A Good Movie, but not True to Harry Potter

Rating: 10/10 (5 June 2004)

I preface my comments by stating that I had exceedingly high expectations for this film. Harry Potter is one of my many obsessions, and after watching the trailer, I was sure that this film would be by far the best of the three. I was, however, disappointed. The cinematography was beautiful, and most of the acting was much improved (aside from Radcliffe's pitiful crying scene and Hermione's pathetic dependency acts), but the movie was so poorly thrown together. The first twenty minutes were hilarious. I was rolling in my seat laughing as Aunt Marge blew up, busting buttons (which consequently hit Dudley in the face), and the Knight Bus was equally amusing. Sadly, however, once you get any farther, disappointments ensue. The set is entirely different. This isn't necessarily always a bad thing. The set was much extended, but certain aspects of the it were noticeably different. The whomping willow decreased to about half of its size and also changed locations.
The chronological order of the events in the movie were also rearranged, as well as leaving out many important aspects of the novel. Maybe I'm a traditionalist, but I personally really liked how the movies followed so closely to the books. Peeves is still missing from the story, many important conversation in general (particularly between Harry and Lupin) are taken out, Harry finds out all of the information about Sirius and how he is his godfather in a completely different fashion, Harry receives the firebolt (without any explanation as to how he got it) at the very end of the movie, and most annoyingly and obviously, everything about the bond between James, Peter, Sirius, and Remus is left out. It did not explain at all who Prongs and Padfoot and the like were at all. So much was left unexplained, and as a whole it was very very rushed and choppy.
Many beg to differ with my opinion and perhaps I need to see it again, but I thought Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban was a good movie alone as a movie, but regarding the true feeling of Harry Potter left much to be desired.