Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016)

An answer to the question: "What would happen if David Attenborough attended Hogwarts?".

Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them centres around Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne) and his journey to America, along with his suitcase filled with a menagerie of impossible creatures. Due to an unfortunate accident, some of them escape and Newt must hunt them down before they hurt themselves or anyone else. Accompanied by the bewildered No-Maj/Muggle, Jacob Kowalski (Dan Fogler), the unfortunate ministry official, Tina Goldstein (Katherine Waterston) and her always enchanting sister, Queenie (Alison Sudol), Newt must not only rescue his animal friends but also face a greater threat in the form of one Mr Graves (Colin Farrell) who is determined to find a dark power hiding in the city of New York.

At first glance, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them would seem like stretch from the comfortable Harry Potter franchise we all know but in truth, it actually pushes the boundaries of the cinematic wizarding world that we didn't know we there. My first realisation is that, because the main protagonist of the Harry Potter franchise was a student and the main setting was a school, there were a lot of limitations and laws preventing any extreme uses of magic or magical creatures as well as how magic had been incorporated properly into the outside world and internationally as well. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them seeks out this opportunity for exploration and does so brilliantly. We get to see an entirely new version of the magic world hiding from the non-magic one, we are introduced to a huge array of creatures that most of us couldn't even begin to imagine and we are brought into the great evil before Voldemort was even born; Grindlewald.

Regarding performance, Eddie Redmayne does a brilliant job in displaying the shy, awkward nature of Newt when he is around humans but as soon as he's handling his magical creatures, he is confident, brave and completely assured of himself. Simply discredited as Redmayne "always being awkward", which I have heard many times since the film's release, I think this character trait was beyond accurate. Newt is someone who was rejected by nearly everyone at Hogwarts because of his fascination with magical creatures, this has obviously developed into a mistrust of the human race and he has placed all of his emotional investment into animals as they, like him, are misunderstood.
However, I believe the under-appreciated frontman of this entire film is Jacob Kowalski, a simple aspiring baker who gets caught up in Newt's Antics and after immediately falling in love with magic, he helps Newt on his search and forms a strong bond of friendship with him, the first human friendship Newt has had for a while. Now, while Jacob is hilarious and quite obviously the window for the audience to see into the fresh, american version of the magical world, I believe the way he is utilised doesn't just make him a blank canvas that the audience uses as a stepping stone to get to the same level of understanding as the wizards, he goes further than that, Jacob has his own dreams and aspirations and makes his own decisions regarding the events of the film, making him just as enjoyable and influential on the story as Newt.

The story of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them perfectly balances itself alongside the earlier additions to the Harry Potter series, as it combines whimsey and adventure with dark forces and characters seeking to corrupt the peace. For a lot of of the audience, the wizarding world is somewhere amazing where you ride dragons, conjure fireworks from your fingertips, turn into animals or even turn your friends into ferrets. The Harry Potter series sought to place it's main antagonist in the realm of seeking power and dominion over his enemies, where Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them takes an approach that is much more political, much more cunning and strangely human, having it's main antagonist, once revealed, be a feared force against the magical government as he is a radical, a "fanatic" bent on changing the laws, which means he has a lot of people by his side. The events in the film don't really exploit this side of Grindlewald and more focus on his basic evil image but there is indeed a lot of potential for more adult themes in the area of politics, propaganda and reference to real events.

To sum up, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them took a huge step in taking magic overseas and through fantastic use of character and story, it has truly paved a path for many more interesting adventures to come.

4.5/5 - Now we all want a Niffler.