Director: David Yates, 12A, 138min

Stars: Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson, Imelda Staunton, Gary Oldman, Michael Gambon

Brows were more creased than a house elf’s elbow when Yates was announced as the director of the fifth Harry Potter film. While his predecessors – Chris Colombus, Alfonso Cuarón and Mike Newell – were all seasoned big- screen directors, Yates’s television background involved nothing on the scale of this lumbering ogre of a franchise.

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Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

First review of fifth instalment: fails to cause stir of earlier films and feels like a chore

Related Internet Links

• Watch Screen Online - Harry Potter special

• Visit Times Online's Harry Potter topic page

• Order Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows online

But Order of the Phoenix is not just about scale. It’s the “political Potter”, in which the Ministry of Magic seeks to dampen speculation about the return of arch magical terrorist Lord Voldemort by – in true Noughties style – launching a smear campaign against Harry and divesting him and his fellow students of their civil liberties.

Sorcerous machinations like these require a deft touch, and it was Yates’s handling of the Byzantine conspiracy drama State of Play that prompted Potter’s cinematic custodians to offer him the job. He has since been given the reins for episode six, which suggests that they were happy with this effort.

And well they might be: with its unprecedented emotional intensity, subtle narrative touches and barnstorming climax, this is arguably the best episode yet, and certainly the most smartly edited. The contemporary echoes are there, but the mood owes as much to McCarthy-era paranoia, while the imposing Ministry sets evoke the pageantry of the Spanish Inquisition.

The ridiculously illustrious supporting cast is further swelled by Staunton, a vision in poisonous pink as Dolores Umbridge, the twee bureaucratic despot who is parachuted in to lick Hogwarts into shape. And the central trio are even beginning to hold their own against their co-stars, especially Radcliffe ( above), as Harry emerges as a leader of wizards and gets his first taste of tonsil hockey. Or should that be tonsil quidditch?

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