Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1

We’re almost there.  Just a little further and we’ll be done.  One more movie after this one, due to be released next summer, and that’s it.  The deluxe DVD/Blu-Ray box set in the shape of Hogwarts, that opens and unfolds like moving staircases, will be released around this time next year, perfectly coinciding with the holiday season.  No sympathy for the people who bought the “Years 1-5” or the “Years 1-6” set, because they should have known better.  We all knew it was coming.  The final swing of the wand.  The last catch of the snitch.  The ultimate Ron Weasley gormless face pull.  The end.  Almost.

Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps

In some ways, I appreciate Oliver Stone’s turn from a confrontational rabble-rouser to a softer, more contemplative political director.  Not to say he’s terribly successful at the latter, but there’s something admirable in his ability not to turn his George W. Bush biopic into a polemic, and likewise in his Wall Street sequel to not go after banks and trading companies all-guns-blazing.  It’s as though he’s living out that old cliché of the once-raging lefty who gets worn down by time until he looks at the younger ‘rebels’ and smiles with knowing affection at their gumption and vigor, but knows somewhere inside knows it’s a fools game.  Unfortunately it hasn’t made him a very interesting director, and Wall Street: Money Never Sleep’s problems stem from an unfocused, unsure desire to be a decidedly populist yarn about conventional family issues and doing the ‘right’ (in a very broad, centrist way) thing.  I won’t take issue with the movie that could have been, because that’s not what’s here.  I think a gritty drama about money, greed, corporate desperation, and backroom dealings at The Fed could be interesting, but alas, that film has not been made yet.

Predators and Killers

John McTiernan’s tight, sparse and commendably pure Predator still stands as one of the finer action achievements of the 1980s, and though it has been sullied by a grim sequel borne out of the Jason Takes Manhattan mode and a pair of cinematic abortions that shall not be mentioned by title here, the simple concept still has allure.  For those living under a rock, it is basically a sci-fi Most Dangerous Game, with honour-bound but ruthless dreadlocked aliens hunting humanity’s finest killers.  While the original was happy for our heroes to tangle with a singular beast, Nimrod Antal’s Predators takes a cue from the Alien franchise by pluralizing both the title as well as the number of predators.