Save Your Money--Avoid Harry Potter

The first thing you are struck by in this enormous third act of a movie is how few lines of dialogue are actually spoken, but given the intellectually insubstantial heft of the source material that is probably a good thing.

It is unfair of me, of course, to expect more from a franchise built on a rather unimaginative retelling of the struggle between good and evil. There is never a doubt that Harry and his motley crew will triumph over the evil, evil Voldamort, who is closer to ridiculous than threatening in this less-than-riveting seventh installment.

For those of you who pay attention to such things, there is never a doubt about such things in this type of story: good guys suffer; unimportant secondary characters die bravely; bad guys get it in the end.

On the other hand, not many of you do pay attention to such things. Americans don’t read anymore so all’s well; well, except for such groundbreaking “literature” as Harry Potter and the can’t-be-forgotten-fast-enough Twilight series.

If you do--read, that is--the words “plot spoiler” and “Harry Potter” would never be within a dependent clause’s distance of one another again. There are no “plot spoilers” in this sort of story, just short cuts to Tritesburgh, U.S.A.

Yes, I know Rowling is British, but the entire Western world has grown fat on America’s saccharine naivete, and it shows in the spread of the Potter empire.

But let’s get back to the movie, which included such heart-stopping moments as two 17-year-olds kissing and holding hands, and lots of green and red lights colliding in mid-air.

By my count, there were seven or eight lines of dialogue in the movie, which included such bon mots as, “Harry, no!” and the ever popular, “Harry? No...”

I’m sure Joe will have a more favorable view of the movie, but as I understand it, ignorance is the best cure for depression. I extend my sympathies.

Honestly, I don’t even know why has me review these kinds of movies. Perhaps it's in the hope that I’ll be able to keep even a few of you from wasting your unemployment benefits on this drivel.

I hope I have succeeded.

Caviar Rating: 1 out of 5