Pretty, plotfilled, but soulless...

Rating: 6/10 (29 November 2001)

Everyone's already said it: This is almost exactly the Harry Potter world from the book. Almost perfectly rendered, characters spot on, even if Harry was a little wooden, and has most of the action from the book.
Which is, of course, the problem.
I saw this movie with a bunch of kids in the rows in front of and behind me. The younger ones fell asleep. No surprise there. The older ones watched it, marvelled at it, compared it to their imagined versions, and... almost fell asleep.
There is a lot to cram in to this movie. But curiously, rather than rating some plot points as more important, others as less, this version of Harry contains EVERYTHING. All the major plot points are there, with a couple of stripped down exceptions. Faithful to the story - yes. Faithful to the spirit of the books - no. And the kids around me said it.
"Where were all the jokes, Dad?" Asked one kid. "Where was Lee Jordan's commentary of the quidditch," asked another. "It didn't FEEL like fun," a third said as we walked out, probably the most telling comment of all.
Rather than prioritising the plot points, we got the lot. So the spirit of the books - the urgency, the glee, the fun, the joy - all disappeared. We lost Harry's character... reduced to a quiet noone. - which is odd, coz all of the other characters were perfect! (Though Dumbledore needs a sense of humour, and the Wesley twins aren't "bad" enough"...)
A functional rendering of the book, but as one person said as we walked out: "Value for money wise - I'd rather spend $18.95 on the book than $10 on that movie".