‘Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them’ (2016) ****/*****
JK Rowling and David Yates pull a rabbit out of a hat
JK Rowling’s Harry Potter character was the basis for seven beloved books and eight beloved films. They were gigantic successes. They’re modern classics that will last forever. They served as an introduction to genre storytelling for an entire generation of geeks. But they’re over. To tell more stories set in the wizarding universe created for the Harry Potter franchise has to be seen as a cash-grab — a cynical attempt at wringing every last dollar out of a property that has name value, until it’s been bled of every bit of joy that made people fall in love with it in the first place. And yet, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them has brought back Potter creator JK Rowling as its writer, it’s brought back the helmer of the last four Harry Potter movies, David Yates, as its director, and it’s somehow ended up being really good, completely different from the Harry Potter movies, and not at all exploitive of what’s come before it. Who would have imagined that a movie set in the Harry Potter universe that wasn’t a Harry Potter story could be good? This movie is as amazing as a magic trick.
Not enough can be said about how little Fantastic Beasts resembles Harry Potter. The story it’s telling is completely different from the story that was told in that series, and it’s pretty astounding that they had the conviction to go in this direction. The characters are all adults. They show up in the movie fully formed, and with what seems to be rich past histories. There’s no mythic battle looming in the future of this series, no talk of “chosen ones” or anything like that. There’s no clear structural framework to the story, the way that the Harry Potter movies each covered a school year at Hogwarts. It’s pretty ballsy to take such a huge departure from what has worked in the past and what was beloved about that franchise. It’s a ballsy approach, and it’s welcome, and it works. Compare Fantastic Beasts to other recent franchise movies, like the new Star Wars films, which look like greatest hits albums of the Star Wars movies that came before them, or The Hobbit movies, which were expanded and re-written to look more like The Lord of the Rings, and this movie shines.
The story being old here centers on a character called Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne), who’s a Hogwarts dropout, a passionate conservationist of magical creatures, and the future author of the canonical tome ‘Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.’ When we meet him he’s entering New York from Britain in order to release one of the beasts kept in his magic suitcase (which holds an entire zoo’s worth of creatures) to its natural, North American habitat. Once he shows up in New York everything goes wrong though. Several of his beasties escape. A former auror (Katherine Waterston) from the US version of the magical governing body has caught his trail and is onto his antics. A fundamental orphanage-head (Samantha Morton) who hates magical people is leading a crusade against the magically-inclined. Also, an evil wizard named Gellert Grindelwald (?) is backing terrorist actions to create a war between wizards and normal people. Newt gets mixed up with all of them.
The thing that stands out the most about Fantastic Beasts is its setting. The story being told here is being told in 20s-era New York City, which ends up being an absolute delight. First off, Yates’ depiction of 1920s New York is so deep, expansive, detailed, and gorgeous to look at that it must have cost an insane amount of money to create, which is all up on the screen, but secondly, it needs to be mentioned that said detail is executed on such a level that it feels like you’re watching a movie set in a fantasy world. So much thought, so much planning went into creating this version of New York that it stands right next to places like Middle Earth when it comes to invented locations for a story to take place in. Watching this movie feels like you’re being transported to a fantastical place that (mostly) never existed, and lingering in that space is a great deal of fun.
How’s the acting? In general, really strong, as long as you ignore Ezra Miller’s typical overacting in the role of a key antagonist. Eddie Redmayne is the foundation this new franchise is being built off of, and he proves to be a solid choice. Give him too much rope to hang himself with, and he tends to make a mess on the screen, but give him a meaty character to dig into, and he generally does fine. He’s doing fine here. Katherine Waterston plays the female lead, and it’s hard to imagine anyone being more engaging in the role. There’s something about her that’s so compelling. Her face, when static, is entirely unassuming, but once she starts emoting there’s so much going on in her features that you can’t take your eyes off of her for a second. The same could be said for everyone in this movie. If there’s something that connects all of the performers cast in this film, it’s that they all have faces that are insanely articulate and that can communicate multiple emotions at once. The actress playing Waterston’s character’s sister, Alison Sudol, she’s got so much light in her eyes and sunshine coming off of her face that she’s guaranteed to become a big star. The real story here is Dan Fogler though. In dialogue and in delivery he seems like he’s playing a character from a Coen brothers movie, which is likable beyond words, and which mean that he steals the movie out from under everyone else. Somehow, in a movie about characters who can perform amazing magical feats, a baker from New York stands out as the most interesting new personality you get introduced to.
There are a couple of problems here. If you think about it too much, there are too many coincidences that get the characters together in places where the plot needs them to get together. Things like that. There are so many little things to like here though, which separates this film from pretty much every other big studio picture that’s been released this year. The ending is very bittersweet, which feels really adult for something taking place in the Harry Potter universe. Eddie Redmayne and Ezra Miller come very close to having a weird-off, which doesn’t quite happen, but gets close enough to make it feel like what you’re watching isn’t a mainstream, studio picture. There are all sorts of strange creatures running around, which must have been a great deal of fun for the film’s designers, and is definitely a ton of fun for its viewers. Also, there’s a speakeasy for wizards in this movie, which is basically the most entertaining thing that’s ever been conceived. When you enter into the world of Fantastic Beasts, you’re entering into a world that’s full of delights. I can’t wait for the next one.
