Harry Potter and The Goblet Of Fire [27]

"Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire" welcomes back stars Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter), Rupert Grint (as Ron Weasley) and Emma Watson (as Hermione Granger) for the fourth film adaptation of J.K. Rowling's popular Harry Potter novel series. Harry must contend with being mysteriously selected to compete in the prestigious Triwizard Tournament, a thrilling competition that pits him against older and more experienced students from Hogwarts and two rival wizarding schools. Meanwhile, supporters of Harry's nemesis, the evil Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes), send a shockwave of fear throughout the wizard community when their Dark Mark scorches the sky at the Quidditch World Cup, signaling Voldemort's return to power. But for Harry, this is not the only harrowing news causing him anxiety -- he still has yet to find a date for Hogwarts' Yule Ball dance.

This was the fourth in J.K. Rowling’s tales of the young schoolboy/wizard. His parents were murdered by Lord Voldemort and he is just coming to grips with the fact that he is a wizard. The Goblet of Fire book weighed in at 734 pages, versus its volume III predecessor at 448 pages. Director Alfonso Cuarón had to slash and burn just to fit Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban into 2 hours and 21 minutes.

After this book, there was a gap of three years while Rowling worked on book 5, Order of the Phoenix. There have been rumors of writer’s block, plus she gave birth to a new baby.

At two and one half hours with no toilet break, this movie may have you squirming in your seats and crossing your legs, especially during the underwater mer-folk rescue scenes. Even still, much will have to be chopped from the book. The escape from Privet drive ought to be wrapped up in two minutes. Expect the S.P.E.W. and blast-ended Skrewts sub-plots to be short, or perhaps non-existant.  The Goblet itself figures very little in the movie except in two places. Like the Philosopher's (Sorceror's) Stone, it only has a bit part in the movie.

Lego has already released building play sets with young fans in mind. There is the Graveyard Duel, The Durmstrang ship, Rescue from the merpeople, and Harry and the Hungarian Horntail. I assume all four of these scenes are in the movie.

This was the final of a four-picture deal that Daniel, Rupert, and Emma were to have signed. I am not up to speed on whether the fifth will even be produced. However, the Harry Potter franchise is worth $2.6 billion according to boxofficemojo.com. The first three movies are numbers 3, 8, and 15 in box office gross worldwide. So this movie will be worth a good 700 million give or take. The next three have to be worth another billion too. So what would it take to keep the principle actors? It is somewhat unnerving when another actor takes over an established part. Even with Michael Gambon's great acting, it is hard to get away from Richard Harris' portrayal in the first two movies. Dare I say that I would probably have been happier if they had started with Gambon for the whole series.

I am looking forward to this picture very much. I plan to see it in the theater, even though I like the cineplexes less and less. This will be my 2nd theater first run this year after Revenge of The Sith. {BB}

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Added: November 3rd 2005
Reviewer: BB
29 Point Scale Score:    [27]

Related Movie Link (IMDB): IMDB - Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire
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Language: english