Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1

2010

Directed by David Yates

Netflix says… The first installment of the two-part conclusion to the Harry Potter series finds the bespectacled wizard walking away from his last year at Hogwarts to find and destroy the remaining Horcruxes, putting an end to Voldemort’s bid for immortality.

• I guess I should apologize at the start of this.
• Because if you’ve never seen the first six Harry Potter movies or read any of the books, you might be lost coming into Deathly Hallows, Part 1.
• It feels like there’s nothing but sadness to this movie.
• Hermione has to remove herself from her parents’ memories, so that they’ll be safe from the Death Eaters.
• Harry’s family, the Dursleys, as horrible as they were to him all those years, have to leave their home for good, so that they’ll be safe from the Death Eaters.
• Dumbledore’s dead.
• Snape’s been named headmaster at Hogwarts.
• Voldemort meets with his Death Eaters and they’re talking about when Harry will be removed from the Dursley house and taken to a safe house.
• He reveals that he needs to borrow someone else’s wand because his own shares a core with Harry’s. So he can’t kill Harry with his own wand.
• No one volunteers to give up his or her wand to the dark lord… so he voluntells Lucius Malfoy to give up his wand.
• A whole crew from the Order of the Phoenix arrives to move Harry. Half of them drink polyjuice potion so they can be decoys.
• But the Death Eaters caught wind of the move.
• They made a big deal about Harry still being underage and, therefore, still having the trace on him. Meaning he can’t do magic without the Death Eaters knowing which one is the real Harry Potter.
• But then he still uses magic to defend himself when he and Hagrid are attacked by Death Eaters.
• Hedwig, Harry’s owl, sacrifices herself by blocking a killing curse meant for Harry.
• Hagrid and Harry arrive at the Burrow (Ron Weasley’s home), where there are tons of protective spells.
• They find out that Mad-Eye Moody was killed and George Weasley was seriously injured.
• The Minister of Magic drops by to give the kids the things that Dumbledore left them in his will.
• And here’s some happy: the wedding of Bill Weasley and Fleur Delacour.
• But even that’s interrupted by Kingsley Shacklebolt’s patronus, which arrives to warn everyone that the Ministry of Magic has fallen and the Death Eaters are on their way.
• Hermione grabs Ron and Harry and they disapparate.
• And from here, they’re on the run for the rest of the movie.
• Their mission is to find and destroy Voldemort’s horcruxes. Though they really only find one in this movie.
• To be fair, there’s a lot that happens that keeps them from finding more.
• I mean, they have a hard enough time figuring out how to destroy the one that they do get their hands on.
• Ron has a falling out with Harry and leaves. But then he comes back.
• And we get a beautifully animated telling of the story of the Deathly Hallows near the end of the movie.
• Of course, being part one of two, we’re left with something of a cliffhanger.
• I really love all of the Harry Potter movies. I love the books even more. And I suggest, if you haven’t seen this, watch them all.
• They’re really very entertaining and, apart from the kids playing the main roles, the adults who play the teachers throughout the series really don’t receive enough recognition for the parts they played.
• Especially Alan Rickman as Snape. Should’ve won an Oscar.

Next week, we’ll stick with the fantasy genre with Labyrinth at #82.