Every Harry Potter Movie Ranked
Few franchises have managed to grab the hearts of millions of fans all around the world as much as the Harry Potter series. Whether it's through the books or the movies, nearly everyone you meet has had some experience with the now 20-year old phenomenon. Starting out as a simple dream in 1990, Harry Potter eventually met the world in 1997 with its first book, selling just over 500 copies. Twenty years later, it has now sold over 400 million books worldwide and is now a multi-billion dollar movie franchise. And the reason for that is quite simple: they're really, really good.
J.K. Rowling is a brilliant storyteller, creating an expansive world with intricate, highly characters. However, not all books are created equal, and especially not the movies. Don't get me wrong, all the movies are good and some are even great. All the books are great and some are even amazing (except Cursed Child, which I don't care what you say, it's not canon.) But there are definitely some that are a cut above the rest, ones which help elevate the series from great to phenomenal.
Here I'll be ranking all nine movies from worst to best (in my own opinion, of course) to follow up to my previous post ranking all the books.
Here I'll be ranking all nine movies from worst to best (in my own opinion, of course) to follow up to my previous post ranking all the books.
After all, it's not everyday yer young series turns 20, now, is it?
Every Movie Ranked
9. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them
But instead we get this weird mash-up that essentially combines two very different movies into one. This makes for a very confused movie that often jarringly switches between two very different moods. One scene will have Newt making mating calls to a magic elephant, then the next will have a senate be brutally assassinated. Or we'd be watching Newt and Jacob trying to snatch a Niffler before cutting to a scene of Credence being whipped. Okay?? What are you trying to make me feel? Is this movie supposed to be fun? Is it supposed to be dark? Is it a comedy or a mystery or a thriller?
And some things about the movie just make me frustrated. Newt's trying to catch his creatures, and yet he never uses the "Accio" spell except for once. Certain parts of the magical world like the new form of execution seems really overly dark. And I really didn't like how the concept of Obscurials changed from an implied mental illness in Deathly Hallows to an atomic bomb-like creature in Fantastic Beasts.
The Best: Had the movie been two separate things or had been better incorporated, it would've been an excellent addition to the Wizarding World.
The Worst: But unfortunately, they weren't. So we have a very "it's okay" product.
8. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
While the other movies usually have me listing things I would have wanted them to keep from the books, Chamber of Secrets has me listing things I wished they DIDN'T keep, just for the sake of shortening the movie and having better flow. The whole sequence with Aragog for instance could have easily been written out, and Dumbledore and Hagrid's suspension from the school never seemed realistic in the movie.
The movie also ends with the whole school applauding Hagrid's return and the clearing of his name as if that was the emotional core of the movie. Had the movie been focused on Hagrid being framed for opening the Chamber and being gone for about half the movie, this would've made sense. But in the actual movie, he wasn't even gone that long, and no one really seemed to believe that Hagrid was behind all this, so that ending seemed very fake.
Side note: Fawkes the Phoenix is one of the most beautiful songs in the entire series' soundtrack. I will always think of this song as Dumbledore's theme.
The Best: The whole Chamber of Secrets scene, as well as Dumbledore's talk with Harry at the end.
The Worst: Terrible pacing is easily messes up what could have been a much better movie.
7. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1
Of course this movie would be low, and that's because it's hardly a movie at all. It's only half a movie, containing the boring half of the book. It's all set-up and no pay-off. We learn about the Deathly Hallows, but that's it. We find the Sword of Gryffindor, but that's it. We see Dumbledore's eyes in Harry's mirror, but that's it. We kind of get something about Grindelwald, but that's it. Sure, these questions will be answered later, but that doesn't make for a good movie in itself.
Another issue I found with this movie is that it has to clean up a lot of the mess made by previous movies. Namely, so many things are introduced very quickly because the previous movies couldn't be bothered to mention them. Rufus Scrimgeour was supposed to be introduced in the last movie, but let's just have him appear now for a single scene before he gets killed. Sirius's mirror from book 5? Gets introduced here out of nowhere. Bill and Fleur's relationship? Gets introduced here out of nowhere. Lupin and Tonks' marriage? Is briefly seen in the last movie but still essentially gets introduced here. Kreacher's relationships with Sirius, Regulus, and Harry? Gets wiped out completely. Dobby being a recurring character in the books so it's actually really sad when he dies? Well, we haven't seen him in the movies since the second one, so let's just have him pop out of nowhere to take a knife to the chest for Harry.
