3-D Adds a Little Magic

Some have complained about the fifth Harry Potter film, "Order of the Phoenix," substituting such stuff as suspense, politics, troubling character developments and effective narrative momentum for what they call magic. While A) I don't agree, there's plenty of impossible stuff in the movie, and B) if so, how exactly is good storytelling a lesser thing than silly tricks, I would suggest that these critics take another look at the movie in its IMAX format as soon as they can get a ticket.
I managed to see "Phoenix" on the enormous screen over the weekend. Size didn't matter much, but the 20 minutes of climactic action - essentially, when the kids fly from Hogwarts to London and battle a bunch of Death Eaters - that have been been converted into 3-D are a lot more transporting than when I saw them on fllatscreen. What appeared in 2-D to be a sorry attempt at making wand warfare look like a Star Wars lightsabre fight gains formal richness and an extra, um, dimension of beauty from the conversion process (the shower of broken glass is particularly lovely).
Though I still basically view 3-D as more of a gimmick than a real element of cinematic art, it's nice to know that it can at least enhance the latter and not just be used for cheap extra thrills - especially with guys like Jim Cameron now talking about making whole movies that way.