Stlll no formal reviews yet, but we keep hearing exceptional reactions from people who’ve seen the Half-Blood Prince in early screenings. This one from Paul Dergarabedian at Hollywood.com, tipped to us this morning by darkevangelist, is typical of the hints that this might be one of the very best HP installments yet.
Lest you think this movie was preaching to the converted or that I am some sort of huge Potter aficionado, I will be honest and say that heretofore, I was not a huge fan of the franchise; certainly I understood the popularity of the books and the films, but they just were not my cup of tea.
Well, stand back because now the Potter-loving beast in me has been unleashed after having witnessed a film that was not only exquisite in its production values, but was also charming, funny, scary, enchanting, moving (stop me, the adjectives could go on and on) and dare I say, sexy. Brilliantly directed by David Yates (he directed 2007’s Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix), Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is a tour-de-force that combines style and substance, special effects and heart and most importantly great performances from all of the actors young and not-so-young.
But how realistic is the Oscar talk? The Half-Blood Prince has a fairly dismal AMPAS track record to overcome:
