The Goblet of Fire

Movie info from IMDB
Movie reviews from Metacritic

Finally got some free time today and nipped to the cinema to catch the latest Harry Potter movie. Bloody glad we did too!

From the opening credits to the closing scenes this is a dark movie, much darker than the previous movie and all the better for it. The movie centres around a wizard tournament into which Harry finds himself mysteriously involved. Dangerous challenges abound and for the first time in this series of movies I found myself not noticing the CGI scenes as much as I did in the past.

The tone of the movie allowed the pace to high, moving from action sequence to action sequence with a little character development along the way. More back story, more side stories and the series becomes deeper and richer and now feels a lot more mature and well crafted than the first two movies did (the third was a marked improvement).

The teenage actors are still a bit wooden, but the supporting cast grows stronger and stronger and keeps things at a consistent level. And of course the appearance of the villain of the piece, finally, puts the marker down for the next three movies in the series. I sincerely hope they can keep the cast together for, if they were to change them now, it would lose a lot of the consistency they’ve managed to achieve already. You truly feel that you are a Muggle in the world of magic.

No comparisons with the book are required, I don’t think. The movies stand on their own as unique versions of a story, in the same way the Disney’s Cinderella is more fondly remembered than the story from which it came.

The Goblet of Fire is an altogether different movie from previous as it marks the turning point in the series, the overall feeling of foreboding and evil (well, nastiness at least) was well handled and didn’t venture into pantomime territory. Thoroughly enjoyable, and I’m pretty sure this one will stand up to some repeat viewings, there are better movies out at the moment but this one is worth a look.