That doesn't mean that it doesn't have some good moments. Harry and Hermione's dance will always be one of my favorite HP moments, and Ron's departure from the group feels much more genuine here than that one time in Goblet of Fire where he's fighting with Harry (which felt real in the books but seemed to lasted about 10 minutes in the movie).
I also personally thought this movie would have benefited from a little cutting and rearranging. The whole Bathilda Bagshot sequence was exciting in the book and served to reveal more clues on Dumbledore's past, but felt like a weird side-step in the movie. Dumbledore's past was even cut from the movies so why keep this scene? The only thing it achieves is Harry's wand breaking, which easily could be attributed to another event.
I also found the ending to be largely anticlimactic. I guess they wanted to end with Voldemort getting the Elder Wand, but I think the movie would have benefited by ending with the Gringotts escape. It would have been a nice change of pace for the finale of the movie to be like a heist where the characters plan out how to break into Bellatrix's vault, then do it only to fail, and end the movie with the characters breaking out on the dragon. The book always made this event sound legendary, with Harry and friends being the first people ever to break into and out of Gringotts. Ending Part 1 this way would make it a great event, rather than starting Part 2 with it, making the event seem pretty minor. And it would've been a great way to end the movie on a bang, with their first real victory in the movie.
The Best: The fact that it exists. Imagine how terribly rushed and long Deathly Hallows would have been if it had only been one movie. And even though it's only half a movie, it's actually very well done.
The Worst: All set-up, no pay-off.
6. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Oh dear, this was just sad. My favorite book, the longest of all the books, adapted into the shortest of the movies. Naturally so much would get cut out. But while Prisoner of Azkaban's and Goblet of Fire's changes were mostly trimming the fat from the meat, this movie just seems like the bare bones of the book.
Wonderful bits of foreshadowing like Dumbledore's letter to Aunt Petunia or Sirius's mirror gift are tossed out the window, and Neville finding the Room of Requirement instead of Dobby was just egregious. The whole thing about the Room of Requirement is also never really explained, so movie-goers will likely be confused about it in future movies. Snape's Occlumency lessons are cut very short, lasting just two nights, and Harry's moody teen angst is implied to be Voldemort trying to possess him rather than him just being... you know... a teenager. Moral of this movie: if you have mood swings, you're definitely being possessed by the Devil.
Because of all the things that have been cut, Order of the Phoenix just always seems to try so hard to catch up to itself. But there are some good things that came out of it. Luna Lovegood and Delores Umbridge were perfectly cast, Dumbledore's Army gets some extra training scenes which I loved, and the Dumbledore vs. Voldemort battle was pretty awesome. I was personally very disappointed that Harry's highly emotional conversation with Dumbledore at the end of the book was shortened to a 2 minute scene that was very... unemotional.
The Best: Everything about the DA is done very well overall. And of course, Dumbledore vs. Voldemort.
The Worst: With the sole exception of the Harry possession scene, there is an astonishing lack of emotion in a considerably emotional book.
5. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2
The grand finale of them all, Deathly Hallows Part 2 still doesn't seem to catch up to some of the much better movies. It's still a great one, but nevertheless it's still hindered for being half a story (yes, even all pay-off and no set-up is bad too). Overall it still does a good job, and everything form the Battle of Hogwarts onward has been adapted almost perfectly. But everything before it just falls a bit flat.
Like I said before, the Gringotts bank robbery could have been a great chance to take a heist-like tone. Otherwise, it just seemed very boring, and the famous breakout on a dragon was legendary stuff in the book but came off as nothing more than "oh that's cool" in the movie.
Cutting Dumbledore's past made me absolutely livid. Here was a beloved character who was made more real and human due to his dark past, and they just completely cut all that out. It would NOT have hurt to add an extra 10 minutes to revealing Dumbledore's past. The conspiracy theorist in me believes that they purposefully cut this out in order to justify them making a five-movie spin-off series based on Dumbledore and Grindelwald's history.
