Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - Review

Just rented this movie on dvd today. I completely agree with the reviewer. I read all of the books and enjoyed them. Watching this movie was painful. I constantly was wondering how in the hell anyone who has never read the could possibly follow what was going on!
This movie sucks on its own. And it has so much important things from the books left out that it sucks for the people who have read the book. So it finishes short from every perspective.

How could a director not see this?? I'm not a professional, I don't know jackcrap about movie making. But I sure can tell when a movie sucks, which this one does.

Like I said, I really enjoyed reading the books. I'm biased towards wanting to like the movies as well. Even with that said, this movie is worst than a Cruciatus Curse I'm sure.

To all those calling others "nitpickers" :

1: They missed PLENTY of key points in this movie. I've seen numerous idiots posts, stating that the key points from the books were shown.....hang yourself for being so moronic.

2: If they left out the dumb shit that made no contribution (that they made up themselves), there would have been plenty of time left to fit in the main points (hell...even the main plot would have been nice).

3: Where the hell was Lily in Snape's memory scene?

4: Some of these "minor: things that are left out are ESSENTIAL backstory for important scenes in the next 2 films. Which basically means either people will be very confused when that time comes, or more likely, more things will be left out.

5: As a film student, I have learned a lot about contracts and movie rights. JKR has no rights to the movies. She gave up those rights as soon as she signed that contract (and she did). Also, she is not aloud to publicly complain about her work being ripped apart. It's all part of the normal deal authors get when their books become film.

Excellent, excellent post, Bob. You've said it perfectly.

"Hopefully, people will take this to account and find another actor for the sixth and seventh movie."

I'm guessing you meant "director", Patty. The HP movies have many different directors, but the actors are here to stay.

You are so very very right. My friends thought I was being annoying and overreacting when i complained about the movie, using similar complaints as yours. We need more people like you to critique the reality of this movie. It was a dissapointment to me because it did not follow the book's plot, making things up on the way and leaving out very important things. and it was very poorly made as well. The book was amazing and they could've done a much better job at making a movie based on it. And it indeed was a shame because they had very talented actors and they werent used to the best of their ability.

This movie just doesn't compare to the other movies. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix just wasn't epic like the others.

Hopefully, people will take this to account and find another actor for the sixth and seventh movie.

These books, if you haven't noticed are called Harry Potter and the (fill in the blank). They follow his life and his thoughts. So why in the H*** would the movie focus on anyone else. DUH!!! It has got to be hard enough to condence a 766 page UK adult version and a 870 page USA version down to 2 hours and 18 minutes, and that's not to mention they have to portray his thoughts on screen, because unlike the books, we are not in Harry's head during the movie.

That said, I loved the movie. It is my favorite, but PoA is my second favorite and a lot of people think I am weird for that. I think the screenwriter and the director did a great job of trying to fit the main plots in. For every plot line they try to squeeze in they have to give background on that plot. Which adds time. If they add this plot line then this other plot line that they left out needs now, to be included because they intertwine. Which may push the movie to 4 hours. So they have to tweak the original plot to make up for the lost plot line.

The three things that bothered me about the movie are items that would have only required minor tweaking. For example the reason why Harry is angry with Ron and Hermione. All that would have taken is a scene with Hedwig and Harry telling Hedwig not to come back without long replies and saying that he is sick of no news. The second one is the the Christmas holidays where Harry is distancing himself from the others. I thought this was one of the best parts of the book. Especially showing Ginny talking about being possessed. But this is not crucial to the plot, so I will live with this. The third item is with Dumbledore explaing the Prophecy. This could have been eisily remidied by Harry not hearing it in the DoM and Lucius still breaking the Prophecy. And they could have still had the Dumbledore-Harry talk and that would have only added a few minutes.

But, even with all the haters out there the movie as of today(10-21-2007) has grossed over $936.33 Million dollars becoming the number six(6) all-time worldwide movie.

Not to mention Dan, Emma, and Rupert were fantastic. Dan especially has come in to his own. And Emma is just plain hot!

Let me tell you something I'm a huge Harry Potter fan and I love the first four movies I really enjoyed this one since I saw it at midnight with my buds I love every moment of it except for the scary parts. I love the battle and I love how Dan, Emma, and Rupert has really come along as the three main characters and I even loved Luna Lovegood, she was just plain freaking awesome.

