One big difference between Half-Blood Prince and, say, I Love You, Beth Cooper (a terrible teen comedy, but one directed by Chris Columbus, the man behind the first two Harry Potters): Instead of exclaiming "Omigod!" at every shocking turn, the phrase of choice for aghastness and surprise is "Merlin's beard!"
David Yates, director of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007), returns, bringing a steady hand and a subtle playfulness to the proceedings. This isn't up there with Alfonso Cuarón's The Prisoner of Azkaban (the third, the darkest, and still the best of the Potter adaptations), but its lack of pretense and quiet celebration of J.K. Rowling's iconography imbues it with charm.
As the story begins, Harry (Daniel Radcliffe) is slumming with Muggles in London, flirting with a waitress in a cafe (she recognizes him from the photo in the newspaper, under the headline "Harry Potter - the Chosen One?"), and promising to meet up with her after work. Harry, you rascal, you.
But Albus Dumbledore (Michael Gambon) has an assignment for the lad with the lightning scar on his forehead, plucking Harry from a tube station platform and flying off to a cozy country village where a retired Hogwarts professor, Horace Slughorn (Jim Broadbent), is in hiding.
An expert on potions, and a teacher with a serious Voldemort connection, Professor Slughorn is needed back at the School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in order to fulfill a fateful obligation. And Harry and Dumbledore are there to negotiate his return.
