Originally published 6/15/04
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Director: Alfonso Cuaron
Writer: Steve Kloves, based on the book by J.K. Rowling
Producer: David Heyman, Chris Columbus
Stars: Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson, Michael Gambon, Alan Rickman, David Thewlis, Gary Oldman, Robbie Coltrane, Maggie Smith, Emma Thompson, Tom Felton
The movie opens with a teenager in his bedroom at night, doing something under the sheets that he knows he’s not supposed to do. And it ends with that same teenager exhilarated by the feeling of something new and almost uncontrollably powerful between his legs.
Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) is growing up.
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, third in the series of adaptations of J.K. Rowling’s fantasy books, is a darker movie than its predecessors, more gangly and dangerous. It’s going to stranger places and not entirely sure of itself in getting there. The young actors at its center – Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint (as awkward, good-hearted Ron Weasley) and Emma Watson (as brilliant, desperate-to-prove-herself Hermione Granger) – now seem preternaturally well-cast. Their talents have grown in proportion to what each chapter demands of them, and we delight in their familiarity when they appear.
For young Harry in particular, he’s dealing with his own version of the feelings of all teenagers – coming into possession of grown-up power, and tired of being pushed around by adults. He no longer accepts with downcast eyes the humiliations of his piggish guardians, the Dursleys (Richard Griffiths and Fiona Shaw). They live in a sort of nervous détente, the adults never quite sure when the boy might lose his temper and cause something horrible to happen – like the grimly-amusing fate dealt to their nettlesome relative Aunt Marge (Pam Ferris). Angry and embarrassed at his “outburst”, Harry then does what nearly every child his age has contemplated or attempted: he runs away from home.
Then, after a few encounters sprung from Rowling’s limitless imagination for the whimsically-macabre, Harry’s on his way back to Hogwarts, but under more frightening circumstances. The world of wizards and witches is abuzz with news of the escape of Sirius Black (Gary Oldman) from Azkaban Prison. The prison’s fearsome guards, the wraith-like Dementors, are hunting for him, and patrolling Hogwarts as well – if hovering menacingly in the sky and sucking souls out of those who cross their path can be considered “patrolling”.
One of the darker currents of Harry’s adventures has always been how dangerous a place Hogwarts is. It’s indelibly British that the students and faculty are ever looking to be cheerful in a building where even the stairways can kill you if you don’t keep your wits about you. And the Whomping Willow from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets has returned and is in as bad a mood as ever (pity the local birds). But even the headmaster, Professor Dumbledore (Michael Gambon, filling in for the late, great Richard Harris) finds it hard to lighten the mood with Dementors around.
It is whispered that Sirius Black will make his way to Hogwarts to try and kill Harry. He’s been connected to the murder of Harry’s parents by the fearful Lord Voldemort. The Harry of two films ago would have been at a loss for what to do. This Harry finds his growing anger taking the shape of vengeance, and doesn’t so much mind the idea of Black coming for him.
Of course, he is not alone. Besides Ron and Hermione – whose barbed conversations are taking on new dimension as their voices and bodies change – there’s a kindly new professor named Remus Lupin (David Thewlis) who has assumed the post of teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts.
By now we know this as about a stable a job as drumming for Spinal Tap, so we’ve got our eye on Lupin. Despite his dislike of full moons, habit of showing up to each class with alarming wounds on his face, and suspicious name (for those with any familiarity with Latin), he’s a source of comfort to Harry. He teaches the boy how to fend off Dementors, gives him chocolates when he’s ended up on the wrong end of a soul-sucking, and shares stories about his famous and well-loved parents.
In each passing entry we learn a little more about James and Lilly Potter and the circumstances leading to their death. It brings a sense of continuity to the series, and keeps a quiet pool of sadness underneath Harry; from the very first he’s had the look of someone who had to grow up too quickly.
By now the stories have a somewhat familiar arc, as there is the thing that everyone, Harry included, thinks is going on, and then there is, just as the climax is beginning, the discovery of what’s actually going on. This time the climax feels more transitional, even Harry complains that little seems to have been resolved (though I’m sure Buckbeak the Hippogriff would disagree).
With seven chapters planned, we’re now entering the middle of the Harry Potter saga, where the important players have been introduced and the whole of the story is just beginning to take shape. While important events transpire, viewers expecting the self-contained cleanliness of the early entries may be disappointed.
I could take up pages upon pages simply with examples of Rowling’s creative powers at work; like the intimidating Monsters textbook, which must be opened with great caution. The above-mentioned Hippogriff is a marvelous creature; half-horse, half-griffin, he looks almost as fun to ride as Falkor the Luck Dragon. Emma Thompson plays Divination Professor Trelawney, surpassingly daffy even among the already-eccentric faculty.
I suspect Chris Columbus, director of the first two movies, might have found himself hamstrung by this more chaotic story, which also manages to weave in time travel and what looks like the cruel execution of a beloved creature. The material required a director with more daring, and Alfonso Cuaron (whose Y Tu Mama Tambien, it must be said, also explored the confused passions of adolescents, though in a considerably less mass-market way) was an inspired choice.
From the darker color palette to exquisitely-composed long takes to the delicate handling of our heroes’ newly-tumultuous attitudes, there’s a sense of dangerous exploration, of trying new things that might not always work but are exhilarating to put forward nonetheless. Hogwarts and its surroundings become richer and more detailed with each entry, and this one is a quantum leap. One climactic piece of special effects work has such a captivating ethereality to it, and we can’t put our finger on what it reminds us of until composer John Williams hints that, at least in the way we feel looking at it, it’s a bit like Close Encounters of the Third Kind.
It does not come without cost. There’s less resolution. Some details must be skimmed by so rapidly as to feel more arbitrary. And as the books get longer and the movies stay approximately the same length, we lose a little more nuance each time. But I find myself more engaged than ever. While its first chapters were bright and lovable, adventures about children made (even in the scary parts) with childlike wonder, this is an adolescent movie, unruly and imperfect, but far more compelling in its way, because we sense it’s going somewhere extraordinary.