But of all these bad things, the movie greatly makes up for it with the Battle of Hogwarts. There really isn't anything to say here. It's amazing stuff. All up to the very end where the movie makes me want to rip out my hair when Harry breaks the Elder Wand without mending his own wand. Like come on guys, you were doing so good up until that point. What. Ever.
The choice to make Harry's final duel with Voldemort much more cinematic was an interesting one. Of course, this was done because movies always benefit from flashy things, but this essentially changes the tone of the entire scene. Potter purists will argue that this is wrong because a big part of Voldemort's death was that it's supposed to be anticlimactic because in the end, he's just a man. Personally I don't care much. The people who prefer the more meaningful anticlimactic death will have the books and people who like a nice cinematic death will have the movies.
The Best: The Battle of Hogwarts, without a doubt.
The Worst: Taking out Dumbledore's past.
4. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
This movie's just great. Sure it's simple. Sure it's childish. Sure it doesn't have anything going on under the surface. Sure it doesn't have any real danger. That's the thing. It's not supposed to. The only thing this movie tries to be is purely magical, and it achieves that in spades. The whole movie, we get to follow Harry and share in his awe at the wonderful wizarding world we now find ourselves a part of. The movie also has some of the most iconic scenes of the whole series: Harry's house flooded with Hogwarts letters, Hagrid's "Yer a wizard, Harry", the scene where he receives his wand, the trio's first meeting, "Wingardium leviosa", among many others.
The movie has the advantage of not having a lot to adapt, so it's able to keep almost all the original content without having to worry about what needs to be cut. To make up for this, the movie has to worry about all the casting, and surprisingly all of the cast holds up extremely well. The main trio are definitely their characters, and there is no better McGonnagall, Snape, or Hagrid that's better than the ones we got. Richard Harris (rest in peace) will always and forever be the better Dumbledore. He perfectly captures the wizard's wittiness and wisdom. And while sure, Michael Gambon looks and acts more powerful, Dumbledore's greatest strength was always his kind wisdom, not his power.
But perhaps the best thing that came out of the movie was the wonderful music. So many iconic themes were introduced here, like Hedwig's theme, Christmas at Hogwarts, and Leaving Hogwarts.
The Best: The child actors are still young and inexperienced, so we really needed the adult actors to be spot on in order to make this world feel real. Lucky for us, they were very spot on.
The Worst: Would it kill you to keep Hermione's potions challenge? That was supposed to be her big moment, yo.
3. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
Goblet of Fire suffers from being the first movie where they REALLY had to cut a significant portion out. Essentially, everything related to Harry was kept and everything else was cut or severely shortened. Barty Crouch, Jr. and Winky's tragic story was cut, Hermione's S.P.E.W organization was cut, Hagrid's giant lineage was cut, the Quidditch world cup was cut, you get the idea.
But while these are disappointing, it ultimately is for the greater good. Goblet of Fire hits the mark perfectly on what it means to be a Harry Potter movie--a perfectly balanced sense of magical awe (which was lost in later books/movies) and an equally perfectly balanced sense of excitement, danger, and darkness.
Dumbledore is at his worst here, constantly looking angry and mean and absolutely nothing like his book counterpart.
On the bright side, everything about the Triwizard Cup and the Yule Ball was done very well. My favorite scenes include Harry taking on the dragon, Harry asking Cho to the Ball, and Hermione walking down the steps.
And on a side note, the music here is really, really good. Look up Harry in Winter for one of my personal favorites. Movie-wise, I think Harry and Cho had the best romance and it could be due very much to this song alone.
The Best: The Triwizard Cup and Yule Ball scenes were excellently handled.
The Worst: "DID YA PUT YER NAME IN DA GOBLET OF FIYAH??!!"
2. Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince
This was the movie that caught me in surprise with just how GOOD it is. Being much smaller than the later books, its movie counterpart had less to cut and took advantage of this by delivering a surprisingly very well done movie.
