Goblet of Fire Fan Reviews

By William

Harry is starting his fourth year at his secondary school, Hogwarts School or Witchcraft and Wizardry, and there is exciting news indeed when the headmaster announces the Tri Wizard Tournament. There are two other major wizard schools in Europe besides Hogwarts, and the wizarding community has decided to rekindle the old tradition of inter-school competition. Due to the extreme danger and high risks of the events involved in the tournament, only students over the age of 17 may compete. All eligible students wishing to participate must write their name on a piece of paper and place it within the flames of the Goblet of Fire, the ultimate magical impartial judge. Then the day arrives when the three competitors, one from each school, will be selected by the goblet and everyone is shocked that a fourth name is also chosen... Harry Potter. Being only 14, it would have been impossible to have submitted his own name, but once the goblet chooses you, you are obliged to compete, ready or not! Being the youngest and least experienced of the entrants, Harry finds himself at a severe handicap, but is determined to see this thing though till the end. Yes, eternal glory awaits the champion of the tournament, but the winner may find themselves face to face with something... someone... more terrifying and fearsome than anything the competition alone could ever present.

The Good: Action! Excitement! Teen angst! A hint of romance (but not TOO much)! Thrills! A few laughs! It's all here, kids! Let's all pat new Potter director Mike Newell on the back for a second.... and done. Okay then. Also, let me say how wonderful it is that the studio was able to maintain the same ensemble cast four movies in a row (with the exception of Dumbledore of course but it's not their fault Harris died!)! It's so good to see not only your front and center characters played by the same actors, but all the background students as well like Neville, Seamus, the teachers, and the Weasly family, to name a few (I'd particularly like to thank Jason Isaacs for returning as Lucius Malfoy and Gary Oldman as Sirius Black, bravo, gents!). We of course get some new characters in this film and I'd like to compliment them on the over all casting: Krum, Cedric, Fleur, Rita Skeeter, and Cho were just smashing. The special effects were once again quite excellent, particularly the dragon Harry has to fight as part of the tournament. I really admired how there were lines in this film that were straight out of the book; I love it when adaptations manage to do that. The depiction of the Yule Ball was just grand. There were a few cuts from the novels that I quite agreed with, such as omitting Hermione's S.P.E.W. movement and everything having to do with Dobby (sigh of relief).

The Bad: Unfortunately, John Williams did NOT return to score this film. The music wasn't BAD, just not as good as I'd come to expect. It sounded a bit too... almost Danny Elfman Batman-y. It sounded so out of place that when the film started, I wasn't sure whether it was the feature or another trailer! There were quite a few things that they changed from the book that I'm having trouble adjusting through. No, I'm not talking about stuff like "they got the colour of Hermione's Yule Ball dress wrong" or anything like that, I'm talking about certain events/characters that are not only central to this plot, but also to the plot of the whole series. The main one being nearly everything that has to do with Barty Crouch Jr. I won't go into specifics in case you haven't read the book or seen the film yet, but some MAJOR things were toyed with here and I'm wondering how this will affect the film series' continuity. Also, the fact that Rita Skeeter is an animangus is never mentioned or utilized in any way. The Quidditch World Cup sequence seemed edited weird. One minute it's "yay World Cup!" and the next the match appears to be over and no one even mentions who won! Dumbledore felt out of character at times. Usually he's quite relaxed and subdued, but here he got very cross indeed, to the point of almost manhandling Harry.

In the end, I quite enjoyed this movie. I find it more enjoyable if viewed as a separate entity from the novel, because if not I could sit here and scrutinize and nit pick all the live long day, but if I turn that off and sit back, I'm really entertained. The Tri Wizard Tournament made for some truly thrilling action sequences, and I was glad that they didn't pull any punches in the climactic cemetery scene. The main trio have given us some of their best acting yet in this film, which is only emphasized by the wondrous "supporting" cast.

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