Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

This third Harry Potter movie is by a new director. The look of the movie is completely different. The director of the first two HP movies made them somewhat child-like, but this third one is definitely darker. There is also more “incidental magic” (magical stuff that happens in the background but doesn’t really have anything to do with the plot). I enjoyed this director’s interpretation, but I think that the three principle actors need some acting lessons. They are all a bit stilted. It seems like they just memorize the lines and say them at the right time, but don’t put any sentiment into them. This probably has to do with the fact that they started to do these movies when they were so young, they didn’t have to act all that much. But now that the plots are thickening, they really have to act in order to make the movie watchable. Perhaps they are all just stuck in a phase. Maybe they’ll grow out of it. Anyway, I really enjoyed the movie overall, so I am giving it 5 stars. (*****)