Soon after learning that a prophecy was made about him in his youth claiming that he would be the only one that can take down Lord Voldemort (Ralph Fiennes), Harry (Daniel Radcliffe), starts to learn from Dumbledore (Michael Gambon) exactly who the Dark Lord is and was. It is with the hope that Harry can understand Voldemort better, so that he can defeat the Dark Lord once and for all.
A lot of this film focuses on not only Harry's new training, but also a secret mission that Voldemort has sent Draco Malfoy (Tom Felton) to perform. After the disgrace that befell the Malfoys in the Ministry of Magic during Order of the Phoenix, Voldemort has decided that it is the boy's turn to try and do some good for his cause. To compound the various plots that start to come up during this movie, Snape (Alan Rickman), who has been working for Dumbledore as a spy in Voldemort's camp, is forced to make an Unbreakable Oath with Malfoy's mother, Narcissa (Helen McCrory), so viewers and characters alike begin to question Snape's true loyalties even more. Of course, this is still early in the film, and before it is all over, Snape's actions seem to reveal just who he considers his master to be.
Meanwhile, Harry's found himself in an unusual spot. With all the suspicion that he is "The Chosen One," he finds himself receiving a whole new kind of attention from when he was merely "The Boy Who Lived." It seems no matter where he goes, there are giggling girls staring at him, and from what Hermione (Emma Watson) says, it seems he is the target of a lot of love potions. In fact, while there are a lot of dark moments in The Half-Blood Prince, there is an odd undercurrent of romantic comedy at play as well. This can really be seen in the growing relationship between Hermione and Ron (Rupert Grint), as well as Harry's budding feelings for a certain female Weasley (Bonnie Wright).
This film also introduces a new potions master, Horace Slughorn (Jim Broadbent) since Snape seems to have finally gotten his dream job as Defense Against the Dark Arts professor. Slughorn, chosen by Dumbledore himself, is an unusual character who likes to brag about the famous people who have left Hogwarts under his tutelage, and the prospect of adding The Boy Who Lived/The Chosen One to his collection, not to mention the son of one of his favorite students, Lilly, is too much for him to ignore, despite his fears of being attacked by Voldemort's Death Eaters.
When Harry starts taking Slughorn's class, he finds himself without a potions book, but a quick raid of the supplies yields an old tattered version of the text. What no one realizes is that the notes scrawled all over the pages of the book are major improvements for the written instructions and, following these penned-in notes, Harry quickly becomes the top student in Slughorn's class.
Harry soon learns the real reason why Dumbledore wanted the potions master back in the school, and while he is a great teacher, it has more to do with one of his past students than any current work he is doing. Slughorn once taught a young Tom Riddle, later known as Voldemort, and while Dumbledore had gotten a hold of a memory from Slughorn that suggests at Voldemort's apparent immortality, the memory was altered, and Dumbledore feels that only Harry can convince the old professor to relinquish the real memories so that Harry and Dumbledore can learn exactly what Voldemort did and learn how to defeat him once and for all.
Like the other Ultimate Edition releases, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince Ultimate Edition comes with the special features of the previous releases and the added documentary piece that is becoming quite a broad and diverse bit of work about the creation and world of Harry Potter. This sixth part focuses on the special effects of the films and how many of the magical acts came to life. I will say, I was amazed by the number of effects that were made by practicals instead of CG images.
This documentary touches on everything from the flying envelopes in the first movie, to the moving staircases and animated pictures, to Harry's dive in the lake and the many wand-to-wand fights that are seen throughout the films. I remember first getting an interest in special effects and computer graphics in the 90's when the original Star Wars Trilogy was being re-released in their Special Edition form. I watched quite a few documentaries and interviews about that process and it really helped to inspire me to move in that direction with my life. Well, I can see this particular documentary doing the same thing with a new generation of viewers as it shows how a lot of movie magic is performed and seeing those tidbits of behind-the-scenes goodies is a lot of fun.
Other special features include a lengthy documentary that follows J.K. Rowling around for a year as she writes Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, as well as short interviews with the cast as they try and give the viewers their impression of their characters in 60 seconds. There's also a couple of special features that feel a bit outdated at this point. While I can see the sneak peek at the amusement park "The Wizarding World of Harry Potter" at Islands of Adventure to still be somewhat relevant since many people haven't had a chance to make it there yet, the early footage of the Deathly Hallows film seems out of place since Part 1 is already out on home video and Part 2 will be in theaters very soon, but I guess it's still hype buildup for the last part of the final chapter.
Like Order of the Phoenix's Ultimate Edition, Half-Blood Prince doesn't offer a re-edited version of the film with the deleted scenes spliced back in like the earlier Ultimate Editions had, so most of the added value of this release comes in the form of the new documentary and the various extras like the book and character cards that come in the package. While great for hardcore fans, it's definitely not for everyone. In fact, I would almost say, at least for those people who haven't been keeping up with the DVD/Blu-ray releases, to wait just a little longer. I wouldn't be surprised at all if there was some big boxed set to be released not long after the final movie comes out to home video.
