It feels as though the Potterheads have been waiting years
for this movie (myself included) so its safe to say the anticipation for us has been incredibly high. That being said, lets not delay this review any
longer.
In 1926, Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne), a young Magizoologist, arrives in New
York City for the first time, carrying with him a briefcase containing a
menagerie of magical creatures that he cares for. Unfortunately, Mr Scamander
could not have chosen a worse time to arrive in New York: the city is being
plagued by an undetermined creature whose powers are beyond any the magical
community have seen. Fearing a widespread panic leading to war between Wizards
and No-Mages (the American term for ‘Muggles’), the MACUSA (The Magical
Congress of the United States of America) begin a hunt for the creature, lead
by Percival Graves (Colin Farrell). When some of Scamander’s creatures
accidentally escape during an altercation with ‘No-Maj’ Jacob Kowalski (Dan
Fogler), Porpentina ‘Tina’ Goldstein (an ex-auror played by Catherine
Waterston) believes that Scamander might be behind it all, and becomes
determined to bring him in and prove her worth to her superiors. Joined by her sister Queenie (Alison Sudol) the group must band together and take back the city before its too late.
The positives: The acting in this film has to be one of the
main standouts. Eddie Redmaynes’ Scamander manages to be both awkward and
sufficiently charming enough to immediately begin liking him, and its clear
that Redmayne had fun playing this character because it translates to the
screen. But the best moments have to be those between Scamander and Jacob.
Their chemistry and personalities balance each other out well, and becomes the
tale of unlikely friendship by happenstance. This is especially entertaining as
it’s the first time we’ve seen proper wizard/muggle interaction that wasn’t
negative (after all that time we spent with the Dursleys), but rather get a
glimpse at how muggle/wizard communities interact, which for diehard fans will
be something to look forward to. Also, Farrell’s
Percival Graves was another standout whose character really shone in the (relatively few) scenes he was in. The visuals in this film were also stunning, bringing to life
creatures that could only exist in imagination in all shapes and sizes. In
short, its one of those epic films that continuously catches your eye and also
makes you hope that the merch for this film includes plushies because damn, some
of those creatures are really cute!
The negatives: As much as I enjoyed this film, it’s
a classic case of a film that cannot make up its mind. As always tends to be
the case in Hollywood, the pacing in this film tends to be a let down, as well
as the ways that different sections of the story connect to each other. In some
points the film seems to be leading one way, only to suddenly take a turn into
something completely different. While there are moments where you are able to
catch up, I felt that the film seemed somewhat haphazardly pieced together,
meaning that too much time was spent in some parts and not enough in others and
that ultimately it threw off the flow of the film. Because of this, some of the
characters were not given enough time to be properly introduced, the most
noteworthy being Tina. Her motivations seem sketchy and don’t really become
clear until much later, which leaves the audience questioning her actions
rather than jumping on board with her character which is a bit of a let down.
In most films these would be only minor flaws, but because this film is such a money-maker,
its disappointing to see that more care and effort wasn’t taken in teasing out
these aspects. It’s understandable that this is just a setup film for what
looks to be a very long running franchise, but that doesn’t excuse the need for
coherence just because there is an assumption of a guaranteed audience.
All in all, this film is definitely going to be a good time for families and
fans of the Harry Potter universe. Its got great characters, entertaining
creatures and above all, a new setting and new rules for the audience to
discover. Although it was enjoyable, it was definitely in need of
readjustments, either in the scriptwriting or editing stage, which would’ve
dealt with many of the issues described above. On the whole the film
was entertaining and certainly going to get audiences excited for the rest of
the franchise, which will hopefully only keep getting better from here!
