Decent fare for non-readers. Some fans will be disappointed.

Rating: 7/10 (5 July 2007)

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - Harry (Daniel Radcliffe) goes through his third year at Hogwarts and has to deal with convicted murderer Sirius Black (Gary Oldman) who has escaped from Azkaban prison.
Ironic that my favorite of the first three books should prove to be my least favorite movie. Whatever magic and energy is powering this film, it's not Rowling or British. Cuaron is a fine director, but was a bad choice for director. He's too breezy with the material and whips through the plot with not enough of the book's charm. Once the kids get to school, everything gets pretty not fun. The Dementors are wonderful creatures and are done to terrifying effect, but are not explained very coherently and some other vital stuff will be lost to people who didn't read the book.
There's some fine humor and dark atmosphere, but a lot of the humor is gags and pratfalls. Ron (Rupert Grint) and Hermione (Hermione Granger) are sidelined to doing this one routine and are both wasted. In fact a lot of the cast is criminally underused. True, Quidditch has been established as one of the "gimmicks" in the series, but this movie could've really been livened up had they included the fantastic Quidditch Final,but Cuaron couldn't be bothered. He was too busy doing long tracking shot after long tracking shot back to the Whomping Willow again and again. We REMEMBER, okay? A line of exposition would suffice to make everyone remember about it.
The movie seemed like more of a companion guide to the book. Some of the best things in the book were absent and the magic had more of a creepy "Day of the Dead" quality (talking shrunken heads. Why are they all Jamaican?) The kids are acting better. Gary Oldman was good. The movie in general, was good, but disappointing for me as a fan. It seemed like Cuaron found it a chore to be dealt with. Some fans may not mind. A B.