Though never as polarizing as the Twilight series (how many people do you know that just sort of like it?), the Harry Potter films have similarly divided the character’s fan base: they of the true believers (who read the books before the films came out) and those who like consistently seeing the most popular film in America. The perfect centerpiece of this dichotomy is Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, probably the entry best liked by critics but most refuted by devotees of the books, who claim that the adaptation has missed key aspects of the original novel and harmed the overall progression of the series. Not having read any of the books (or seen the most recent film), I can only infer how much of this is true, but viewed separately from the work that spawned it, Prisoner of Azkaban is easily the best developed and most affecting out of any of the films yet released. It helps that this one has the director and cast with the most film cred out of any of them, but more likely it’s due to the people at the helm being willing to make the sacrifices necessary to unshackle Harry from the source material that had been holding him back for two films already.
Immediately prior to his third year at Hogwarts, Harry (Daniel Radcliffe), who is still living with Mr. and Mrs. Dursley (Richard Griffiths and Fiona Shaw), receives a visit from Aunt Marge (Pam Ferris). She immediately proceeds to verbally degrade Harry’s long-dead parents (and, in a surprisingly harsh exposure of the series’ oft-latent class subtext, compares them to dogs, referring to the mother explicitly as a bitch), and Harry reacts, for the first time in the series, with an irrational use of magic, inflating her like a balloon to the point where she levitates off the ground and floats away. The consequences of this are slim to none, as authorities at large are more concerned about the escape of Sirius Black (Gary Oldman), the man who gave up Harry’s parents to Lord Voldemort, from Azkaban prison, as it is assumed that he is coming after Harry. Once back in school (with Rupert Grint’s Ron and Emma Watson’s Hermione), he befriends new professor Remus Lupin (David Thewlis), another man who knew his father, but he also begins to prepare for a confrontation with Black; he readies himself, in his own words to 'kill him’.
The first immediate departures from Chris Columbus’s take on the material are aesthetic; in stark contrast to Columbus’s cleanly arranged sets and frames, Alfonso Cuaron’s world is grimy, shady, and more reactive to light and darkness, although he’s more than willing to shake up the color palette by throwing in a red, pink, or green before the whole thing starts to look like a high-budget Uncle Vanya. Certain differences, however, only become clear when the full scope of the series (nearly complete) comes into view. While the dramatics of the first two films (and later ones) are cleanly executed, they can’t help but seem overly schematic when placed in comparison with this, in which the raw emotion of adolescence is allowed to comfortably interact with a magical world that seems all the more physically tangible for the juxtaposition (helped immeasurably by Cuaron’s preference for physical rather than digital effects whenever possible). This is particularly clear with Radcliffe, whose Potter matures from an innocuous, frustratingly blank central hero (think Luke Skywalker in A New Hope) into a frequently unpredictable, confident screen presence.
With that being said, the gaps in logic left by omissions from the book noted by fans are numerous, and rather hard to ignore once you realize what was only minimally explained. Had Cuaron been given the reins to the entire franchise, it seems possible that he would have altered major aspects of the entire mythology to suit the needs of his sustained pace. But that’s probably why this works as a viewing experience so much better than the others do. Recent cinema has been rife with object lessons on why it’s probably better to risk angering fans of source material rather than sacrifice momentum (look no further than Watchmen), so it stands to reason that Azkaban benefits from having taken the road less traveled, even if it wasn’t the way that the original fans wanted it to go. If nothing else, this remains the closest glimpse that we’ve ever had to having a major franchise take a direction completely different from the one that it began in, under the direction of an equally creative but no less single-minded driving force.
Blu-ray Bonus Features
Like all the entries in the Ultimate series, this one has probably everything that it ever occurred to you that you might have wanted in a set. The focus of this set's Creating The World of Harry Potter (appropriately) is Creatures, going into the process behind the creation of the various monsters that populate the series, but all of the other features that you've come to expect are here. There are three vintage television specials, the theatrical trailers, additional scenes in high definition, a tour of Nick Dudman's creature shop, a Spanish-language interview with Alfonso Cuaron, Conjuring A Scene, about creating Buckbeak the hippogriff and the Dementors, Creating The Vision, an interview with J. K. Rowling and the filmmakers, and Johnny Vaughan and the shrunken head interview with the cast. There are also a number of interactive pieces, including self-guided tours of Honeydukes and Professor Lupin's classroom and the Three Great Challenges.
"Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - Ultimate Edition" is on sale October 19, 2010 and is rated PG. Adventure, Children & Family, Fantasy. Directed by Alfonso Cuaron. Written by Steve Kloves. Starring Alan Rickman, Daniel Radcliffe, David Thewlis, Emma Thompson, Emma Watson, Fiona Shaw, Gary Oldman, Maggie Smith, Michael Gambon, Richard Griffiths, Rupert Grint.
