Good for fans, blah for others

Rating: 6/10 (17 November 2001)

Harry Potter was an okay movie. It was not a particularly good movie. All of the atmosphere from the books was just plain missing... It was a faithful plot rendering, but it was not gripping. You don't get emotionally wrapped in what happens, and you just don't care what happens to these people. If you've already read the books, then Harry et al. already mean something to you, so it's okay-- but if you haven't, you're in for a yawn. The movie was also lacking a lot of the books' wit... presumably because they couldn't fit anything else in.
I think anyone who's a HP fan will enjoy the movie, but people who haven't read the books won't. The movie doesn't make you care about the characters: it depends on you to already care. It caters directly to the fans that will graft their OWN understanding of Harry et al. onto the screen exposition, who aren't depending on the movie to show them what these characters are like, because they already know. To anyone who's seen the movie and hasn't read the books, I'd say: Go read them even if you didn't like the movie; what the film most painfully lacks, the books actually do supply.