In the latest Harry Potter spin-off ‘Fantastic Beasts: the Crimes of Grindelwald’ directed by Potter’s David Yates, J.K. Rowling adapts the magical textbook to teach us a few things about the non-magical world.
Newt Scamander is here as a stand-in for Albus Dumbledore’s (Jude Law) ultimate philosophy of tolerance, to take down the evil Gellert Grindelwald, played with typical panache by Johnny Depp. Grindelwald certainly portrays a striking parallel to the wizards who hate muggles which were found in previous movies, although it does not establish a clash between characters.
The central conflict of the movie is also this complex relationship between Albus Dumbledore and Gellert Grindelwald. Unfortunately, ‘The Crimes of Grindelwald’ lacks the wizarding world’s power to process a layered conflict through its storyline to create a compelling villain.
Quest for the Chosen One (Sub Head)
The deal this time is that it’s 1927 and the coldly malevolent Grindelwald, has escaped from a magic prison and is rallying his pureblood followers with the aim of reigning over all non- and semi-magic people. It’s implied at one point that if he’d been permitted to carry out his plan, it would have prevented World War II.
Grindelwald wants to find Credence Barebone (Ezra Miller), one of the orphans from the last movie because he believes Credence is some kind of Chosen One. Credence, who is working for/possibly enslaved by a magic freak show in Paris, feels the same way and is looking for his birth mother to find out who he really is.
Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne), the quivering autistic man who collects fantastic beasts, is also looking for Credence, acting on orders from Albus Dumbledore (Jude Law). Ministry of Magic auror Tina Goldstein (Katherine Waterston) too has joined the hunt.
The bridge between the ‘Harry Potter’ and ‘Fantastic Beasts’ movies, that tries to connect the parallel timelines, can be ruined easily. After all, it takes only one match to start a forest fire. Overall, the story lumbers without any form of urgency. Yates and Rowling earned their audiences’ loyalty just by using the Harry Potter fonts in the title and petty as it may seem, the new details they keep dropping to set up three more movies on the cycle will hopefully burn the bridge from an insignificant sequel. Even something as small as a lighter could bring down a big structure like the wizarding world.
Lackluster plot (Sub Head)
That is not to say the diversions can’t be exciting, and the flashbacks to Hogwarts during Newt’s younger years are emotional and thrilling. Even visits to the Ministry of Magic come with the special frisson of discovery relished in the ‘Harry Potter’ films. There are new creatures to discover, new family secrets, and enough winks to the Rowling-created universe to keep Potterheads pleased. Yet some of the most anticipated revelations fall flat, including Newt’s previous bond with Leta Lestrange (Zoe Kravitz) to a deeper exploration of young Dumbledore and Grindelwald’s relationship. Rowling seems to be playing to the fans in the thinnest way possible, building stories that require foreknowledge to appreciate them fully. The unindoctrinated will be confused; the admirers, disappointed.
While calling ‘Crimes of Grindelwald’ a ‘filler’ would perhaps be unfair, on any view, it is a film which scrapes by on the good name of its forebears - like an indolent child born of a prestigious family. There is a definite sense that the lacklustre plot is held together by little more than the audiences’ collective anticipation of what is to come: the greatest wizarding duel of all time, the famed clash between Dumbledore and Grindelwald.
This story is about the far more personal and heartbreaking battle between both sides who have different beliefs about what will achieve the solution, and it is revealed from the history stated in ‘Harry Potter’ that Dumbledore will end up defeating an incarcerating Grindelwald in a duel in 1945, the same year that World War II ends and Hitler’s fascism and genocide are brought down.
With that said, however, for those who enjoyed ‘Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them’, this sequel is indubitably essential viewing. While it is not a wholly-satisfying film in its own right, there’s enough of the old magic for it to be enjoyable, and it does what it needs to do to further the series, laying the foundations on which the subsequent installments will stand.
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