Review: Fantastic Beasts & Where To Find Them
After the monstrous success of the books and the films and the merchandise, hearing that J.K. Rowling was returning to the Wizarding World with a trilogy - now upgraded to five films - exploring 1920's Wizardry and chronicling the adventures of famed biologist Newt Scamander, previously only mentioned as part of a Charity Book Rowling wrote many, many years ago. There couldn't help but be a question of whether money or imagination was at hand. With the first in this new series, Fantastic Beasts & Where To Find Them named after Newt's own book, released I can say that there's definitely a story to tell, but I fear it'll only come into play in the later films leaving this one the skippable Incredible Hulk of the HPU.
Set in 1926, the film finds young New Scamander arriving in New York with a delivery for a friend, however he also comes with a case filled with magical creature most unknown and feared by even the magical community. After briefly getting involved with human - or No-Maj which is the American version of Muggle - Jacob Kowalski, the two accidently switch cases and some of the beasts are set loose. Newt and Jacob team up with the reluctant Tina, an ex-Auror turned desk clerk looking to get back to her old job, and her free-spirited sister Queenie to recapture the beasts before either sadistic Auror Percival Graves does or, more frighteningly, the Muggles do.
As it turns out Newt's arrival could not have come at a worse time, the dark wizard Grindelwald has been wreaking havoc trying to ignite a war between Wizards and Muggles. When an Obscurus - a dark force born from a wizard's repression - is rumoured to be on the loose and with ties to Grindelwald, Newt and his friends have to prove that their innocence against a magical creature nobody believes exist and a dark wizard nobody wants to cross.
For the most part the film follows Newt and his team recapturing the creatures that have escaped and reintroduces us to this world but with an American twist and set in a time of hatred and unrest. That in itself would be enough for a single film but there needs to be more to follow on and that's where the Grindelwald plot comes in, perhaps a little too heavily because by the time the film's over there feels like there's a lot more story to tell but none of it is Newt's. I wouldn't even call this a first chapter, it's a prologue to a much bigger story which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it keeps it from being its own thing and the film suffers as a result.
The main characters were good but a lot of the supporting cast felt underwritten, Jon Voight is the biggest offender with his newspaper edition Henry Shaw being nothing more than a background extra who disappears into the third act despite having one of the biggest character scenes of the film. Ron Pearlman is covered in a CGI character but he's playing Goblin Ron Pearlman so i can't complain. And Samantha Morton's witch-hater Mary Barebones was a little too one-dimensional but her adopted son Credence - played by Ezra Miller - was made a much more interesting character due to her treatment of him.
Percival Graves, played by Colin Farrell, did make for a decent villain but he's too sidelined. For as much as Farrell sold the sadism and cold-heartedness of the character, a man willing to bend the rules to achieve his own goals, Graves never played into the film as much as he should've, instead being left to the side in order to focus more on our heroes. It's understandable and there's potential for Graves in the sequels but it feels like a waste of a villain.
Nevertheless, the main four heroes do make an impact, maybe not as much as the trio from the original series but it is early days. Eddie Redmayne makes for a fine Newt, he's the type of guy you'd expect him to be, shy, awkward, possibly autistic or at least some variant, at least that's what I thought with how little he made eye-contact with people, and more in tune with animals than humans. We get that Newt's a loner and that's his thing he's eccentric - perhaps overly so with a ridiculous segment involving s rhino-like creature in heat - but he makes for a nice, upbeat change from Harry 'Everything's Shit' Potter and there's no denying that when he's in his element you can tell he really cares for these creatures and understands them better than anyone.
Katherine Waterston's Tina is a much more straight-laced character though not without her honourable streak. An ex-Auror who was kicked out for using violence against a No-Maj, Tina has been looking for an opportunity to get back into the good graces of her boss and back to what she does best and she sees Newt as that opportunity. What's important to note is that Tina never comes across as backstabbing, just desperate, too desperate in fact to see the bigger picture until it's too late. While this does lead to her helping Newt it also leads to her helping herself, loosening her up and remembering that there's more to life than a career, a fact her sister Queenie - Allison Sudol - knows very well.
Queenie initially comes across as the ditzy blonde but she's a very fun character, blessed with the gift of mind-reading, she's able to have an entire conversation without the other person even speaking. It takes some getting used to but it makes her a great judge of character and opens the film up to some funny exchanges. Where she shines is in how she's completely without fear, fear of being caught, fear of being hurt and without fear of the unknown, despite Jacob being a No-Maj she welcomes him into their world with open arms and puts herself in the firing line to keep him and everyone else safe. i really liked Queenie and I'm hoping to see more of her in the sequels.
Final character - and arguably the actual protagonist of the film - is Jacob Kowalski, played by Dan Fogel. What makes Jacob work is that while he's initially seen as the audience insert to be introduced back into this world, he quickly grows and becomes his own thing when he completely embraces the Wizarding world. The sheer look of amazement and wonder and even at times fear on his face are strong enough to remind you and the same looks you had on your face the first time you saw Harry Potter. Jacob's just a very likeable person, he's humbled but confident enough to fight his own battles, smart but not without his own troubles keeping that intelligence subdued, there's a lot more to Jacob that makes him a great counterpart to Newt as well as a strong character in his own right.
The reunited team of David Yates and J.K. Rowling should be a strong indicator of what to expect and I think Rowling has managed to reinvent her own world as though she never left at all. The similarities are there but the American Twist adds a whole new dimension with the divide between humans and wizards even deeper than in the UK, it was great seeing something familiar from a new angle and made feel fresh again. This was especially true of the creatures, the imagination that went into their design and their mannerisms is astounding work, the moment where you finally see Newt's sanctuary is one of the franchises most jaw-dropping moments.
Yates also delivers on the darker elements of the film, particularly though Credence who is abused by his mother and used by Graves for his own sinister purposes. Even with that the film goes to some dark places with our first proper look at Wizard execution, which is as pleasant as it sounds, and even the film's maguffin, the Obscurus which is a ball of uncontrollable and hateful energy, Harry Potter started fun and got darker, this looks to be starting dark right off the hop, and with Grindelwald waiting in the background that's not a surprise.
Even still, I can't help but think there's a hollowness to this film, and I think it's to do with how the film plays itself out. While the majority of the film is Newt searching for his animals there is a lot of groundwork being paid for what's to come. Too much groundwork in fact and the film comes across as the Iron Man 2 of the HPU where all we learn here is who the characters are and where they'll be when the actual story starts in Part 2. Perhaps calling it skippable is being unfair, there's enough character building and relationship forming to justify future viewing - a cameo appearance at the end seems to hold a lot of significance - but it doesn't feel like a film to watch on its own, it never feels like it's own beast which leaves a lot of the film feeling half-baked even with the promise of more to come.
Fantastic Beasts is a fine reintroduction to Harry Potter and fans will find a lot to like about it, I doubt it'll win over new fans but for the long time followers the chance to return is too good to pass up. Even with the story issues the new characters make a good impact and Rowling pumps fresh blood into her franchise with the American setting. It'll be interesting to see where it comes from here but if the rumours are true we'll in for an interesting ride.
7/10