Mixed Opinions

Rating: Null/10 (4 June 2004)

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There are many good things to be said about this film - such as the beautiful CGI scenes, the Hogwarts castle's "new look", and daniel radclife coming a little closer to acceptable (emotional scene outside of hogsmede not withstanding...). Furthermore, it is fair to say it is an enjoyable film and not a bad use of a couple of hours of your time, if you should decide to go and see it...but that said...
In places, this film is so jaw-droppingly pretentious that it makes my head spin! Its obvious that the new director wanted to make the films somewhat more mature than Columbus's previous efforts - but the scene-setting beautyshots of hogwarts, sunsets, flowers, paper bags dancing in the wind... (oh! sorry, wrong over-wrought film!) I don't know...they seemed somehow too much like a waste of time, and felt almost coldly mechanical and contrived. I guess what i am trying to get at is that the scenes which were intended to cause me to shed tears and grasp my heart upon seeing Hogwarts in all its (new found?) melancholy beauty...well, they just left me thinking "so what!?".
I guess that said shots were simply too methodical and predictable - I'm sure they could be classed as art, but only in the same way as teenage goths scrawling copies of bleak nu-metal album art along with some heartfelt words from kurt Cobains diary into their GCSE sketchbooks is art...and though I'm by no means a die hard Harry Potter fan, I did read and enjoy all the books in the series and for what its worth I would definitely question the casting and portrayal of (for example) Lupin (who was far, FAR too camp) and Sirrus Black (who again, came across as a screaming queen rather than someone who had spent over a decade having his sanity slowly ripped apart by Dementors).
Also, Richard Harris was utterly superb as Dumbledore - he was everything I would have imagined Dumbledore to be in fact. Michael Gambon seems colder and less credible in the role...
Some summaries:
-Emma Thompson. Emma Thompson is an utterly wonderful actress. It doesn't show in this film. Watch Angels In America instead.
-The weasly twins. Why? Why oh why?
-I Did not like lupin. He was portrayed as being too camp, and too effeminate. I felt that 2 scenes in particular let him down - A) the train - there was something very uninspiring about his entrance, and B) The bridge scene, discussing Lilly Potter - it was so utterly contrived that i found myself completely losing interest. And the boggart-scene music, what on earth was with the music...?
-The dementors were beautiful. In a sick sort of way.
I liked the film, but not too much. I still feel that the process of converting the Harry Potter books into the Harry Potter films has a long way to go.
6.8/10
It would have been 7.8 but it lacked...something.