Funny and imaginative but not harry potter

Rating: 6/10 (17 February 2008)

I totally agree with every positive review of this film. It is both funny and imaginative as well as entertaining however it does not capture the magic of the first two films.
As with every director Alfonso Cuaron wanted to put his own mark on his work and thus this film is incredibly different from the first two films directed by Christopher Columbus. It seems that while Columbus preferred to focus on the actual book and narrative, sticking jealously to the plot, Cuaron preferred to branch out from the norm which had a positive and negative effect on the film.
The film is as I said very enjoyable, entertaining, thrilling and in most cases downright funny. However the negative part is that there was a loss of continuity. This means that basically for me the film no longer felt like the books. Things like the animal sweets, the big swinging pendulum and the toads singing seemed completely out of place.
Another example of lack of continuity was Michael Gambon as Dumbeldore, who's almost energetic performance is in stark contrast to the wise, plodding Richard Harris who captured Dumbeldore perfectly. Gambon is less convincing. By contrast David Thewlis and Gary Oldman are great in their respective roles.
All in all this is not a bad film, however it fails quite badly to capture the magic of the first two films of the books