But I'm not sure how often we can watch, for film after film, that opening scene in Uncle Vernon's suburban house, then the scenes outside in the street, then the railway station and then the dangerous but essentially cosy Hogwarts, where Harry gets to fly around on broomsticks or fantasy animals. After three movies, I find myself now longing for Harry to test his powers outside the closed world of school, to confront a human adversary in a situation where magic skills may or may not be of any use, or else to use them to quell a wizard-opponent viciously seeking dominion in the muggle world.
Instead, the impetus of the Harry Potter films seems at this stage to be in the opposite direction: to retreat further from the concerns of non-magic civilians into an autistic wizard-ish universe, which will be increasingly baroque and complex and pregnant with its own self-important Tolkien-esque seriousness and "darkness." This new Harry Potter picture will cast a spell on its fanbase. But the broomstick's losing altitude.
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