The latest installment of the Harry Potter series of movies brings one of the fan favorite books to life.
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is the sixth installment with one more book that is currently being filmed to be released as two movies in 2010 and 2011.
Half-Blood Prince is directed by David Yates who also directed part five and is at the helm for the remaining two films as well.
The book version is epic in scope and would have to be split into two movies as well to have any chance of encompassing all of the content, which is why they decided to split the final book in two (also the obvious money to be made that way). Being only one film, it comes with the inherent shortfalls of missing critical points from the book.
For a fan of the films who hasn't read the books, there is a good chance they will enjoy this film without the nitpicking of details while pushing up your glasses and throwing your Hufflepuff scarf on the ground in disgust. We all know there should have been more of Greyback and Lupin, but tough cuts had to be made.
Visually, the whole movie is stylish and beautiful. They clearly spent a lot of time and money in post production creating a look to tie the whole film together. The special effects were a focal centerpiece in this one, just like the previous films.
The story is enjoyable and they did manage to keep the majority of the critical plot points in tact from the book.
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince feels like it will have the same enjoyment of multiple viewings as the first five had, so that would seem like they accomplished what they set out to do in making a film that the fans will enjoy and buy tickets for.
Art direction is the strongest point in this film, but it is also the most solid overall film in the series. This bodes well with the grand finale coming in two parts in the near future.
I'm giving Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince an A-.

Yeah, I should have listened to all of the reviewers who said that Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen was bad. Especially this one from Pajiba.com.
I've always been the type of person that needs to learn lessons the hard way.
So who thought you could make a movie less compelling and less interesting than the 2007 Transformers movie? It would seem that Michael Bay heard everyone complain about the last one and listened to the complaints that there was too much Shia Lebeouf and that there wasn't enough of the robot aliens. He gave us more robots, but then still gave us too much Shia.
He still thinks we'd believe that a woman that looks like Megan Fox would even talk to a dorky kid called Sam Witwicky.
He also apparently thinks that if we see enough of Megan Fox's barely covered ass that we'll ignore the fact that the story is sloppy at it's best moments and barely ties together the explosions and special effects.
Does Bay think that the American public is stupid? He might be right since the movie has made nearly $300 million and counting.
Maybe Michael Bay is the reason the movie-going public has been ruined by bad movies. They expect less story and more spectacle with every big budget action movie and the progression of Bay's movies have followed that exact standard. Bad Boys and The Rock were a balance of spectacle and story and there has been less discernible plot in each of his movies since then.
Never have I seen a movie with so much action that left me so bored.
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen gets a D.