Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is Oscar Worthy?

Published by Jeff Leins on: July 5th, 2009

Early reviews for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince are trickling their way onto the Internet as Warner Bros ramps up the excitement for the sixth of the series.  Most critics have a gag order in place before the long-awaited release on July 15, but Paul Dergarabedian of Hollywood.com had no problem discussing his unbridled love for the new Potter pic.

With the “Best Picture” category expanded to ten nominees at this year’s Academy Awards, Dergarabedian considers the possibility of Potter finally receiving recognition for the brilliant evolution of the adaptations and this recent “tour-de-force.”  He cites the Lord of the Rings trilogy as a perfect example of an Oscar win for the collective creative work, and just so it’s not one amazed critic, Alex at FirstShowing.net agrees.

Dergarabedian continues by admitting he wasn’t the biggest fan of the franchise, until now.  “Well, stand back because now the Potter-loving beast in me has been unleashed after having witnessed a film that was not only exquisite in its production values, but was also charming, funny, scary, enchanting, moving (stop me, the adjectives could go on and on) and dare I say, sexy.”

The trailers have certainly gotten me excited about the latest Potter and I wasn’t much of a wizard lover until Yates took over as director.  It would be interesting to see HP6 pick up a nomination since it’s just what the Academy was looking for when expanding the category for more viewership.

Meanwhile, filming is already underway on the two-part movie version of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows due out in 2010 and 2011.  Rupert Grint, who plays Ron Weasley, took a few days off to recover from a mild case of the swine flu.