Faithful to the book but I didn't love it...

Rating: Null/10 (16 November 2001)

Though Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone was a very entertaining movie and extremely faithful to the book, it did leave a little to be desired. The movie was two and a half hours long, and oftentimes I found myself thinking, "alright, alright, get onto the next part!" I had read the book, but ages ago, and I barely remembered any of it, so I don't think my knowledge of the story was very responsible for these feelings.
Furthermore, I was quite unhappy to see that Harry's eyes were blue when JK Rowling said in an interview that it was very important for later events in the story for him to have green eyes, which he does in the book. There were very few scenes inside the classrooms, and the dialogue about Sirius Black (which we all know becomes very important later!!) was omitted from the scenes with Hagrid bringing Harry to his aunt and uncle's. Speaking of that scene, the lines were very poorly delivered. Ie: Dumbledore, when seeing the cat, says, "I didn't expect to see you here... Professor McGonagall!" (or something to that effect), as though it's this huge, amazing, crazy thing, only the pause between "I didn't expect to see you here..." and "Professor McGonagall!" is horrible. I would have liked to have seen more Quidditch, as well! It was such an important sport in the book and yet there was only one five to ten-minute game of it in the movie. The characters we had all grown to know and love in the book, such as Angelina, Katie, Parvatti, as well as the fun and crazy exploits of Fred and George, were completely omitted.
Overall, this movie was entertaining, though it dragged on, and it was mostly faithful to the book. However, I will not be seeing it a second time- and that is saying something, because I usually see movies many times over in the theatres. I would give it 2 1/2 stars out of five.