I should probably start by saying that of all the Harry Potter books, Order of the Phoenix is my least favourite. The book is very long, longer than it needs to be, Harry and the reader spend most of the book in the dark, and Harry spends most of it being angry and grumpy, which doesn’t allow for a great deal of empathy. I think I’ve mentioned before that Goblet of Fire seems to be a bridging novel, where we change from one-off adventures with an underlying theme to the big story at the expense of the one-off adventures. Order of the Phoenix then has the unenviable task of bringing in sufficient detail to the big story to sustain us through the remaining two novels. This means it’s a lot of description, back story and setup, without much in the way of action.
Surprise to say then, that Order of the Phoenix, the film, is probably my favourite so far. They have decided to cut huge chunks out of it (too much in some places), giving it a reasonable runtime of just over 2 hours (although IMDB states it’s 138 mins, or 2hrs 18 mins, I put it at 2hrs 5 mins if you don’t stay for the credits), compared to 2 hours and 37 minutes for Goblet of Fire. For the most part you don’t miss the extra material, although I’m sure there’s plenty of gems missing (taking the cover off the portrait of Sirius’ mother and Kreature’s back chat for example). At times you can see they have cut out too much, I’ve read the book (a while ago at least) and even I was finding bits confusing, I’m not even sure they introduced all the characters of the Order of the Phoenix and I was struggling to remember names (it’s been more than four years since the book was released).
You can also spot a few times where the continuity doesn’t flow, perhaps because of these cuts. In a scene where Hermione is given a bike handlebar by Grawp (Hagrid’s giant half-brother), one shot she has it, the next Grawp has it, and is several yards away. I know they’re wizards, but still. Likewise, people move around and change places between shots too. I noticed all these in my first sitting too, repeat viewings will no doubt reveal more.
As for the new cast members, they all work our pretty well. Evanna Lynch is great as Luna Lovegood, hits the part perfectly, doesn’t get much chance to show here stuff and has many of her better moments taken away from her, but still provides many of the (few) laughs. You don’t get much of an introduction to her, so I can see many people being confused by her character. Kreacher (the Black family’s elf servant) is in a couple of scenes, but his general hatred and mumbling is missed. Imelda Staunton fills Dolores Umbridge’s shoes well, hitting a nice balance of someone thinking they are doing things for the good of society, when in fact putting it completely at risk. The other new and returning characters all hit form, although most of them don’t get much time on screen. Gary Oldman as Sirius deserves extra mention though, there’s a character that needed more time in both the books and movies.
Yes, there are bits of the story missing, no the humour that runs through the Potter books isn’t there, but it hasn’t been there in any of the movies. This is very serious, the only light moments supplied by Luna and Ron (Rupert Grint proving great with comedy again). Michael Gambon is great as Dumbledore again, but I’d like to have seen him be more invincible and in control in the final battle with Voldemort. The film does capture the essence of the book though, something any film can only really aspire to (you’ll never squeeze it all into a 2-3hr film). Go see it, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.
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