Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them

PG-13
Starring: Eddie Redmayne, Colin Farrell, Katherine Waterston, Ezra Miller, Dan Fogler, Samantha Morton and Jon Voight.
Running Time: 2 Hours and 20 Minutes

Some of you might be surprised to find out that this is actually a prequel to the ever so infamous
 "Harry Potter" series by famed author J. K. Rowling.
This story takes place seventy years before young Harry Potter reads about the amazing adventures of
Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne) who is a Magiczoologist. Newt is transported along with Jacob Kowalski (Dan Fogler) an aspiring baker and they find themselves in the middle of a secret community of wizards and witches in New York.
Young Newt always carries with him a very prized briefcase full of his very, very special magical creatures that have escaped from him. He gets help from Jacob Kowalski, Tina Goldstein (Katherine Waterston), and Queenie Goldstein (Alison Sudol) to help him locate them. While searching for them, they come across MACUSA, the Magical Congress of the United States, which just happens to have the same significance as Britain's Ministry of Magic.
The MACUSA believe that magical creatures endanger the Statute of Secrecy. Therefore, Newt is seen as a criminal to MACUSA.
Without divulging to much of the intriguing plot, there is not a definitive villain in this movie like Voldemort in The "Harry Potter" series. But, there is a twist in the plot at the very end that I certainly did not expect or see coming.
I found this movie to be interesting, intriguing and very enjoyable. There were a lot of fun characters, I especially got a kick out of Jacob Kowalski and the beasts were most definitely "fantastic"!
The Computer generated images were honestly off of the chart! The special effects were second to none. It was a great escape movie and totally entertaining.
Parents be  advised: This movie is rated PG-13. There were some dark and scary parts to this movie. As usual in these J. K. Rowling movies, there is magic and some intimidating dark magic. I think children over the age of ten will be fine with this story, especially if they are familiar with the "Harry Potter" movies and I think they will be wishing for even more movies to follow.
With that being said, "Fantastic Beasts 2" is rumored to be set in the city of love...Paris and set to be released on November 16, 2018, (only two years away)!
I am giving "Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them" three and a half bags of popcorn.