Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

When we last saw Harry Potter, at the end of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, he had just survived another assault by Lord Voldermort, the Osama bin Laden of J.K. Rowling's wizarding world. His friend Cedric had just been murdered before his eyes. Harry Potter barely escaped with his life.

At the beginning of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, things are just getting more grim for the boy wizard. The Ministry of Magic, the governing bureaucracy of the wizarding world, has decided to deal with the return of its greatest enemy by denying that Voldemort had returned. That means labeling Harry Potter, as well as his mentor Professor Dumbledore, as liars and frauds.

But it gets worse. The Ministry of Magic has sent one of its functionaries, Dolores Umbridge, to investigate and clean up Hogwarts School. Umbridge is a real piece of work, a toad like being with an obsession for pink outfits. She has a nervous giggle and a demeanor that seems to indicate madness just below the surface. And sometimes not just below.

And it gets still worse. There is a psychic link between Harry Potter and Voldemort. The psychic link fills Harry Potters sleeping hours with nightmares. And if Lord Voldemort were to ever discover the existence of this link, Harry Potter will be lost.

It is no wonder that Harry Potter is angry, frustrated, and afraid.

But Harry Potter has some advantages that Voldermort and all of his minions, rightly named Deatheaters, could never have. The love and loyalty of friends, not the least of whom are the ever more buff and ever goofy Ron and the every more beautiful and always brainy Hermione, serves Harry Potter in good stead.

Whether it is training "Dumbledore's Army" in defense against the dark arts when Umbridge forbids it or whether it is conducting a do or die raid on the Ministry of Magic's Hall of Mysteries, Harry Potter can rely most of all on his friends, as well as adults like Dumbledore and Sirius Black, the fugitive from the wizarding prison at Azkaban and the only person that Harry Potter has left than can be called family.

The film version of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is as rich a story as the book, despite the necessity of cutting down a huge story to fit a two hour and twenty minute film. It is filled with love, lost, betrayal, triumph, and danger.

One slight word of warning. Despite being based on a book that it said to be written for children, some scenes in the film may be too intense for younger children. But for those old enough to enjoy it, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is a feast for the eyes and the best Harry Potter film yet.