually the second it became available. For the last two books I actually secluded myself in my house–with provisions of course–until I turned to the very last page. I feared that I might be on the street with some hateful person shouting out the ending and ruining it for those of us who hadn’t finished yet.

The “Harry Potter” movies, however, I have generally not liked. The first three were just a mash-up of every scene in the book. Number 4 (“Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire”) got a tad better. Number 5 (“Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”) I more or less enjoyed.
But “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince“–now this was a movie!
Anyone who reads the books knows that starting with Book Four, they begin to get progressively darker, and in many ways, Book Six has the darkest moment of all Seven. It’s the book when everything gets worse (before its going to get better in the last installment). I worried that the Sixth movie would be so dark that I would not like it. However, it was fantastic! I haven’t laughed that hard at a movie in ages–the film was filled with wink-wink moments when Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ginny and friends are navigating the hilarious terrain of high school romance. The cinematography was gorgeous–it has some of the most picturesque sequences I’ve seen in awhile, the best of which are the darkest moments of the film (there is a scene in a cornfield that is terrifying–and worth the price of the movie itself).

Perhaps my favorite moment, though, is when, after Harry and Dumbledore go searching for one of Voldemort’s Horcruxes, they must escape across a darkened sea filled with writhing, attacking zombies. It’s just before the moment when you-know-what happens (I don’t want to spoil anything for those who haven’t read the books). It’s one of those moments when you love Dumbledore the most in the series–when he seems to be at his weakest, and then he pulls out the most wonderful, powerful magic you’ve seen from him yet. And the movie does this beautifully–it’s as if Dumbledore is Moses, parting the sea for his and Harry’s escape. It’s appropriately grand, given what’s about to happen next.
It got me all teary.
So if you haven’t seen HP 6 yet, it’s a must. Go this weekend. Be prepared to laugh and cry and all that good stuff.