Source: theindependentinitiative.com
We start the movie with Grisha Mclaggen who breaks in into one of the places of the Soviet Aurors to, what we later find out, get Tom Riddles diary. She can’t stand the Aurors she’s up against and gets captured and interrogated with Veritaserum. General Makarov is the one doing the interrogation and to him, she tells him why it is that she wants the diary so bad. As she’s questioned, with the help of flashbacks, we see a part of Tom Riddles journey to become the most powerful wizard of all time. For example, the time when Grisha, Lazarus and Wiglaf spend some time in the Room of Requirement in Hogwarts. Lazarus and Wiglaf have a friendly duel which is won by Wiglaf. Tom joins them and Lazarus wants him and Wiglaf to battle to see who is the better wizard. Wiglaf refuses so Lazarus does it himself. Although he is only a second years and Tom, a seventh years student, he wants to battle Tom to impress Grisha but he loses. In that moment we start to see Toms natural behaviour and that he wants to win, no matter what. Not that Grisha would ever think about marrying Lazarus, because she has lost her heart to Tom.
Source: http://www.iamag.co
After Hogwarts, Tom wants to remain at Hogwarts as Defence against the dark arts teacher. Headmaster Dippet refuses so he takes a job at Borgin and Burkes instead. While working at Borgin and Burkes, Tom visits Hepzibah Smith, aunt to Lazarus, to ask her to sell a goblin-made armour. Hepzibah takes a liking for Tom and therefore shows Tom her two most valuable treasures: her Helga Hufflepuff’s cup and Salazar Slytherins locket. Tom really wants to possess the objects, so he kills Hepzibah. He covers his tracks by implanting a false memory into Hokey, Hepzibah’s house-elf letting her believe that she accidentally poisoned Hepzibah. A couple of days before, it was Lazarus who found the cup and brought it to Hepzibah, an action he had to pay for with his life.
Meanwhile, Grisha is on the hunt for Tom. She arrives at Borgin and Burkes, looking for him but he is already gone. Even though she knows Tom’s hunger for power, she believes that he can be redeemed. Somewhere along her search for Tom, she meets up with Wiglaf again, who has changed appearance wise quite a bit after his Hogwarts days, to help him with an injury. But some time later he also ends up dead.
When we return to the present, the bottle of Veritaserum is almost empty and the interrogation is over. General Makarov is impressed with her story and decides to let her go, with the diary. When Grisha is walking up the stairs, General Makarov asks her how she knew that they would have the diary. To answer that question, Grisha Mclaggen turns into Tom Riddle. He used transfiguration to turn himself into her and get the diary. Before the Aurors can do anything, he already disappeared. In the final scene, we see some Aurors opening a case which probably contained the diary plus some unidentified female bones. Sadly we never get a clear answer to the question what happened to Wiglaf, how he died and what really happened to Grisha.
Let me start my personal opinions on this film by saying that all the people at Tryangle Films did an amazing job in creating such a movie with little resources, compared to big blockbusters. The special effects were amazing just like the cinematography, the lighting, and graphics were pretty good for a low budget movie. And don’t forget the casting of, especially, Tom Riddle. However, there are some flaws that will keep some Harry Potter fans away from watching it a second time.
All over the internet, I’ve been reading that people disliked the dubbing. Some actors might have been speaking Italian or the sound was too bad to use without adding the voices in the edit. I think part of the reason why they did the voices this way was that they use different actors for Grisha and Wiglaf, one for their Hogwarts days and the older versions. Their voices might have been too different to be able to let them be one and the same person. To me, I read these comments before watching and therefore thought it would have been a lot worse. It is only a small group of actors where the dubbing is really obvious. And if you are used to it (I grew up watching kids tv shows that were all dubbed) you barely notice it.
Another point of criticism on the internet is the reason why Tom transfigured himself into Grisha to get his diary back. As he is trying to make a name for himself as Lord Voldemort, it would make more sense if he would search for his diary as himself. Destroying a lot of Soviet Aurors certainly brings fear to the name Voldemort. Next to that, how could Voldemort resist against Veritaserum and not show himself? Normally a few drops should be enough to uncover the truth and not injecting a whole bottle straight into the veins
But the one thing that upsets probably every fan who watched this movie, is that the movie multiple times says that Ravenclaw’s mascot is a raven instead of an eagle. It’s very disappointing because one, this is common knowledge and two it would have been very easy to look up.
Have you watched the movie yet and what did you think about it?
