The Crimes of Grindelwald Film Review

/

Went to see “Fantastic Beasts the Crimes of Grindelwald”. I really enjoyed the first Fantastic Beasts film. That was a lovely film with lots of invention, whimsical creatures and engaging characters. So, when the sequel came a long we decided to go and see it without thinking.

That won’t happen again. I guess the first movie in a series is designed to hook you in. Then the second one has to set up a whole bunch of plot lines that you know are going to run until the very end of the movie sequence, and probably beyond that if the takings go well. What I liked about the first film was that there wasn’t too much of the turgid stuff that weighed down the last few Harry Potter films. This one had the lot though. Including:

  • A “chosen one”

  • An “avenge the death of my father” speech

  • A blood pact between sworn rivals

  • A marginal person who is introduced, bigged up with a dark secret and then killed off just to give everyone something to be depressed about

  • Brothers who fall out and then fall in again

  • A goody that everyone knows is a baddy right from the start

  • A baddy who nobody seems to be able to kill

  • A goody who has turned into a baddy so that they can turn back into a goody in film number four

  • A sneaking into a library/bank/whatever sequence to find out something crucially important that I can’t bring myself to care about

  • Folks waving wands at each other and sparks jumping about

I don’t really think that any of the above counts as spoilers. I suppose in our hearts we were hoping for something more. It was all stuff we’d seen before, in a slightly different order and by less familiar characters. And there was so much potential for whimsical invention and new directions in the first film. By the end I was just waiting for it to end, wondering what “crimes” I was seeing and coming to the unhappy conclusion that I might be the victim of one.

If you like Harry Potter, particularly the final depressing films, you’ll be fine. If you’ve been there and done that, you might like to ponder whether you want to do it again before going and seeing this film.