I agree with your Harry Potter assessment. I don't know that Goblet is my favorite book, but this is definitely an excellent movie in the series. I think they made really good choices about how to put it all together but you're right, they could have made it a bit longer.

I was just watching a TV Guide Channel video about it and the woman on there said that the movie was good, but it was almost all plot because you know the characters already in theory. Of course, reading the book makes everything come together more concretely. My dad hasn't read it yet so I'll have to see what he thinks from the non-reader perspective.