Those who are disappointed in the film might as well get over any dreams they have of Peter Jackson taking over HP, because it ain't gonna happen. Rowling is perfectly happy with the series and she has every reason to be. She's certainly not going to give movie rights over to anyone else and I wouldn't want her to. If the author's happy with the product, that's it.

First of all, I'm a huge Harry Potter fan = fan of the books. The first four movies were decent, not fantastic though, as they stuck to the books rather closely, and only left stuff out here and there because a movie can't last five hours.

But after coming out of the movie theatre after seein order of the phoenix, I felt angry, disappointed and insulted as a HP fan.

Everyone with a positive opinion on this movie is wrong. Normally I'd like an open discussion, but in this case the movie is just a massacred version of the book. The main reason for it being a piece of trash is the script. I would really like to write the script for half-blood prince myself, to save that movie at least.

The script cuts many chapters, which is fine: you can't have too long movies. No comment on that. But the script ADDS so much it has to leave out more of the real book. I honestly don't get why there was need to change (and mutilate) the story. All the additions and changes that made the movie untruthful to the book are the reason it sucked. Normally I'm never this straightforward but David Yates should be taken off the HP series.

Of course the movie fans will say: "Great special effects! Great sound! Great acting!" I agree completely with the first two, except the acting. The adults are mostly OK (Snape's performance is the best) but the teenagers...... It's like they're rehearsing a drama exam and have to look at each other to remember their lines. When they're not speaking they mostly just stand about, looking at the speaker, out of character .... Or perhaps they just didn't have time to do more cuts as that would cost too much, making the movie a lesser profit.

And let's all remember: good sound and special effects by itself don't qualify for a good movie. Add a good story (= the book itself, no changes, but perhaps many cuts) and you've got a blockbuster. Good example : The Matrix (the first one of course!)

There I think I made my point. I really hope Peter Jackson will read the Harry Potter series and make seven films of four hours each.

I thought it was a very well directed movie. There were lots of things that I was excited they put in. I was a little disapointed that there wasn't Quidditch but hey Half-Blood Prince they must put it in that movie. And the mirror that Sirius was supposed to give Harry, I was a little disapointed in that too, but they could put that in the 6th movie. And Ron and Hermione being prefects wasn't in there, but again 6th movie. The little things they didn't put in too, like in the fighting scenes, I think were ok not to put in but I wished I could've seen Harry tell off Malfoy.

Well this movie had its mistakes and its great moments.I want to say it was a bit shorter than what i expected
and i am super furius they didnt include the Scene at quidditch there was a important scene there harry gets banned
from playing anymore quidditch also they forgot to mention that Ron is now a part of the quidditch team and that harry
looses his broom well actually it gets confiscated,but if they would have put this scene people will understand why they
had to ride on those horses with wings in methology they will be pegasus.also i want to tell why they flew with the brooms at the begining it is probably the same thing as the Nightbus in hp3 and remember how they go thrue platform 3/4 they are right infront of all those people and they dont notice at all maybe is the same when they fly at NIGHT!!!! AND THEY FLY FAST in this movie.The reason why i just said that, was beacause i have been hearing people say why those he get to fly on a broom over london when he gets expelled from school for using magic .maybe the explanation i wrote before will help you understand. Moving on i must say wow!! those fights at the end of the movie way cool cmon death eaters vs D.A/and the order of the phoenix wow i liked the ninja wand fighting style pretty cool huh.oh but how can i forget
the best for last Dumbledore vs voldemort wow just like i imagined well...maybe even better.well last but not least i must say harry great job on using the cruciatus curse on bellatrix lol the ***** deserverd it hahahah.Oh and what ever happen to dobby the house elf he was suppose to appear in this fifth movie he is going to play a major role in the deathly hollows movie . they should have at least mentioned him in this movie cmon is going to be pretty weird seing dobby helping harry in the last movie when they havent talked since the 2nd movie cmon. Besides dobby has to grow as a character,during the books harry talks to dobby as a free elf he also works at cleaning hogwarts room of requirements aka D.A hide out.they should have at least shown him four a couple of minutes in the movie.

