Film Footle: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

You know how sometimes you watch a film from a series and there's something about it that feels... different? It's not the cast, and the change of director in the Harry Potter films, while noticeable, really only divided them into pre-Cuaron childishness and post-Cuaron darkness with a hint of sweaty adolescence. Anyway, it was like that throughout what turned out to be a very fair summary of what is one of the most aimless and slightly bloated of the books.

It was only when the credits flashed up that I realised what was wrong; no more Steve Kloves! His expert rendering of the dialogue, refreshingly free of much of the sickening drivel that Harry Potter could have inspired, was not present here where a thankfully restrained but nonethless noticeable vein of cloying twee crap worked its way in...

The plot of the fifth book is laboured. It's mostly a slightly bitter satire on the media and the government, turning the Ministry of Magic against Harry and his tales of Voldemort's return, and planting a vile Ministry spy at Hogwarts, replete with torturous punishment methods and kittens on plates.

One thing the film did extremely well was something the book struggled with. The latter seemed to be drowning in tidal waves of Harry shouting and stomping, with the occasional comic relief of his crush on Cho Chang. In the film he was calmer, more pleasant and much more human; Daniel Radcliffe has hugely improved, and now emotes like anything, God love him. I wish I could say the same for the wonderful-in-real-life Emma Watson, who has yet to match her performance in Prisoner of Azkaban. Rupert Grint's job is now largely to make the world of Harry seem real and current ("he's bang out of order, mate!"). But going back to Harry... Learning about the sides of his father he wasn't so familiar with, grappling with being a reluctant hero, learning to deal with yet more death and destruction; these are all things that make this a richer film and make up for the lack of straightforward plot.

It's a long film; there are bits glossed over, but if there were not we'd have all got extremely painful buttocks. The massive continuity effort that has lurched from film to film probably handed David Yates a headache, but as he's directing Half-Blood Prince as well, it's a headache he'll have to get used to. He did a masterful, atmospheric job, but hopefully will retire Michael Goldenberg and go crawling on bleeding knees back to Steve Kloves. And while he's at it, could be please stab a large pin in Michael Gambon's ego. Dumbledore is kind, wise and subtly powerful, and as such shouldn't have Gandalf-style tormented rants. The whole point of Dumbledore's power is that it's a shock coming from the mild and kindly gentleman. It almost seems like he's swapped personalities with Snape, sometimes.

I know it doesn't seem like I enjoyed it. But I did. So there.