Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

The sixth film of the series. The war has started. A bridge comes down in London and the ministry can no longer deny what is happening. Dumbledore takes Harry with him. They go to bring a retired teacher back to the school; Slughorn holds a memory and that memory has been altered. From there the film runs on two lines. On one, Harry's effort to get the memory out of Slughorn and a past that unfolds through it; on the other, Draco secretly repairing something at the school. Harry finds a potions book. There are notes in the margins and the notes are better than the recipes; the owner gave himself a name. What the narrative is interested in is not evil but formation: the memories at its centre show how a boy became what he is, and do it with ordinary scenes. The Draco line is the best written subplot in the series. The character is not a villain but a boy forced into something he cannot do. The adolescence at school carries the humour and balances the tone. The last part takes place in a cave and on a tower. The cave is one of the darkest sequences in the series. The image is almost colourless. The director deliberately lowered the saturation and the film carries a grey texture. The account of the past in the book was heavily shortened, which is the adaptation's most criticised feature. The film was nominated for an Academy Award for cinematography. Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson, Michael Gambon, Alan Rickman, Jim Broadbent and Tom Felton are in the cast. David Yates directed. Who it is for: anyone following the series. Who it is not for: anyone expecting the book; the film's most important information is passed over very quickly compared with the text.