It's also by far the funniest movie. While it's not a comedy or anything, there is plenty of more comic relief that we don't find in the other movies, and really helps to relieve tension and to help us feel that the trio really are best friends. This comedy is also balanced with a lot of emotion. No one needs to tell you that the last act of the movie, especially Dumbledore's funeral, was very emotional.
It's also surprisingly very scary at times. Katie Bell's possession and the Inferi in the cave venture close to horror territory which is--like the comedy--a very refreshing change of tone. The movie also does well to cut out a good chunk of the drama in the Ron-Lavender-Hermione love triangle and does a good enough job with Harry and Ginny's scenes together.
There really isn't much else I can say other than it's a surprisingly great movie.
The Best: Emotions are genuine! Dumbledore's funeral in particular was surprisingly much more heart-breaking and an improvement from the book. The movie also is able to perfectly balance other emotions like humor and horror.
The Worst: The decision to cut out the DA and Order fighting the Death Eaters. In the book, we see Dumbledore's Army and the Order of the Phoenix bravely fighting the Death Eaters and trying to prevent their escape, while also providing a logical reason for why all the good guys were unharmed. The movie makes it look like Death Eaters can just waltz into Hogwarts, kill the headmaster, and leave without problem.
1. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
This is the movie that really made Harry Potter into the cultural phenomenon it is. Director Alfonso Cuarón is amazing, and makes some decisions that really work to expand the Potter world. His expansion of the Knight Bus scene was fantastically fun, and . The previous two movies really only show Hogwarts castle, but Cuarón expands the school throughout all of its grounds and adding more towers, bridges, and landmarks, essentially tripling Hogwarts in size.
He also adds in a lot of small details that are wonderful to see. Harry's hair--for the first and only time--is messy and unkempt like it's supposed to be. He allows each character to customize their school uniform so that each would be able to display their unique personality like real teenagers would. The decision to have the trio wear muggle clothes when not in school hours is questionable, but it a way it does make sense.
And nothing beats the way dementors are presented in this movie. They were never described very specifically, so their appearance and cold, deathly effects on the environment are all determined by this movie.
I've mentioned in my books ranking that the first three books were like a trilogy, and this absolutely holds up in this movie. Harry's growing maturity is shown here more so than in the books, and the entire movie focuses much more on Harry's loneliness and isolation, as well as him having to come in terms with his parents' memories and the pain of being alone. By the time the movie ends, we feel that Harry has matured significantly since the beginning of the first movie.
The Best: The decision to focus the movie on the theme of Harry's loneliness, pain, and isolation, which works so magnificently well with the story since it has the dementors, Patronuses, and Sirius Black and the Marauders.
The Worst: Removing everything about the Marauders' past and their connections to Harry.
The movie also ends with the whole school applauding Hagrid's return and the clearing of his name as if that was the emotional core of the movie. Had the movie been focused on Hagrid being framed for opening the Chamber and being gone for about half the movie, this would've made sense. But in the actual movie, he wasn't even gone that long, and no one really seemed to believe that Hagrid was behind all this, so that ending seemed very fake.
Side note: Fawkes the Phoenix is one of the most beautiful songs in the entire series' soundtrack. I will always think of this song as Dumbledore's theme.
The Best: The whole Chamber of Secrets scene, as well as Dumbledore's talk with Harry at the end.
The Worst: Terrible pacing is easily messes up what could have been a much better movie.
7. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 1
Another issue I found with this movie is that it has to clean up a lot of the mess made by previous movies. Namely, so many things are introduced very quickly because the previous movies couldn't be bothered to mention them. Rufus Scrimgeour was supposed to be introduced in the last movie, but let's just have him appear now for a single scene before he gets killed. Sirius's mirror from book 5? Gets introduced here out of nowhere. Bill and Fleur's relationship? Gets introduced here out of nowhere. Lupin and Tonks' marriage? Is briefly seen in the last movie but still essentially gets introduced here. Kreacher's relationships with Sirius, Regulus, and Harry? Gets wiped out completely. Dobby being a recurring character in the books so it's actually really sad when he dies? Well, we haven't seen him in the movies since the second one, so let's just have him pop out of nowhere to take a knife to the chest for Harry.
