Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 – 2010
First of all, I’d like to mention that I think this entire movie is underrated. But I must also confess that I believe I understand why. The reason I mention the merits of the film, as a whole, is that it has a direct bearing on the film’s visual effects. Were they good? They most certainly were. But when compared with most of the rest of the Harry Potter movies, there just didn’t seem to be very many extraordinary effects sequences.
That’s not to say that there weren’t a few pretty remarkable effects. There were, of course, but they were largely understated. And that ties back to the fact that the film is underrated. You see, the movie is the first part of the final edition in author J.K. Rowling’s series of books. The complete story had a flashy and spectacular climax, which this movie seemed to lack. The plot of this first part, and the visual effects needed to show it on the screen, just didn’t require many impressive special effects. This film was more about setting up the climax that would come in the next movie, and to be sure, part 2 was nominated for Best Visual Effects in 2011.
It is also important to keep in mind that this was the 7th Harry Potter movie. We’ve seen all the relevant effects before in parts 1–6. We’ve seen the smoke projectiles that are the Death Eaters flying. We’ve seen the fantastic image warping effect that shows characters disapparating. We’ve seen the CGI snake, Nagini. We’ve seen curses being fired out of wands. We’ve seen characters morphing into other characters when they drink pollyjuice potion. And we’ve seen dememtors, house elves and patronus charms. This movie was about story and set-up, not effects. It was all familiar territory, and there wasn’t much that was new.
Sure, the scene with seven Harry Potters was amusing, and the scene where Harry is attacked by Nagini was scary, but those scenes didn’t really stand out to me as special. Even the scene where Ron Weasley destroys a horcrux was very intense and creepy, but it didn’t really blow me out of the water. After doing some reading, I found that the Death Eater flying effect was slightly enhanced for this movie, but only slightly, something I wouldn’t have known just by watching the film.
But the sequence that really stood out to me was the animated sequence that told the Tale of the Three Brothers. Now this portion of the film remarkable! It was completely animated, but I’ve never seen any animation that even approached this kind of style or sophistication. It was clearly CGI, but it almost looked like they filmed live puppets and enhanced them with digital effects. It was gorgeously masterfully done! The little story within the film’s narrative was artistic in a way that nearly transcended the film, itself. It sparkled like glitter, if glowed like magic, if flowed like ink in water. It was beautiful and memorable. Amazing!
Don’t get me wrong. I really enjoyed the film, but there was very little that was new, that put it above the preceding Harry Potter movies. Was that short, animated sequence enough to earn it its nomination? I’m not so sure.