Not very good, as a film

Rating: 5/10 (15 December 2002)

* spoilers ahead *
If you haven't read the books you may not think very much of this film. I haven't, and most of the film seemed like a random chase from one arbitrary scene to another.
"Deus Ex Machina" - something with no other point or explanation than to resolve a scene - is all over the place. Oh, the water is overflowing from the toilets. Why? So the characters can go into the toilets and find the chamber. Harry's about to get killed by the basilisk. Oh, here comes the phoenix. Harry's about to get killed by the basilisk AGAIN. Oh, there's a magic sword in the bag. They're about to get eaten by spiders. Oh, here's the magic car. THIS IS A SIGN OF COMPLETE INCOMPETENCE. It's a beginner's mistake in writing stories, like the "and then he woke up, it was all a dream" trick.
Then there is the lack of follow through. We're constantly going into a scene that shows promise then just stopping, such as having Harry tell the snake to threaten some kid for no apparent reason. Whoah, maybe Harry has a little streak of nastiness in him. No, the scene just stops and Harry goes "I don't know" and that's the last we hear of it.
What is with this Quidditch thing? It only makes sense in the context of a "jolly school tale" which this is mostly not. Plainly, they just put it in because the fans want it. It's completely irrelevant to the actual plot. Granted, it was a bit more fun than in the first movie, but it could have been entirely deleted and saved some time.
Speaking of which, this movie is too long. There's just no need to wander on for almost three hours telling such a shallow plot. The introduction could have been mostly deleted, since there is so much in this film that relies on the first film/book anyway. Take out this and the Quidditch and you would have a reasonably focussed movie.
It is darker, with more action, which for adults is an improvement on the fuzzy, slow moving feel-good of the first movie. It doesn't really need to be any darker. What it needs is just to be better.
The actors/characters are pretty crap, on the whole. Harry never gets excited or worried. He seems to have these few unexplainable (deus ex machina, again) talents like talking to snakes, otherwise he just blunders around and lets others do the work (Hermione, Ron, the professors, Hagrid). Maybe that's how he's supposed to be, but I find it pretty boring. Ron is just too hammy. He has his "afraid" expression and his "gosh I'm thick" expression and overdoes both. Hagrid was mostly uninteresting except for Robbie Coltrane's general charisma. Prof Dumbledore was never impressive.

I have to assume that the book is more detailed, coherent and gripping, because otherwise I can't see why anyone would really like this film - except for the surface glitz. But I can tell you that this film doesn't encourage me to read the books, because the plot is very amateurish, the characters are caricatures, the atmosphere is hit and miss, the action repetitive.
I like fantasy, and wish more good stuff would make it into movies, like say Ursula Le Guin's Earthsea novels. For some reason it seems rare. From this point of view Harry Potter is a good thing. And of course, it seems that many people do like both the books - so much so that it doesn't really matter how good the films are, so long as they evoke a reasonable echo of the book millions will go see them.
In conclusion, I have to say this is not a very good film, at least for adults, and I think the main audience for it is existing fans of the books, who can fill the gaps and ignore the inconsistencies with their memories of the books. Rating: 5/10.