Review: Prisoner of Azkaban

[jducoeur]

Okay, let's keep this one brief and spoiler-free...

Capsule: what the rest have said. While I wouldn't go quite so far as to call this a great movie, it's a damned good one, really the movie that the Potter story deserves. Darker, moodier, and generally better constructed than the previous two, this takes the risk of not being quite so word-perfect faithful to the books and makes a much better film that way.

A particular note that I appreciate: this movie really rewards having read the book. While the film is reasonably complete unto itself, one way that it keeps the pacing tight is by just not bothering to explain a lot of the little details. For example (and this isn't a spoiler because only those who know the book will understand it), when the stag appears, they just show it without going into a lot of explication. This is trying to be a good movie first and foremost, while leaving enough details in to be improved if you dig into the original.

Couple that with far more creative direction and cinematography than the first two movies, and CGI that just keeps getting better, and it really works quite nicely. Absolute purists should bear in mind that they do fiddle with the fine details here and there. But they don't do so terribly often, and they manage to preserve the spirit of the story quite nicely. I can only hope that the succeeding films do as well...

Comments

[ladysprite.livejournal.com]

Hrmf - I had just about the opposite impression. I thought it was clumsily edited, poorly tied together, overly oOOoky-spoOOky, and.... just weak, in spite of some amazing acting.

I'm not upset that they strayed from the book; i just wish they had picked a few specific points to either abandon or focus on, instead of giving almost all of the plot points a lick and a promise....

[jducoeur]

Hmm; I dunno. They do actually drop and rearrange a fair amount of plot from the story in order to tighten it up. For example (and this is going to get into spoiler territory, so those who haven't seen it yet may want to stop here), the considerable majority of the Privet Drive section (with the initial confrontation with the Dementor, and the little old witch down the lane and suchlike) is entirely dropped. It's true that they still hit most of the plot points, but not with the fanaticism of the first two movies.

Also, I liked the way the movie picks up one or two thematic nuances from the book and plays with them. For example, time is visually called out as a theme throughout the movie, even though it doesn't become *plot*-relevant until the end.

And while I agree that it goes fairly deeply into the spooky, that struck me as appropriate for this book. Azkaban and Order of the Phoenix are the two books that I personally think of as "spooky". (It may not be coincidence that they're also my two favorite books.) Even in the book, the Dementors are the driving image throughout.

Different tastes, I suppose. Like I said, I don't think the movie is brilliant. But I do find it head and shoulders better than the first two, which came across as irritatingly episodic...

[rufinia.livejournal.com]

...the considerable majority of the Privet Drive section (with the initial confrontation with the Dementor, and the little old witch down the lane and suchlike) is entirely dropped. It's true that they still hit most of the plot points, but not with the fanaticism of the first two movies.

This bit is actually in Order of the Pheonix, not Azkaban. (When the dementors attack Harry and Dudley, and Harry drives 'em off, and nearly gets expelled for it.)

I liked this movie better than the other two, but like you, Azkaban is my favorite book of the five.

[hakamadare.livejournal.com]

It's true that they still hit most of the plot points, but not with the fanaticism of the first two movies.

yeah, that was one of my most significant impressions; this movie felt a lot more like "let's tell this chapter of the story" and less like "let's show you the sorting hat! let's show you quidditch! let's show you magic pictures! aren't these nifty?", which is how the first two movies felt to me.

more moviemaking, less fan service. :)

-steve

[shipbrook.livejournal.com]

Not having read the book(s), I really had no basis for comparison except against the other movies. I thought it had a much more cohesive narrative (the first movie seemed more a pastiche of vignettes; the second was better in that respect but still seemed to devote a lot of screen time to showing the wondrous world of Hogwarts instead of advancing the plot).

I'm unfortunately very aware of loose plot threads and continuity errors when I watch movies, and I only noticed a couple of "problems" (most of which were explained away during the last act). In fact, the only remaining one I can remember (after having seen it less than 24 hours ago) was a technical continuity error; Harry was moving towards [someone] in one shot, and the POV cut to an overhead shot, in which he was seated on a boulder.

