The prisoner

Rating: 10/10 (5 June 2004)

THE prisoner OF AZKABAN by Alfonso Cuaron.
A little punk going to magic school with his friends, been there, done that, not interested thank you very much. Hogwart can feel a little bit claustrophobic when you have a fantasy background and the limitations to the story are obvious, the first two movies have the traces of the same draw and the main plots have been seen a billion times so I promised myself I will never touch a Harry Potter book in my life, now after seeing the third in the series I'm struggling to compose myself not to. This has become overnight high quality fantasy because of the story and the magical artifacts we are presented, we still have to endure the cheap sense of humor and certain sequences that only slow things down, like the compulsory opening with uncle Monty that is a perfect example of both. But there is some progress like the Riditch scene (the stupid game yes), the have followed the master rule get in late leave early and put it in the context of the story with the Dementors as the quarter backs, plus comes with a surprise... brilliant.
The main plot is now the big attraction, this is superb storytelling, this movie can challenge the alltime fantasy favourite THE PRINCESS BRIDE any day and Willliam Goldman knows one or two things about his craft, the things get darker up three gears bordering the genius of Poe and we are introduced to new lectures essential to walk the streets safely in today's world, the dark arts and the monster class. Interesting characters lager than life, developed backstories, twist and turns and the biggest payoff in cinema history that does more for time travel than the whole TERMINATOR trilogy combined. Cuaron is in the driving seat, strange choice, anyway in this kind of productions I wonder if if matters at all, the final product is so precisely calculated that he probably only said two words, "action" and "cut", we will only be able to judge his work when THE GOBLET OF FIRE is released next year. Mike Newell will be the only one to put things in perspective and he's another strange choice and what's worse he's an outsider, let's see how he deals with what everyone reckons is the best book published to date.
I like the Shakespearian casting of the movie, British actors make terrific villains and they master confusion. Harry Potter universe is like the Hong Kong portrait in INFERNAL AFFAIRS where nobody is really who it seems to be and the line between GOOD and EVIL is obscure when you approach the edges, the best sample of this is Allan Rickman's character Snape, yo never quite know where he's coming from and he plays the part to perfection, when he's not in the scene you miss him. THe other big player is Sirius Black AKA the prisoner of Azkaban, as Claude Rains is "unavailable" the natural choice is the chameleon of the silver screen, Mr Gary Oldman. Altough he claims that he did the movie for the money for and he's not really interested in the project he mesmerize the audience and outplays everyone else in the movie with his performance, always a good run for your money he's the best actor you can hire these days, some might say a small mistake was not bringing him earlier in the story but that kind of build to the monet he's presented and make it even more intense. He was not welcomed by the aficionados in the internet forums but then their major concern is the detail that Coltrane's hut has been located down hill from the castle, poor devils, and finally I challenge everyone to spot the cameo of the former lider of the Stone Roses. One thing that worries me is the appetite of people to make things darker, dark is better, there is definitely a darker approach to the material visually and story wise which is probably the reason that makes the movie more appealing for adults although I'm not so sure how are all the six year olds that fill the theaters around the globe going to chew this heavy load. This demand for the dark stuff left me completely puzzle when the darkest film in years, DONNIE DARKO fails to generate any interest and went unnoticed on release, the fill noir for the playstation generation, now re-released after Gary Jules hit the Christmas number one with "Mad World" beating The Darkness, bizarre. Not VAN HELSING neither TROY, THE prisoner OF AZKABAN is not only the best blockbuster of the year so far but is also the best movie, SPIDERMAN comes crawling HARRY... altogether SPECTOR PATRONAS.****