Synopsis
In Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry returns for his fifth year of study at Hogwarts only to discover that much of the wizarding community has been led to believe that the story of the teenager’s recent encounter with the evil Lord Voldemort is a lie, putting Harry’s integrity in question. Worse, the Minister for Magic, Cornelius Fudge, has appointed a new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, the duplicitous Professor Dolores Umbridge. But Professor Umbridge’s “Ministry-approved” course of defensive magic leaves the young wizards woefully unprepared to defend themselves against the Dark Forces threatening them, so at the prompting of his friends Hermione and Ron, Harry is convinced to take matters into his own hands. Meeting secretly with a small group of students who name themselves “Dumbledore’s Army,” Harry teaches them how to defend themselves against the Dark Arts, preparing the courageous young wizards for the extraordinary battle that lies ahead.
If there was anything that plagued this portion of the overall story from J.K. Rowling it would have been the character build that it does so well. It takes time to create a sense of loneliness and isolation through a character without blatantly saying, “I’m lonely and isolated”. I can only imagine how difficult it was to put such a thing on paper, as you’re solely depending on the imagination of the reader to ‘get’ it. Most shunned the book as to say it was a bridge to the next one, but director David Yates showed exactly how valuable this book really was. Instead of concentrating mainly on the story, which would have been fine, he concentrated on the characters. He brought out Harry’s loneliness and isolation through a series of events. Harry has to deal with separation anxiety from Dumbledore, who has chosen to back away from the main man in this episode. This becomes evident in the trial scene with Harry when he goes through a verbal barrage from the Minister and soon to be troublemaker Dolores Umbridge. Dumbledore comes in to save Harry, but offers no comfort on the way out. You can see through Yates’ vision of the scene that he wants his main character to act like a confused child who has just learned his parents are divorcing; providing no answers and leaving too many questions. It’s effective, sad, but at the same time so well done that you can’t help to feel bad for Potter’s situation.
In other words, it magnifies the isolation our main character is experiencing, which also magnifies the tragedy at the end of the film.
At the end of the day the film really does act like a bridge into the most violent of woods that lie ahead for all the main characters. While the fourth film establishes ‘death’ for the first time in the series then this establishes how the kids are in the final stages of losing their playful innocence the other movies had firmly established. They are now in the midst of it all with the other adults in the film and that idea is repeated in the final big battle with the Deatheaters at the end. So, yes this movie is a bridge, but it’s one of the best, sturdiest bridges that could have been crafted. It does what it needed to do to help the overall story and finally convert our favorite wizards and witch into the dark destiny that they can’t avoid.
What’s more remarkable about Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is how Yates took a very large book and translated it really well to the screen without splitting it into two films. Sure we lost some elements that they’ll have to ignore in the last set of films, but they weren’t really that important to begin with. Outside of Yates, this was the first film where the trio of main characters really bloomed. You can see that Daniel Radcliffe had turned that corner with his acting career. No more awkwardly spat out lines, but complete character wrapping. You can also see the exact same performances from Emma Watson’s Hermione Granger and Rupert Grint’s Ron Weasley. These young actors got away with being green in the first three films, but they fully bloomed and connected with their characters in this one. Excellent performances.
You know how strong this movie is, so the question is why should you purchase the ultimate edition? To Warner Home Video’s credit they’ve always provided some good value with special or ultimate editions of their Blu-rays. If you need a good example then look to their release of the The Goonies last year. Great film with a good HD transfer, and it has some solid goodies with it. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix Ultimate Edition doesn’t break that mold that WHV already established. You get a very impressive Blu-ray transfer of the film that literally has zero video issues when shown on a good 1080p screen. You get some fantastic audio transfer mastered in DTS-HD 5.1 that will help enhance the viewing experience. The transfer is really impressive, folks.
On top of this you get a nicely made hardback case that the Blu-rays come in; it’s almost as big as the actual book that Rowling released. On top of this you also get a set of character cards, that all the ultimate editions have, and also a hardback 44-page book with images from years 1-7. That’s the stuff you can physically touch.
As for the actual special features, here’s what you’re looking at:
– Creating the World of Harry Potter Part 5: Evolution
– Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix: Behind the Magic
– Building the Magic: The Sets of Harry Potter
– Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix: The Rebellion Begins
– Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix: Fulfilling a Prophecy
– Additional Scenes in Hi-Def
– Trailing Tonks: Natalia Tena (aka Nymphadora Tonks) Leads a Very Personal Film Set Tour
– Harry Potter: The Magic of Editing: Director David Yates and Editor Mark Day Show What a Difference a Good Edit Makes
– Theatrical Trailers
These are on a Blu-ray disc of their own and the first two will take nearly two hours of your viewing time. The first feature, Creating the World of Harry Potter is long and detailed. It goes through the directors of each HP film and gives some insight how each approaches the world of HP and how each contributed a piece of their own vision. Having four different directors and maintaining the same continuity is beyond impressive, as directors generally let their egos get in the way of the movies. The feature is charming, informative and interesting, as each director connects their piece with the previous. The other features are really quite good and are worth the price of admission that you pay for it. So, even if you have this movie on Blu-ray already it might be worth having this version on the shelf as well. I was very impressed with what WHV included with this release because it felt more than just a simple re-hash of previously released material.