Confusing and Choppy

Rating: 1/10 (18 November 2005)

I love this series, but this movie confused me. I was really disappointed. Perhaps the world created in the previous movies was not to Mike Newell's (the director) liking, but entirely changing the world (except for the ricketty bridge) in this movie really detracted from the flow and interest. This change was the first of many that seemed unnecessary in this film, both from the previous movies and from the books. While the dragon scene was exhilarating, there was almost no connection in that scene to the book, which I thought was a better story. Also, the Clock tower, which was forefront in the previous movie, was changed--WHY? This movie was also very choppy, I understand it's a long book, and therefore difficult to compress into a movie, but I have been told by those who haven't read the books that they couldn't follow it at all. Would it have been that bad to add an extra half hour if it would have made it smoother? Come on here, the movie and books have almost a cult following. On the other hand, I was impressed by the use of facial expressions to portray the emotions which could not easily be displayed in a movie, but beyond that, the movie was horrible.