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Youth lit’s favorite teen wizard is a lean, mean, wand-wielding machine in “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.” A mightily scaled-down screen version of J.K.
Rowling’s mammoth fifth novel about orphaned wizard Harry, “Order of the Phoenix” will upset some fans with its excising of characters and storylines. Yet the “Potter” films have always struggled with their allegiance to the books. What “Order of the Phoenix” realizes is that a battle between good and evil is looming, and there’s no time to waste.
Harry can mope all he wants in print, but he’s on a mission here. While it takes nearly a quarter of the book to return Harry to Hogwarts School of Wizardry and Witchcraft, the film gets him there in a few broad strokes. Screenwriter Michael Goldenberg, in his first “Potter” outing, intuits that there’s no real suspense involved in the early plotline about whether Harry (Daniel Radcliffe) will be expelled from Hogwarts, so he streamlines that.
There would be no books if Harry weren’t at Hogwarts. Goldenberg makes short shrift of Harry’s stay at the home of his godfather, Sirius Black (Gary Oldman), and his introduction to the Order of the Phoenix — a group of witches and wizards preparing to fight evil Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes) when he makes a move to regain power. Instead, Harry quickly falls into his fifth year at Hogwarts, though it’s not the refuge for which he’d hoped.
The Ministry of Magic has done a thorough job of discrediting the claims by Harry and Hogwarts headmaster Albus Dumbledore (Michael Gambon) that Voldemort has returned, and Harry is the target of much gossip. The new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Dolores Umbridge (Imelda Staunton), is a Ministry of Magic official whose not-so-secret motive is to find a way to oust Dumbledore. She’s so married to the party line that the Dark Lord has not come back that she refuses to teach the students anything useful.
Realizing how vulnerable they are, Hermione (Emma Watson) and Ron (Rupert Grint) talk best friend Harry into secretly teaching a group of schoolmates some of the lessons he’s learned in his past encounters with Voldemort and his minions. Meanwhile, Umbridge issues one decree after another cementing her position and making life at Hogwarts unbearable. The liberties taken by Goldenberg and director David Yates make the film more nimble and focused than its predecessors.
At 138 minutes, it’s the shortest of the series, and it feels even shorter than it is. The movie obviously doesn’t preserve all the nuances of the book, and it reassigns, condenses and otherwise alters many of the events. But it hits the main notes of action and emotion while it tosses overboard most of the whininess and redundancy.
There’s real feeling in Harry’s sense of aloneness, his bond with Sirius and his distance from Dumbledore. His friendships with Ron and Hermione grow stronger, while his fledgling relationships with Cho (Katie Leung) and Luna Lovegood (Evanna Lynch) show his growing maturity. Radcliffe, Watson and Grint are still erratic, though they seem at ease with each other.
The adults in the cast balance things out. Staunton makes a perfect Umbridge, down to her overplayed sniffs. Alan Rickman registers strongly in his few moments as Snape.
Oldman is an endearing father figure. The special effects are mostly seamless and play to humor as well as intensity. But make no mistake: “Order of the Phoenix” steers Harry down a dark road.
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