As HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE draws to a close, Harry mutters in exasperation that all his strenuous efforts had been a big waste. I know how he feels. After straining to figure out what the heck was going on through 2 and a half hours of rather convoluted action, I”m left with the distinct impression it was all for nought. Did I really just sit through an extended time-filler, a movie designed to do little more than kill time until the final two Potter films finally wrap things up? It sure feels that way.

Here’s the problem. To aid him in his battle against the ultimate bad guy Voldemort, Harry spends most of the movie trying to track down something called a horcrux. When he finally finds it though, it turns out to be a fake. Thus, Harry’s frustration. And we feel just as jobbed as our titular hero. So what was all that cinematic sound and fury for? Did it really signify nothing? Did we just spend an entire movie chasing down a red herring? I’m afraid so.

And it’s not just the bogus horcrux that leaves us muttering under our breaths. Another mystery raised is the identity of the half-blood Prince, the one-time owner and inveterate note-taker of the potions textbook that Harry uses as a kind of cheat sheet at Hogwarts. When we finally find out who this half-blood prince is, however, it’s the biggest yawn of the show. What are we supposed to do with that piece of information? What’s its significance and why does it matter? The film doesn’t even bother to explain why he’s called the half-blood prince. Ultimately, the revelation fails to pass the WHO CARES? test. I realize it’s tough to keep interest up over an eight-movie arc, and HARRY POTTER AND THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE proves it. When I wasn’t scratching my head trying to figure out what was going on, I was scratching my head trying to answer the question: so what???

That’s not to say there aren’t joys to be had in HALF-BLOOD PRINCE. Alan Rickman as Professor Severus Snape has always been the best thing about the series and HALF-BLOOD is no exception. His imperious manner is used to great comic effect. Who else could make a sneer seem multi-syllabic? Jim Broadbent is the latest great British actor to join the Potter cast. He seems to be channelling Ed Wynn a bit in his spot-on turn as the retired potions expert Professor Slughorn.

And the movie continues its fine tradition of imaginative and magical trifles. As clever as paintings and posters whose subjects movie within the frames is Slughorn’s hourglass timepiece. As he explains it, the speed with which the sand falls through the funnel depends on how interesting the conversation in the room is. (What a brilliant little metaphor for how we all experience life.)

But the real saving grace of HALF-BLOOD PRINCE is its comic depiction of teen angst. If half of the movie is devoted to Harry’s (and Dumbledore’s) preparations for an eventual battle with Voldemort, the other half is all about a teenage battle with hormones. After all, Harry, Ron and Hermione are not just wizards-in-training, they’re 17-year-old boys and girls. So, if half of the film seems so “inside baseball” as to appeal only to Harry Potter fanatics, this other half is so recognizably human as to appeal to practically anyone who might stumble into the theatre. After a lot of talk of horcruxes, death-eaters, and sectumsempra curses, it’s a great relief to focus on characters who get tongue-tied around members of the opposite sex and who secretly (or not so secretly) harbor crushes. Taking a page out of Shakespeare’s A MIDSUMMER’S NIGHT DREAM, the movie makes great use of love potions to highlight the absurdity and arbitrariness of many human emotions.

As successful as this aspect of THE HALF-BLOOD PRINCE is however, it’s not the reason why audiences are wild about Harry. It’s the magic and wizardry in the battle between good and evil that sets the HARRY POTTER series apart. And it’s that component that flounders. I guess we’ll just have to wait for 2010 and 2011 when the final two Potter movies arrive. Until then, we’re stuck dining on herring (red.)