Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince Blu-ray Review

Magic, wizardry and witchcraft make for a spellbinding Blu-ray.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, the second to last installment in the Harry Potter films, released earlier this year to the delight of its age-spanning fan base.

The Blu-ray, released just last month, is the latest in a series of solid, if not always perfect, Blu-ray discs in terms of video and audio quality. How does this latest installment shape up?

STORYTELLING:  

Overall, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince has everything you are expecting if you are a Harry Potter fan, with some changes to the books which you may or may not like. Screenwriter Steve Kloves returns to pen the screenplay in what I find to be the most humorous and enjoyable of the films to date, with the possible exception of the Alfonso Cuaron directed Prisoner of Azkaban.

The audience rejoins Harry (played again by Daniel Radcliffe) in an Underground coffee shop, reading in the newspapers about the events unfolding in the wizarding world. The waitress serves him, comments on the paper, and flirts briefly with Potter, before Potter notices Professor Dumbledore (Michael Gambon) outside of the window, appearing into thin air. The opening scene subtlety sets the tone for the rest of the film.

When Harry and his friends Ron and Hermoine (Rupert Grint and Emma Watson) return to Hogwarts, even after the revelation to the wizarding world that super antagonist Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes) has returned, the tone is much more lighthearted then the previous film in the series, Order of the Phoenix.

The best way to describe the tone is an exaggerated version of high school and summer camp combined. Hogwarts is somewhat separated from the rest of the wizarding world. Most of the restrictive atmosphere has been replaced due to the Ministry of Magic no longer caring about Hogwarts as it has in the last installment, which allows Harry and the students to be kids.

Plots such as Harry and Ron’s love lives and Ron’s success playing Quidditch (the wizard sport) are touched on humorously and often throughout the film. The cast yet again brings a good acting performance, which greatly helps these parts.

This high school atmosphere is interrupted at times by the threats of the outside world, through scenes where Dumbledore teaches Harry about Voldemort’s past, and through Harry’s suspicions that school bully Draco Malfoy (in Tom Felton’s best performance) is secretly part of Voldemort’s sworn followers.

The cinematography of Half-Blood Prince is brought to life in these scenes especially. Academy Award nominated cinematographer Bruno Delbonnel is a notable addition to the crew of the Potter films, and his work shows in the leap of quality in how the film is shot. Scenes as simple as Malfoy walking down a hallway are brought to life with great camera angles. I actually prefer the cinematography to the only other series standout, Prisoner of Azkaban.

Half-Blood Prince is brought to a close when the whimsical high school environment crashes with the dark reality of the outside world and Voldemort’s looming presence. If anything, I must complain the film ends too quickly in comparison with the book, which was a decision by director David Yates in order to build up for the two film finale.

My only other gripe with Half-Blood Prince is the film may confuse viewers who haven’t read the books. The film does a poor job explaining who the Half-Blood Prince is other than the owner of the potions book which Harry uses throughout the duration. While not as annoying as this detail was in past films (making Goblet of Fire a garbled mess of misguided storytelling) it does harm the viewer’s comprehension of some important plot items in relation to the film’s third act.

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