Evil is swathed in the most hideous shade of colour for this movie, poisonous pink. Dolores Umbridge is wonderfully played by Imelda Staunton. She is the amalgamation of all our worst school teachers, a chronically strict and arrogant instructor who seeks only to carry out the ministry’s fullest intention in suppressing and denying the news of the resurgence of Lord Voldermort (wonder if I’m tagged? Eww…so geeky). The despicable, petty government functionary masks her prejudice and sadism in blinkered loyalty to her irrationally paranoid boss Cornelius Fudge. Her acting was subtly nuanced; nonchalantly sipping tea, savoring every ounce of exquisite agony derived from executing medieval methods of torture on her students. Her words are gilded with sarcasm and speeches filled with poisonous accusatory insinuations. She seems to echo my junior college principle in the way she pronounces her cruel diktats with a passive-aggressive feminine sweetness. The insincerity and artificialness of her dull but precisely memorized speeches clearly articulates the sinister intentions of the ministry and is similar to how they choose to instill “loyalty” back at ACJC. Her annoying silvery throat-clearing cough which she uses so rudely to interrupt everybody whenever she hears or sees something she violently disagrees with is exactly how I imagined it when I was reading the book. Pink and perky, she soon becomes the students' nightmare: a cheery commissar whose smile gradually fades away revealing a face of cruel malignity with a mouth contorted into an otherworldly rictus.
You may be wondering why I am talking so much about Umbridge. Well that’s because she has been allowed to dominate the screen time for far too long, proving to be a great distraction to the story. Because of the lack of judicial distribution of screen time (although Alex would disagree and tell you that everybody has precisely 15 minutes...pffth TJC always has to be right...anyways), this series continues in it’s unwavering tradition of endorsing a shocking waste of talent which includes Maggie Smith (Minerva MacGonagall), Emma Thompson (Sybil Trelawney); both of whom I simply adore and Julia Walters (Mrs. Weasley) just to name but a few. However the thespians truly owned the small snippets of screen time which they share with their younger co-stars. It’s nice to see Alan Rickman (Severus Snape) in a more active role other than his watered-down camos of forcing Harry and Ron to study.
I’m glad that Emma Watson (Hermione Granger) has taken heed to what critics have been lamenting about for the past 4 films. To say that she’s overly melodramatic is stating the obvious. Only she has been so oblivious to the alarming fact of her deplorable acting and blatantly ignores the overwhelming responses to that. Darling there’s more to acting than frowning and it’s a movie not a soap opera so spare us your theatrics. With that said Evanna Lynch (Luna Lovegood) is a breath of fresh air. No more Little Miss confused a.k.a. Hermione hogging the silver screen thank god. And I know I’ll be saying this for the umpteenth time but I simply love her eyes. So pretty.
There are many out there bemoaning the fact that her longest book having being reduced into the shortest film yet produced sacrifices too much narrative for effects. But then again by consensus it's not really her best work. I don’t see how this should hinder us from enjoying the movie. The stark difference between watching and reading is that a movie manages to capture a scene what a book tries to achieve in many words. J. K. Rowling’s strengths are her arresting narrative and vivid description of characters which I think was well captured in the movie. The intensely breath taking magic duels in the cavernous blacked tiled Ministry of Magic, the clandestine and illicit “army” spearheaded by Harry and the broom rides through London is simply magic. Although I wish they had taken more time to introduce the newer characters instead of just flooding us with so many new faces. I mean I don’t even know who they are until I see the credits and these are people who are going to reappear in the later books.
Oh dear i just realised that my blog's pink haha.
Ring any bells? An all too familiar sight haha
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