Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Difficult times might lie ahead for Harry Potter, but his fans are going to find it very easy to sit back and watch his trials and tribulations in Goblet of Fire, the fourth film in the series.

The story starts with 14-year-old wizard-in-training Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) bedeviled by foreboding nightmares — nightmares that come to pass when the long-missing evil Lord Voldemort’s (Ralph Fiennes) Death Eaters make their mark on the Quidditch World Cup, leaving nothing but scorched earth in their wake. Voldemort hasn’t been seen in 13 years, not since he murdered Potter’s parents and tried to kill young Harry too. Slowly, year after year, he’s been rebuilding his strength and feeding on his hatred for Potter. Now, it’s time to come out in the open.

As Harry’s fourth year of education at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry commences, his bad dreams continue and things are further complicated when somehow his name is put forth for competition in the elite Triwizard Tournament. Harry doesn’t want to participate, but the magically binding contract says he must. The treacherous tournament pits three of the best and brightest wizarding schools against each other as they compete in a trio of life-threatening tasks.

Scariest of all, perhaps, is having to find a date for the Annual Yule Ball.

There are some very interesting an entertaining new characters this time around: MadEye Moody (Brendan Gleeson), a teacher with a roving eye; Rita Skeeter (Miranda Richardson), a rapacious reporter; and the beautiful Cho Chang (Katie Leung), the object of Harry’s affection. The addition of several different students from the other two wizardry schools is also a lot of fun and makes for a different vibe from the other three Harry Potter films.

As Harry and his two closest friends — Ron (Rupert Grint) and Hermione (Emma Watson) — battle evil wizards, dragons, merpeople and grindylows, perhaps the biggest suspension of disbelief for the audience will be in accepting that the characters are still young teens. The actors have certainly outgrown their roles by now (how will they do it in 2008 with Half-Blood Prince?), but the rest of the film looks so good you might not care. It’s the most beautifully filmed installment since 2002’s Chamber of Secrets (incidentally, it’s the same director of photography on both films: the Oscar-nominated Roger Pratt). Sets look incredibly deep, colors are impossibly vibrant, and digital blends with real seamlessly.

Some truly amazing visual sequences include the conquering of a dragon; an entire underwater world; and a ferocious fight in a gloomy graveyard. The smaller moments are just as marvelous — MadEye Moody’s bizarre glass peeper; a humorous sequence in which Draco is turned into an adorable ferret; and the way Rita Skeeter’s quill pen plays on parchment, floating in air.

Word has it that Warner Brothers wanted to pull a Kill Bill in adapting author J.K. Rowling’s nearly 800 page book — making two films and releasing them a few months apart — but director Mike Newell (the first actual Englishman to direct this British-steeped series) felt he would be able to effectively separate the wheat from the chaf. I’m pleased to report that he’s done a marvelous job in juggling the suspense leading up to Voldemort’s return, the introduction of an almost entirely new cast of characters, the exhaustive Triwizard Tournament, and the growing pains of the three angst-addled teens.

Although last year’s installment, The Prisoner of Azkaban (directed by Alfonso Cuarón), was supposed to the be the darkest in the series I daresay Goblet of Fire is darker still — there are some genuine white-knuckle moments, truly chilling images of the Death Eaters, and Voldemort definitely doesn’t disappoint.

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Reviewed by Staci Layne Wilson