The original Harry Potter story joins the list in the 92nd position on the list and 4th of the 8 movies in my rankings. The original movie was made in 2001 and using a confident of success budget of $125m the confidence was not out of place with a return of $1.002b (yes over a Billion Dollars). It started the beginning of a phenomenon and starred Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson, John Cleese, Robbie Coltrane, Warwick Davis, Richard Griffiths, Richard Harris, Ian Hart, John Hurt, Alan Rickman, Fiona Shaw, Maggie Smith and Julie Walters. Although I am not sure how Cleese is ahead of Maggie Smith if you compare screen time. Talking of screen time for a kids movie this has a runtime of 2 and a half hours which is unheard of for a kids movie in the eighties. I guess they went for the story and didn’t want to miss anything out and just let the time run and run. It was critically well received and was instantly loved by all and many kids who loved the books were pleased to see their heroes come to life on the big screen. With regards the critics I am so please to announce that just as I have all but given up on the Tri-Critic Sync Challenge we finally get another entry onto the scoreboard with a 6 point divide. I will say straight away that I like it the most then Rotten Tomatoes with a 81% then the rather disappointing scores of IMDb with a 7.6 out of 10 which is not the greatest score but it does make an entrance onto the scoreboard.
The story for many I probably don’t need to mention as they already know it off by heart. It begins with a Wizard, a cat and a huge giant of a man with a beard arrives at a street in suburbia. The three turn out to be the head of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry and one of the professors who can change into a cat and the giant is the groundskeeper at the school. They deliver a baby boy called Harry Potter to his only surviving family the Dursley’s. We jump forward ten years and the Dursley have put a roof over his head but that is about all. Harry lives like a servant and has a small bed under the stairs of the house. Where their only son is treated like a Prince. Harry accidently causes an accident went the family go on a trip to London Zoo where he starts to talk to a snake and the glass keeping it in place disappears allowing the snake to escape and then caging the son. Harry gets the blame although he has no idea how this had happened. In the next few days and months Harry receives letters which the Dursley’s force him to ignore and refuse to hand over. More and more letters keep appearing and they continue to keep them locked away from Harry. Finally they try to escape the barriage of letters and owls bringing them by hiding on an Island but Hagrid the giant arrives on the island and bursts in uninvited to announce that Harry is a wizard and has been accepted into the Hogwarts School and is here to help him prepare for the school. They go to Diagon Alley to collect all he needs to be a student wizard staying at Hogwarts. Harry then goes off and lives at Hogwarts and is taught many different aspects of being a wizard. There is another main story running through this movie about the Philosophers stone but for that main aspect of the movie you can work out for yourself. It is the mystery that binds everything together so I am sure this mystery will suck you into the story.
The first movie was going to be a risk and was going to take a large budget to pull together and they had to choice the main children actors very carefully as the plan was to keep them together for the next six movies (OK it turned out to be seven but back then) so that decision was crucial and they nailed it. I have made my comments about the actors abilities post Harry Potter elsewhere which is where it is staying. They nailed this first story. The CGI is very ropey in this one and very cartoony but can be easily by-passed with a smile. There are some other special effects that don’t really work that well from me, namely the sorting hat really doesn’t link with Harry’s head very well. All those issues aside this is a great movie. And I will point out that the word ‘children’s’ was not prefixing the word movie in that sentence. That is because this is a great movie full stop, it may of started as a children’s movie but this is the start of the story that lasted eight movies not just one and its difficult not to clump all these movies together when reviewing but I am doing my best and I hope you appreciate that effort.
Next on the countdown comes a horror movie that so many people hated but I liked it but I feel I may struggle to justify it…
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