I WANT TO BEGIN WITH WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU GUYS!!!!
i agree with some here you cant expect the director to put every last page in the book to
a movie,the movie was a success yes maybe the movie will leave you wanting more
but wth the directors tried to fit everything they could call relevant. I read the 5th book let me tell you
the whole book was great from beginning to end it was a master piece,with that been said i came to the premire
that day with my friends, expecting the same master piece i read in the book to be all in the movie ''all'' i mean all.
this is because the directors could not take anything of because everything was perfect i thought it will be a replica of the book i watched the movie and i was a bit upset because i expected the movie to have all the sceanes but later
i asked my self wait but everything relevant was there maybe the directors thought that with that it will be enough. i am
satasfied with this movie cause of that but if you think back to the movie all the great scenes of the book are there.
You have to remember the books are getting darker with that darknest comming is making the movies more mature and definely more moody. people were very angry because these scenes are missing:1st the quidditch match were harry fights malfoy and cause of this an effect comes to place, his broom gets confiscated. is this neccesary i mean cmon we have had way too many fights with malfoy in the potter films whats the diffrence now and we have seen quidditch way too much cmon,we all know that umbridge is an evil evil witch that needs to be thought a lesson thats what the whole quidditch thing was about,prooving who malfoy really is and how umbridge is evil.i heard some people say how kids are flerting in this movies and how it those not go with the plot of this movie,SO WHAT!!!!! this shows they are growing up and they are getting very mature.One last thing jk rowling those not have a say between what the script of the movie is going to be, she lends them a book to the director,he reads it, takes all the crap out gets all the juice thats all jk can only watch how they make it and tell them if it fits with her books,the end she has to respect the directors choices.in my opinion every movie has been better than the next two thums up hp order of the phoenix.

I just wonder how they’re going to recover from the missing information in the seventh movie. For example Mundungus Fletcher if I recall was not in this movie. He was the one responsible for watching Harry at the beginning of OOTP. He’s important to the plot in the seventh movie because it was his cowardice that got mad eye moody killed I wonder what’s going to happen with that. And they left out the part about the mirror Sirius gave to Harry which leads them to be saved out of the Malfoy dungeon by Dobby… I know they cant put everything into the movie but these parts are important to the rest of the series and just to put in whatever they feel like just ruins the entire thing.

I liked this film, and so does J.K Rowling. Jo made it specific in her contract with warnerborthers that she has to have the final word on the script in order for the rest of the films make sense and the continuity is kept intact. If this is what she left for the filmakers to make then so be it I have no complaints. In all this film did feel more scentered around Harry, which is easy to understand why, but it did need some inbetween areas, bridges so as to have a break from the usual pace of the film. I wouldnt have minded seeing them going through the stages of cleaning grimauld place and emphasize more the danger and incredulous situation of harry's expulsion which reflects the position and corruption that is taking place within the ministry of magic. This scene could also incorporate Kreacher and up his importance which will be more prominate in the upcoming films. ALso I wouldnt have minded to have seen more of the comraderie that is present during the hogsmeade weekends, like harry's date with CHo. This scene alone would serve as that junction and break within the movie for some much needed light heartedness that can be compared with the presence of the Yule Ball in the goblet of fire.

With one last thought in mind, If they went to the trouble of introducing Kreacher to the movie they should have had thats scene where Kreacher lies to Harry about Sirius being captured.


In all I was satisfied with the movie and have seen it three times.
Too all who did not like it is a movie based on a 800 page book. Even J.K Rowling admited to have wanted to edit and condense the 5th book . So dont take it to heart and cry bloody murder for not having it the way you wanted, because the majority who I have talked to never read the books but loved this movie the most out of the others.

oh please! to all the people who keep saying that such a long book would have made a 5-6 hours long film.

we are upset about a million things apart from what got cut off. its the lousiest cut and paste job ever by the way.

I am more upset about the scenes that finally did make it.

A shreiking, scared near nervous breakdown reaction has been altered to some calm clipped sentence taking more time than the original one which lent the right amount of weightage and credibility to the event. Where is teh question of time in this?

For example, uncle vernon on lesser occasions has been spitting fire and here he says some lukewarm shit when finally dudleydums is 'attacked ' by harry!! In teh book you get the moment of crisis so well as vernon hollers and howls and so does petunia. It would have taken teh same time if you cut vernons hisses and replace them with the adequate fury required. This way all yates has done is to kill the crises, kill the suspense, the drama that was the throbbing, pulsating rythm of the story of OOTP.

c'mon yates..are you trying to like add your own brand of sophistication on some crude village drama?