That doesn't mean that it doesn't have some good moments. Harry and Hermione's dance will always be one of my favorite HP moments, and Ron's departure from the group feels much more genuine here than that one time in Goblet of Fire where he's fighting with Harry (which felt real in the books but seemed to lasted about 10 minutes in the movie).
I also personally thought this movie would have benefited from a little cutting and rearranging. The whole Bathilda Bagshot sequence was exciting in the book and served to reveal more clues on Dumbledore's past, but felt like a weird side-step in the movie. Dumbledore's past was even cut from the movies so why keep this scene? The only thing it achieves is Harry's wand breaking, which easily could be attributed to another event.
I also found the ending to be largely anticlimactic. I guess they wanted to end with Voldemort getting the Elder Wand, but I think the movie would have benefited by ending with the Gringotts escape. It would have been a nice change of pace for the finale of the movie to be like a heist where the characters plan out how to break into Bellatrix's vault, then do it only to fail, and end the movie with the characters breaking out on the dragon. The book always made this event sound legendary, with Harry and friends being the first people ever to break into and out of Gringotts. Ending Part 1 this way would make it a great event, rather than starting Part 2 with it, making the event seem pretty minor. And it would've been a great way to end the movie on a bang, with their first real victory in the movie.
The Best: The fact that it exists. Imagine how terribly rushed and long Deathly Hallows would have been if it had only been one movie. And even though it's only half a movie, it's actually very well done.
The Worst: All set-up, no pay-off.
6. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Wonderful bits of foreshadowing like Dumbledore's letter to Aunt Petunia or Sirius's mirror gift are tossed out the window, and Neville finding the Room of Requirement instead of Dobby was just egregious. The whole thing about the Room of Requirement is also never really explained, so movie-goers will likely be confused about it in future movies. Snape's Occlumency lessons are cut very short, lasting just two nights, and Harry's moody teen angst is implied to be Voldemort trying to possess him rather than him just being... you know... a teenager. Moral of this movie: if you have mood swings, you're definitely being possessed by the Devil.
Because of all the things that have been cut, Order of the Phoenix just always seems to try so hard to catch up to itself. But there are some good things that came out of it. Luna Lovegood and Delores Umbridge were perfectly cast, Dumbledore's Army gets some extra training scenes which I loved, and the Dumbledore vs. Voldemort battle was pretty awesome. I was personally very disappointed that Harry's highly emotional conversation with Dumbledore at the end of the book was shortened to a 2 minute scene that was very... unemotional.
The Best: Everything about the DA is done very well overall. And of course, Dumbledore vs. Voldemort.
The Worst: With the sole exception of the Harry possession scene, there is an astonishing lack of emotion in a considerably emotional book.
5. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows - Part 2
Like I said before, the Gringotts bank robbery could have been a great chance to take a heist-like tone. Otherwise, it just seemed very boring, and the famous breakout on a dragon was legendary stuff in the book but came off as nothing more than "oh that's cool" in the movie.
Cutting Dumbledore's past made me absolutely livid. Here was a beloved character who was made more real and human due to his dark past, and they just completely cut all that out. It would NOT have hurt to add an extra 10 minutes to revealing Dumbledore's past. The conspiracy theorist in me believes that they purposefully cut this out in order to justify them making a five-movie spin-off series based on Dumbledore and Grindelwald's history.
But of all these bad things, the movie greatly makes up for it with the Battle of Hogwarts. There really isn't anything to say here. It's amazing stuff. All up to the very end where the movie makes me want to rip out my hair when Harry breaks the Elder Wand without mending his own wand. Like come on guys, you were doing so good up until that point. What. Ever.
The choice to make Harry's final duel with Voldemort much more cinematic was an interesting one. Of course, this was done because movies always benefit from flashy things, but this essentially changes the tone of the entire scene. Potter purists will argue that this is wrong because a big part of Voldemort's death was that it's supposed to be anticlimactic because in the end, he's just a man. Personally I don't care much. The people who prefer the more meaningful anticlimactic death will have the books and people who like a nice cinematic death will have the movies.
The Best: The Battle of Hogwarts, without a doubt.
