Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix

Essential, and a feat of compression: the longest book in the series became the shortest film, and it is one of the better-structured entries. David Yates arrived here and directed the remaining four, which is why the back half of the series looks consistent in a way the front half does not.

Yates made one decisive choice, which was to throw out the subplots and keep the politics. The film is about an institution refusing to admit something has happened, and about what that refusal does to a school: a government appointee is installed, the curriculum is replaced with theory, educational decrees go up on the wall one at a time, and the students start meeting in secret to learn what they are no longer taught.

Imelda Staunton is the reason it works. Dolores Umbridge is the most effective villain in the series precisely because she has no powers worth mentioning and an enormous amount of authority, and the performance is pitched as relentless sweetness with a disciplinary streak underneath. Everything about the pink office and the kittens is funnier and worse than any dark lord.

The weak spot is the ending, which becomes a wand fight in a basement and then loses a character in a way the film has not prepared you for. The pared-down palette, all grey and institutional green, starts here and runs to the end of the series.