As harry potter readers and as movie goers(!!) both we are damn pissed. I mean c'mon. Even if you look at it purely as a film it was terrible. totally bland, missing connections, missing emotion when you had every tool in hand. YOu bloody doing it for the richest guys in teh business- the warner bros. SO whats yuor excuse? YOu trying to save some money?

There were no highs, no reactions, it was just some trite nonsense. It was like taking the book, picking out easy to do sequences, stamping it with the harry potter franchise seal and dishing it out to unsuspecting people.

And the worst part is that they earned money, loads of it coz riding on the HP wave everybody goes for a first look. love it hate it, we all went to watch it and that sent the cash register ringing for 'em guys.

Its not fair to do this to one of the best HP books! I am so sure he f@#$*&% didnt read the book. Damn it i know he didnt. Not as a reader and thats what you got to do if you are making a film from a book. YOu got to READ it. You got to think what got the reader hooked. What made it special for the READER.


What the F#$% was Yates trying to do???! out do Jo rolling? Why the F*&^ should we then buy her books and read em a million times over if we have this genius come piss over the whole thing and charge us money to see it??


And rolling deciding to go along with this crap adaptation of the book is just too painful fpr me to delve in to right now. I would never allow anyone to butcher a story like this if it reflecetd on my intellectual abilities.. but then i guess i dont know the whole story or her exact position on this.

I completely agree about the movies; they leave sense at the door to please HP book fans. There are unexplainable things, but the books shouldn't be at fault. A film should be able to transfer a book and still make sense.
For example
In the movie, they have to fly on thestrals for no reason. (instead of brooms) In the book, Harry has him broom locked up b/c of a quidditch ban from Umbridge (for fighting Malfoy at the last match), and the rest of the crew doesn't have any brooms.

Secondly, and this drives me crazy, HRH go into the fire, get dragged out, and Neville, Luna, and Ginny randomly come in caught with no explanation of the fact that they were supposed to be keeping watch. They're just there.

okay seriously you cant include everything in the film. and it was still enjoyable, if you want to bicker that everything should be included the movie would be over 5 hours long. JK Rowling herself said she loved it, and it is her book so if she likes it who are we to differ. As well the third movie cut out a lot of parts and changed the sequence of events. And when you look at any movie that was once a book there a tons of things changed.

I liked the movie cause I know from watching other films you cant expect everything in the film, what you want in it isnt what always is in it. And honestly you cant blame the director he didnt make the script someone else did and JK Rowling had to approve it. As well the little things were amazing, like the looks Ginny gave when Harry is with Cho. And to those comments that the film centered on Harry, the whole series of books centers on Harry, with little side stories of Ron and Hermoine.

Ok, where to begin - Love the books, but this film was huge dissappointment. I took my mum (laugh it up) and she was lost completely as she hasn't read them. I struggled to begin with - the first 15 mins of acting was shocking!!

Scenes had no meat to them, plot was all over the place. Kreacher was a waste of time, confused about why they felt the need to have Cho informing Umbridge (but forgave them later).

And that fight scene with Dumbledore and Voldemort was shocking. In the books, it's graceful, each casting spells, altering them and in a way feeling similar to a sword-fight - The fight scene shown had nothing to the glamour it had in the book!

Bonus - Its the 5th film!! Umbridge was unbelievable!! Best acting in the film imo!! the storyline progressed.

Ramble over with!!

well, i thought the book was way better than the movie... i was soo excited to see.. once i saw the beggining i knew it was gonna be lozy.. but at the same time i was good. i think they cou;d've done better.
but i can't wait for the next movie.

this movie was a bit bad.
even my mum says so :P

I agree with the review the movie is a dissapointing mess of a good book. The acting is ok but the film is terrible. Lets hope david yates & matt goldenberg dont get to do the final 2 films.

