Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Seeing a movie on Thanksgiving afternoon is turning into a tradition for TS1 and me, and this year we picked a real good one. Maybe it’s new director Mike Newell or that screenwriter Steve Kloves (who wrote all four of the scripts) or the three teenage leads are really hitting their stride. I think all three are actually true, plus Kloves, Newell and (presumably) JK Rowling figured out how to put the meat of the very long novel on celluloid.

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is centered around the Tri-Wizards Tournament, an infrequently held international competition. Troops of students from two foreign schools–dark hard boys from Eastern Europe and agile, pretty girls from France–turn up to spend the school year at Hogwarts. And even though the Ministry of Magic has imposed a new rule allowing only students at least 17 years old to enter, somehow a slip of paper with Harry Potter’s name is regurgitated from the goblet making for four contestants instead of the customary three.

The tournament is no game like quidditch, though that sport does feature in a colorful opening sequence, but rather life and death tasks which are intended to test the school champions’ limits. All four do come close to death and one does in fact die during, but not really in it. The tasks also give Newell and the producers opportunities to bring in some decent special effects (dinosaurs, mermaids).

Of course this is the point in Harry’s saga when Voldemort regains human form. Ralph Fiennes has only one scene, at the climax, where he squares off against Potter but his performance, along with the scene itself, show that Goblet of Fire is fantasy but no kids’ movie. No more than, say, Lord of the Rings or Star Wars.

definitely recommended