Harry Potter: 5 Reasons You Need To Rewatch The Half-Blood Prince

A bird cage? What does this have to do with anything? Well, in the Half-Blood Prince, director David Yates uses a simple shot of a bird cage to exquisitely tell the reader a story.

About two-thirds of the way through the film, Draco begins to test the Vanishing Cabinet in the Room of Requirement - a sequence preceded by a single shot of a birdcage in the corridor.

This isn't even noticeable at first - a simple shot of a bird happily chirping on its perch - and the scene seamlessly progresses. We see that Draco has taken the other bird from the cage and sent it through the Cabinet in an attempt to test if the pathway between it and Borgin and Burke's is safe.

But a bit later in the film, we see this same shot of the bird cage used when Harry is pursuing Draco to confront him, the difference now being that there are no birds inside the cage.

This time, the shot is followed by Harry venturing into the Room of Requirement (to get rid of the Half-Blood Prince's book) and as soon as the audience see this almost identical shot, they are immediately informed of what events have taken place.

By seeing that another bird is missing from the cage, with the shot exactly mirroring its predecessor, we know that it too has been taken by Draco and used as a test subject for the Vanishing Cabinet, proven true when Harry opens the Cabinet and a little bird flies out.

Here, through the use of simple mirroring, Yates tells us an entire story. We see an entire sequence of events within a single frame, simply as a result of its placing at two specific points in the film. This small yet elegant bit of cinematography is a creative piece of storytelling, and one that makes The Half-Blood Prince a brilliant film in its own right.