The Worst: Taking out Dumbledore's past.
4. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone
The movie has the advantage of not having a lot to adapt, so it's able to keep almost all the original content without having to worry about what needs to be cut. To make up for this, the movie has to worry about all the casting, and surprisingly all of the cast holds up extremely well. The main trio are definitely their characters, and there is no better McGonnagall, Snape, or Hagrid that's better than the ones we got. Richard Harris (rest in peace) will always and forever be the better Dumbledore. He perfectly captures the wizard's wittiness and wisdom. And while sure, Michael Gambon looks and acts more powerful, Dumbledore's greatest strength was always his kind wisdom, not his power.
But perhaps the best thing that came out of the movie was the wonderful music. So many iconic themes were introduced here, like Hedwig's theme, Christmas at Hogwarts, and Leaving Hogwarts.
The Best: The child actors are still young and inexperienced, so we really needed the adult actors to be spot on in order to make this world feel real. Lucky for us, they were very spot on.
The Worst: Would it kill you to keep Hermione's potions challenge? That was supposed to be her big moment, yo.
3. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
But while these are disappointing, it ultimately is for the greater good. Goblet of Fire hits the mark perfectly on what it means to be a Harry Potter movie--a perfectly balanced sense of magical awe (which was lost in later books/movies) and an equally perfectly balanced sense of excitement, danger, and darkness.
Dumbledore is at his worst here, constantly looking angry and mean and absolutely nothing like his book counterpart.
On the bright side, everything about the Triwizard Cup and the Yule Ball was done very well. My favorite scenes include Harry taking on the dragon, Harry asking Cho to the Ball, and Hermione walking down the steps.
And on a side note, the music here is really, really good. Look up Harry in Winter for one of my personal favorites. Movie-wise, I think Harry and Cho had the best romance and it could be due very much to this song alone.
The Best: The Triwizard Cup and Yule Ball scenes were excellently handled.
The Worst: "DID YA PUT YER NAME IN DA GOBLET OF FIYAH??!!"
2. Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince
It's also by far the funniest movie. While it's not a comedy or anything, there is plenty of more comic relief that we don't find in the other movies, and really helps to relieve tension and to help us feel that the trio really are best friends. This comedy is also balanced with a lot of emotion. No one needs to tell you that the last act of the movie, especially Dumbledore's funeral, was very emotional.
It's also surprisingly very scary at times. Katie Bell's possession and the Inferi in the cave venture close to horror territory which is--like the comedy--a very refreshing change of tone. The movie also does well to cut out a good chunk of the drama in the Ron-Lavender-Hermione love triangle and does a good enough job with Harry and Ginny's scenes together.
There really isn't much else I can say other than it's a surprisingly great movie.
The Best: Emotions are genuine! Dumbledore's funeral in particular was surprisingly much more heart-breaking and an improvement from the book. The movie also is able to perfectly balance other emotions like humor and horror.
The Worst: The decision to cut out the DA and Order fighting the Death Eaters. In the book, we see Dumbledore's Army and the Order of the Phoenix bravely fighting the Death Eaters and trying to prevent their escape, while also providing a logical reason for why all the good guys were unharmed. The movie makes it look like Death Eaters can just waltz into Hogwarts, kill the headmaster, and leave without problem.
1. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
He also adds in a lot of small details that are wonderful to see. Harry's hair--for the first and only time--is messy and unkempt like it's supposed to be. He allows each character to customize their school uniform so that each would be able to display their unique personality like real teenagers would. The decision to have the trio wear muggle clothes when not in school hours is questionable, but it a way it does make sense.
And nothing beats the way dementors are presented in this movie. They were never described very specifically, so their appearance and cold, deathly effects on the environment are all determined by this movie.
I've mentioned in my books ranking that the first three books were like a trilogy, and this absolutely holds up in this movie. Harry's growing maturity is shown here more so than in the books, and the entire movie focuses much more on Harry's loneliness and isolation, as well as him having to come in terms with his parents' memories and the pain of being alone. By the time the movie ends, we feel that Harry has matured significantly since the beginning of the first movie.
