13 Thoughts While Re-Watching “Deathly Hallows – Part 1”

We have finally reached the penultimate film in our Harry Potter re-watch. If you missed any of the re-watch reaction posts, you can find them here: SS, CoS, PoA, GoF, OotP, and HBP.

Welcome to Harry Potter and the Year He Skipped School to Go Camping! This film has so many fantastic moments! We finally get to see the golden trio outside of Hogwarts. It is is a lot more emotional than I remembered. There were a few things missing, but overall, I am very happy with this one. If a movie can make you cry every time you watch it, then it is doing something right.

1. Hermione’s Parents

This scene was painful to watch. It was absolutely heartbreaking to see Hermione disappearing from all of the family photos. I can’t imagine being strong enough to wipe my parents’ memories of me.

2. Dursleys Leaving

I am still upset that we did not get to see this in the movie. These scenes were released with the DVD, but I really wish that they had made it into the movie itself. This is the only time that we really see the Dursleys humanized, and it was cut.

3. Voldemort

Voldemort oozed power every time he appeared on the screen. Ralph Fiennes did a superb job portraying Voldemort in the series. He was extremely creepy in this film, and it was great. This is why Fiennes is my favorite Voldemort out of the five.

4. The Malfoys

Lucius looks amazing in this film. He is unshaven and disheveled the entire time, and it is fantastic. Dear ol’ Lucius is one of my favorite characters, and I am excited to get a chance to see another side of this aristocratic pure-blood. He has finally realized that his association with Voldemort has gotten his family onto some very thin ice. Now he has to do everything he can to keep them alive.

Draco had a very rough year. He stayed at Malfoy Manor instead of going back to Hogwarts. Taking a year off might sound nice, but it was no camping trip. He was forced to live with his lovely aunt Bellatrix, Voldemort dropped by whenever he felt like it, and his albino peacocks went missing. Stay in school, kids! You don’t want Lord Voldemort showing up at your front door.

Narcissa is the woman I want to be when I grow up. She is strong, powerful, and willing to do whatever it takes to protect her son. Imagine what she has to put up with on a daily basis. Her sister is crazy and keeps torturing people, her son was forced to drop out of school, her husband stopped grooming himself, and the Dark Lord keeps inviting himself over with his merry band of Death Eaters.

5. Cupboard Revisited

Harry’s cupboard visit only lasted a few seconds, but it was the most important scene in the movie. It shows how far he has come and how much he has grown over the past few years. He is no longer just Harry from the cupboard under the stairs. He is leaving his childhood behind to go fight in a war that he isn’t sure he’ll survive.

6. Harry Potter and the Six Impersonators

Daniel Radcliffe is an amazing actor, and it shows through the way that he played six different characters trying to play Harry Potter. He plays everyone perfectly, and I especially love his impersonation of Hermione. I have always been a huge fan of this scene. I love the symmetry of Harry leaving 4 Privet Drive the same way he first arrived there.

7. Awkward Remadora

I have very strong feelings about the movie portrayal of the Remus and Tonks relationship. I talked about this in the previous re-watch article, and I’m going to talk about it again here. They have no chemistry in the movies. It feels like they were just randomly thrown together. Their marriage was just thrown in there by Tonks calling Remus her husband. We never even find out that she is pregnant because Mad-Eye interrupted her. I don’t understand why they did this to such an interesting relationship.

8. Hedwig

Hedwig’s death was just too much. I understand that it was written to further emphasize the end of Harry’s childhood, but it is still horrible. I did love the change that they made in the movie, though. Instead of dying in her cage she got to die by heroically protecting Harry.

9. Snape is a Monty Python Fan?

I bet that Snape had a fun time watching Harry jump into a frozen pond to get the sword. He probably thought about how he could get the sword to Harry and then remembered the last movie he watched. “How am I going to mess with Potter today? I know! I’ll have him pretend to be King Arthur.” Brilliant! Harry almost died.

Also, when did Harry learn to swim? In the fourth book, he said that the Dursleys never let him learn. Do they have swimming lessons at Hogwarts? The Gillyweed helped him swim in GoF, but what helped him here? Well, he did almost drown. Was that all the Horcrux? Or did he just blame his poor swimming technique on the locket?

10. Awkward Naked Horcrux Time?

I hated the Horcrux destruction scene. There was way too much nudity, and that made it awkward, which really lessened the impact of the scene. I love Dumbledore’s random naked time in Potter Puppet Pals, but seeing Harry and Hermione randomly getting naked was just weird. I understand what they were trying to do, but it was very unsuccessful.

 

11. Dobby

I have to admit something to you. Normally, I skip over Dobby’s death when watching this movie. It’s just too sad, and I get very upset, so I just skip over it. That’s what I do with Snape’s death, too. This time I watched the whole scene. It was still sad, but it wasn’t as bad as it used to be. Dobby is amazing at Malfoy Manor. He stood up for himself against his former owners, and he did everything that he could to get his friends out of there safely. He died a hero.

12. What Happened to Wormtail?

Peter Pettigrew dies when Harry and the gang are at Malfoy Manor, but in the film we don’t get to see that happening. I was really looking forward to seeing this moment, not because I wanted to see him die, but because I wanted to see the brief moment of hesitation that caused his silver hand to revolt against him. Wormtail was a Marauder, and I like to believe that there was some part of him that still had some compassion for his old friends.

13. Voldemort Finds the Elder Wand

Every movie should end with a little bit of grave robbing. The whole time I was watching this scene, I just kept thinking about how great that must have smelled. Good thing Voldemort doesn’t have a nose!

Silly McLaggen! That’s Draco’s line.

What are your favorite moments in this film? Let us know in the comments!