make cakes, not war.

As predicted, i was disappointed. To what degree? Not so much as the third movie, wherein my sister and i trudged out of the movie theatre bursting with criticisms and sour faces, but so much that the beautiful special effects were wasted on me. Sure, artistically, it was still fine. But GOD the storyline, AGAIN, was devastatingly lacking in solid and deep meaning that would be relevant and essential for the sixth and, in all likelihood, the seventh movies as well. What happened to a lot of the "key details"??? And to my gargantuan disappointment, a lot of my favorite and most anticipated scenes were not there (ex. career advice, the rest of the dept of mysteries, the weasleys' other pranks, etc.) plus the acting of a lot of the actors were TERRIBLE. Worst of them all by Cho Chang and Arabella Figg. Love for Helana Bonhan-Carter as Bellatrix Lestrange (PERFECT) and the Luna Lovegood girl. Hermione still kept doing the weird exaggerated eyebrow thing when she spoke. Ron stepped up a little for the "defensive friend" part but other than that he did little acting. Harry had...emotional imbalances that were all wrong. Too much emotion when it was unnecessary and not enough emotion when he needed it. Ginny still doesn't impress me much (doesn't seem right for the Book 6 Ginny). Dumbledore ran around too much. He lacked that regal air that Richard Harris had before. We see very little of McGonagall, sadly. And Dolores Umbridge was not toad-y enough for me, although her voice is adequately annoying. As for the rest of the cast, little more than acceptable acting. THe one person who outdid herself and went above and beyond was Helena Bonham-Carter. If you haven't read the book, you'll miss a lot of crucial info. If you DID read it, you'll find too much material missing. The flow and development of the characters was totally lacking. Lord help the 6th movie.