The Best: The decision to focus the movie on the theme of Harry's loneliness, pain, and isolation, which works so magnificently well with the story since it has the dementors, Patronuses, and Sirius Black and the Marauders.
The Worst: Removing everything about the Marauders' past and their connections to Harry.
BONUS: Best and Worst Adaptations
Best Adaptation: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
No, it's not a perfect adaptation, but it does the job pretty darn well. The movie is the one that really started the trend of "keep everything related to Harry, but everything else is expendable" habit that the following movies kept. As such, Prisoner of Azkaban manages to keep most of its material, opting mostly to remove the entire backstory regarding the Marauders. And while this is a big plot point to sacrifice, it does work in the end. I still would have liked Lupin to at least briefly mention at the end of the movie that he, James, Sirius, and Peter were the Marauders. Otherwise there really is no explanation for how he would know how the map operates. It also brings up an issue in the Order of the Phoenix movie when Harry refers to Sirius as "Padfoot" when he should have no way of knowing that was Sirius's nickname. And like I said, Cuarón decides to focus more on a very specific theme that ties together with the whole movie so perfectly well.
Worst Adaptation: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Order of the Phoenix was the longest book in the series by far, and yet its movie counterpart remains the shortest. This led to a LOT being cut out, and while some are excusable (taking out a lot of Harry and Cho's relationship, shortening the Weasley's twins' school-wide attacks from two to just one, everything about the O.W.L.s), others are just plain wrong and completely change the spirit of the book. Harry's occlumency lessons last two nights in the movie and the growing distance between him and Dumbledore feels artificial. The movie elects to ignore Sirius' gift of a two-way mirror to Harry, which cuts the tragedy of his death somewhat. Most of all, Harry's outbursts of rage are much more random and seem to be implied to be due to Voldemort trying to possess Harry rather than due to him being a regular teenage boy. Because of this, his extremely heart-breaking confrontation to Dumbledore at the end of the book was instead replaced with a short two-minute scene in the movie. What the movie does keep, it tends to change drastically. The introduction of Hagrid's half-brother Grawp was an emotional point in the book but is treated as a joke in the movie. Its only saving grace is that we do get to spend more time with the DA than we do in the book, and that amazing Dumbledore vs. Voldemort battle.
Best Adaptation: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
No, it's not a perfect adaptation, but it does the job pretty darn well. The movie is the one that really started the trend of "keep everything related to Harry, but everything else is expendable" habit that the following movies kept. As such, Prisoner of Azkaban manages to keep most of its material, opting mostly to remove the entire backstory regarding the Marauders. And while this is a big plot point to sacrifice, it does work in the end. I still would have liked Lupin to at least briefly mention at the end of the movie that he, James, Sirius, and Peter were the Marauders. Otherwise there really is no explanation for how he would know how the map operates. It also brings up an issue in the Order of the Phoenix movie when Harry refers to Sirius as "Padfoot" when he should have no way of knowing that was Sirius's nickname. And like I said, Cuarón decides to focus more on a very specific theme that ties together with the whole movie so perfectly well.
Worst Adaptation: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Order of the Phoenix was the longest book in the series by far, and yet its movie counterpart remains the shortest. This led to a LOT being cut out, and while some are excusable (taking out a lot of Harry and Cho's relationship, shortening the Weasley's twins' school-wide attacks from two to just one, everything about the O.W.L.s), others are just plain wrong and completely change the spirit of the book. Harry's occlumency lessons last two nights in the movie and the growing distance between him and Dumbledore feels artificial. The movie elects to ignore Sirius' gift of a two-way mirror to Harry, which cuts the tragedy of his death somewhat. Most of all, Harry's outbursts of rage are much more random and seem to be implied to be due to Voldemort trying to possess Harry rather than due to him being a regular teenage boy. Because of this, his extremely heart-breaking confrontation to Dumbledore at the end of the book was instead replaced with a short two-minute scene in the movie. What the movie does keep, it tends to change drastically. The introduction of Hagrid's half-brother Grawp was an emotional point in the book but is treated as a joke in the movie. Its only saving grace is that we do get to spend more time with the DA than we do in the book, and that amazing Dumbledore vs. Voldemort battle.
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