But anyway, as someone who doesn't have the book to compare it against, I thought it was a very tight, satisfying story. And I found it very enjoyable to watch a movie wherein the special effects served the plot rather than driving it.

And I finally realized why Mr. Weasley looked so familiar...

[ladysprite.livejournal.com]

Weird - that's exactly the opposite of the impression I had. This movie felt much less like a cohesive story, and more like....hm, how to express it? Like a medley of 'Greatest Hits of HP and the Prisoner of Azkaban.' A little piece of everything, but not the entirety of any one plot.

Different strokes for different folks, I guess.

[shipbrook.livejournal.com]

I suppose that's probably because I have absolutely no idea how much was cut out. I'm sure the movie's just a paltry shadow of the book, but without a basis for comparison it was pretty cohesive (certainly more so than many movies these days).

I'm guessing that Lupin's secret was better disguised in the book, but it was pretty clearly telegraphed in the movie (even apart from his name).

[gyzki.livejournal.com]

Absolute purists should bear in mind that they do fiddle with the fine details here and there.

At the Two Towers level, or just the Fellowship of the Ring level?

[learnedax.livejournal.com]

Not even as much as Fellowship. There is virtually no added plot (unlike The Most Dangerous Staircase in Arda), and the omissions are much smaller than, say, cutting Tom and the Barrow Downs.

In fact, I think this movie may change less than the first one, in which they diddled the challenges at the end.

[ian-gunn.livejournal.com]

I agree this was the best movie of the three but it still felt a bit rushed. Not enough plot detail between all the action for my tastes. Of course it would have been twice as long if there were an explanation for everything going on. I didn't mind the edits to tighten up the plot at all but there were a couple of changes that bugged me more. Small spoilers ahead.



They never explained who Padfoot,Wormtail,Prongs and Moony were. There was a scene near the end with Harry and Lupin where adding that explanation would have been easy to do and only add a few minutes to the film. That information ties things together in the book quite well and I think would have helped the film too. I expect it will be there in the DVD extended edition version.

The other bit that I would have changed is more a personal bias I suspect. It should have been all three, Harry, Hermonie (sp?) and Ron knocking out Snape in the shrieking shack instead of just Harry. It seems trivial I know but that change bugs me slightly.

My memory for trivial details is to good for my own sanity some times. I haven't read the book for three years but I'm pretty sure the spell used to knock out Snape was Stupify not Expelleramus but this goes much further into GEEKY territory then I usually admit to. This might be leaking over from a few hours playing the video game more recently though.

[elizabear.livejournal.com]

They never explained who Padfoot,Wormtail,Prongs and Moony were. ... I expect it will be there in the DVD extended edition version.

According to ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY 6/11/04:
"Don't expect many deleted scenes from HP&TPOA DVD. At 2 hrs 21 mins, POA is the shortest Potter flick yet, despite springing from the longest book of the three - and the cutting happened before a frame of film was shot. ... The most provocative deletion for fans: the backstory of the Marauder's Map, Harry's magical guide to Hogwarts. The filmmakers believed the details would work better in a future film."

We liked this one more than the other two, but I also like the progression in, well, maturity, from film to film. POA isn't as glossy as the other two and explained less, and I think it's appropriate.

[ian-gunn.livejournal.com]

Huh, I guess I can see it as a 'revelation' in a future movie. The books don't get any shorter though, so they'll end up leaving something else out to make room for it later on. *shrug*

[learnedax.livejournal.com]

In re leaving out minor details: some things like the Messrs. identities I think ought to be left as an exercise for the viewer (they could have pushed the implication a little harder, but I like that it was never made explicit), but some relevant details really need at least a glancing treatment. Most notable, I think, are why the stag matters (wouldn't take long) and how Sirius escaped Azkaban (very important to both plot and character development). What PP planned to actually do other than be sniveling could also have been hit a bit more strongly, and if they weren't going to explain the painting attack, they should have left it out. These are problems because even if you haven't read the book, the narrative is incomplete without some explanation. They made such a big deal about Sirius being the first ever to escape, and we never find out why.