Seems I watched a completly different film to some here.....
I really enjoyed the film and felt that stuff that was left out was not essential to the plot line..it such a large book that it needs to be condensed only to the things that are key to the plot line...yes some things were changed as some things work better in a book than on the screen. The one thing i like about the harry potter films is the fact JKrowling is always very involved in changes they do as she doesnt want the underlaying and important themes to be changed. I didn't find the scence cuts confusing....it is often left for your imagintion and intellegence to work out the bits inbtween...like most films. You will remebr from earlier books there is a reason why they cant fly on brooms....and they flew on the horse creatures as luna was friends with them. Also the reason why Ron and hermione are glancing at each ther is because in the book they are getting feeling for each oither...which is why they fight...the directers can show there feelings but a glace is quicker to show that lots of arguments.....as the Ron and hermione thing is a side plot and not key to the story in the film
The directers do rely on you remembering details from previous films as this is part of a series. They struggle enough to fit content into 2+hours that they dont really have time to explain every detail. Id advise the people who say it suked to actually reread all the ahrry potter books 1-5 and watch all previous films again..the rewatch this film.

The special effects were great, some great acting and a directer who did well to potray the very darkness of the film but still allowing a little humour to come through. A great entertaining film!

5 stars!

gus, i dont thing any of us hoped that the movie would be exactly like the book. we all knew that certaing scenes had to be cut. however, i have to say that the movie was not very good because hello, there where no transititions. no explanations. like, when the members of the da go to the ministry, absolutely no explanation of how they get the thestrals. no explanation as to how they knew which direction to go. when they actually get there, in one shot, u see them flying, and in the next, them running down the atrium inside. they could have at least shown them getting out of the telephone booth.

those were just some examples of the minor thing that bugged me.

STUFF THAT REALLY TICKED ME OFF:

THE TALK WITH DUMBLEDORE; way too short, gave absolutely no explanation at all!!!!!!!! that scene in ootp with the whole talk with dumbledore is one of the most important, influential, and imformative scenes in the entire series, and yet they barely included it!!!!

THE PROPHECY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
as all harry potter fans know, harry potter would have never had all these experiences if it werent for the prophecy; that prophecy is possibly the single most important object (or would u call it an idea?) the entire series. and yet, in the movie, THEY FAIL TO INCLUDE THE ENTIRE PROPHECY!!!!! WTF

thank you for your time, gus. (sarcasm on this last line)

oh and by the way, i thought all the actors have improved. filch was awesome. the lady who plays umbridge was superb. alan rickman as snape, maggie smith as mcgonagal, gary whatever as sirius. ralph fineis or however u spell it as lord voldemort. absolutely fabulous older cast.

the younger cast is also good. radcliffe has really expanded his abilities. grint has definitely improved on making things look natural. watson in particular has improved, though the scene where she says something like "and if umbridge refuses to teach us herself..." as she looks into the fire is downright painful to watch, its so fake.

BUT- most of all, my FAVORITE actor in the entire movie is definitely evanna lych as Luna Lovegood. OH MY GOD (yes i did actually just spell it out) she has EXACTLY the same manerism as i imagined luna to have ( though evanna is a lot prettier than i imagined luna) and her voice fits the part PERFECTLY!!!

P.S.- my fav part of the movie is the montage or whatever u call it, the montage about the DA with the superb, yet not overpoweringly-John-Williams-ish music and all of the added Filch parts!!!

Harry Potter books are not that hard to understand, however, you may need to think when you read them.
People who have not read them should not expect film makers to be able to fit in every single detail into a 2 hour movie. I know that most Harry Potter fans would be willing to sit through a 4 hour movie if every detail was added into it, but sadly, most people have short attention spans.
It would be appreciated if movie critcs would not complain about a plot they know nothing about if the have not taken the energy to understand it.

I think you people are nitpicking way too much. Did you really expect the movie to be exactly like the book? The important thing is that the major story points are touched on and I think they did that with this movie. Who cares if that Nigel kid replaced the Creeveys in the movie. Does it really matter?

The movies will never come anywhere near the books. There is just way too much for them to cram all of it into a film and expect it to be easy to follow. I think this movie came the closest to actually recognizing the story that needed to be told.

Things had to be cut out. Substitutions had to be made. Thats just the way it goes. Try and look past that and you will realize that the things that were changed were inconsequential compared to what was left in and done well. Order of the Phoenix has turned out to be the best of the movies.

i like the movie but it's disappointing at the same time... there are many scenes that has been cut and worse was they made a lot of changes... Order of the Phoenix was a great story enough that they shouldn't made many changes on it... my boyfriend who read the book many times expected to see what he supposed to see on the movie but it turned out a mess to him... haaayyysss.... quite disappointing ayt?