It’s partly because of the regular, reliable nature of the franchise, but we never really anticipate the “Harry Potter” movies. Since the awful first two Chris Columbus entries, the quality of the series has actually been fairly high, with the last entry, “Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince,” proving the best since Alfonso Cuaron’s third movie, but really, they come, they go, we see them, we enjoy them and we forget about them: nothing in the films has really stuck with us over time.
But this may be about to change with the first of the two-part finale, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part One,” which, judging from the final trailer that debuted at Yahoo last night, has a sweep and scope that we’ve yet to see from the series. Director David Yates returns for the third time in a row, and his command over J.K. Rowling’s world seems as strong as ever, with some neat directorial touches on display.
We also get our first look at some of the new additions to the cast, the last actors in Britain not to have yet done what’s become akin to the draft for British character actors: a welsh-accented Bill Nighy, Rhys Ifans, Peter Mullan, Sophie Thompson and David O’Hara all crop up here, along with all the usual Potter cast members. We think that those trying to drum up Oscar talk for the film are a little deluded — the second part, maybe, but probably only as an acknowledgement of the biggest franchise of all time, rather than any intrinsic value in the picture — but this certainly looks a highlight of what’s set to be a rather thin season for event movies.