Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban is a 2004 fantasy film directed by Alfonso Cuarón and distributed by Warner Bros. Pictures, based on J. K. Rowling's 1999 novel of the same name. The film was written by Steve Kloves, and produced by Chris Columbus and David Heyman. It is the sequel to Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002) and the third instalment in the Harry Potter film series. It stars Daniel Radcliffe as Harry Potter, alongside Rupert Grint and Emma Watson as Harry's best friends Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger respectively. The film follows Harry's third year at Hogwarts and his quest to uncover the truth about his past, including the connection recently-escaped Azkaban prisoner Sirius Black has to Harry and his late parents.

The cast of previous instalments returned for the film, with the additions of Gary Oldman, David Thewlis, and Emma Thompson, among others. It was the first appearance of Michael Gambon as Professor Albus Dumbledore, due to Richard Harris's death in 2002. Principal photography began in February 2003 at Leavesden Film Studios. It was the first in the series to extensively use real-life locations, with sets built in Scotland and scenes shot in London. Filming concluded in November 2003.

The film was released on 31 May 2004 in the United Kingdom, and on 4 June 2004 in North America. It was the first Harry Potter film using IMAX Technology and released into IMAX theatres. Prisoner of Azkaban grossed a total of $797.5 million worldwide, making it the second-highest-grossing film of 2004. The film received praise for Cuarón's direction and the lead actors' performances. It is credited for marking a notable change in the franchise's tone and directorial style, and is often considered by critics and fans alike to be the best Harry Potter film.

Plot
Approaching his third year at Hogwarts, Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) has had enough of his muggle relatives. He runs away from them (finally) and enters his third term facing trouble from more than one side: for using magic outside the school and from the news that a notorious criminal, Sirius Black (Gary Oldman), has escaped the wizard's prison at Azkaban and apparently is headed for Harry. The school calls in supernatural help against Black in the form of Dementors, but unusual things continue to put Harry in peril. He is thrown into a confusing panoply of shifting alliegences and shifting shapes where nobody is who or what they seem. Who is the real criminal? What is the real crime? Who is telling or knows the truth?

Why It Wickedly Rocks

 * 1) Like the previous 2 movies, it follows the book in almost everything.
 * 2) Outstanding and beautiful direction from Alfonso Cuarón; he notably left his own touch on the movie's aspect and you can tell he must've had a great time directing the movie.
 * 3) The cinematography looks stunning and gorgeous.
 * 4) It expands the worldbuilding in a fantastic way:
 * 5) *We get to know the background of how Harry's parents died due to a betrayal.
 * 6) *We get to know about Harry's father inner circle known as "the Marauders".
 * 7) *We see new and cool creatures and objects such as Buckbeak the hypogriff (a mix between horse and eagle), the Boggarts (creatures that transform into a person's worst fear), and the Marauders Map (an enchanted map that shows every corner of Hogwarts castle, as well as the people who are there and what they're doing).
 * 8) The Dementors are very scary villains and the way they were adapted from the books was very effective.
 * 9) * One of the things that makes them quite intimidating is their powers and backstory: They feed on people's deep fear by attacking them and once they have them at their mercy, they give them "the dementor's kiss": They extract the soul from your body leaving it completely empty without any self-sense, memories, and anything, leaving you as an empty shell. It's considered as a fate worse than death.
 * 10) The score is very memorable.
 * 11) The CGI was great for its time.
 * 12) Great acting, specially from Daniel Radcliffe, David Thewlis, and Gary Oldman.
 * 13) Many cool and interesting new characters; like Remus Lupin and Sirius Black.
 * 14) The film gives a whole new darker tone and vibe than the previous two movies, while staying lighthearted.
 * 15) A great plot twist where it's revealed that Sirius Black didn't give up Harry's parents, but was instead Peter Pettigrew, who was Ron's rat, Scabbers, the whole time. When you think about it, this movie actually managed to pull both a twist-villain and a twist-hero in a good way, with Sirius turning out to be a good man who cares for Harry while Peter Pettigrew turns out to be the man who betrayed Harry's parents.
 * 16) Very beautiful and cool scenes; particularly Harry flying on Buckbeak above Hogwarts, the entire time-traveling sequence, and Harry using the Patronus enchantment to fight the dementors.
 * 17) Despite its much darker tone, it still has some humorous moments like the scene of Aunt Marge blowing up, the sequence at the Knight Bus, Harry discovering the monster book, and the scene with the Boggart.
 * 18) Heartwarming Ending: Harry and Hermione mange to save both Buckbeak and Sirius from death, while the latter assumes a paternal figure for Harry; and finally, Sirius sends him a brand-new Firebolt as a present for rescuing him.
 * 19) It has shown to be a popular favorite in the Harry Potter fanbase.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) Fans of Richard Harris might be upset due to him being replaced (because of his death) with Michael Gambon, Michael is doing a very great job though.
 * 2) Many of the film's drastic changes from the book were not welcome to some:
 * 3) * The excision of the explanation of the identities of Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs, which confused many moviegoers who hadn't read the books. Especially since it would have been relatively simple to slip into Lupin's final scene.
 * 4) * The talking Shrunken Head on the Knight Bus.
 * 5) * Ron losing his moment of standing up for Harry in front of a supposedly-murderous Sirius, with a broken leg, to Hermione, who, unlike Ron, had already had no shortage of moments to shine in the films.
 * 6) * The Dementors are growling, hissing, flying ghouls who, while effective for what they are, are just classic horror-monsters — as opposed to the books' disturbing, otherworldly beings who didn't need to pose any physical threat, or even move at any speed, because the mental effects of their sheer presence was enough to incapacitate their enemies. The changes to their design and behavior also make them more animalistic, even though they are sentient humanoids in the books — albeit ones much weirder and more threatening than Goblins or Elves.
 * 7) The characters also do some notable dumb things.
 * 8) * Sirius, who knew of Lupin's condition, tries to calm down Lupin not by immediately transforming into a dog, but by trying to remind him of his humanity. You would think if he knew Lupin as a boy and knew about the transformation he would know those kind of appeals don't work. (Not even taking into account the Marauders backstory that the film never mentions.) Remedied when he transforms soon after to draw Lupin away from the kids.
 * 9) * Hermione, who was the one who guessed Lupin was a werewolf after Snape's homework assignment, tries to approach Lupin once he's transformed. Bare in mind, in the classroom scene with Snape, she tells of how werewolves can't remember who they are when they transform, so why did she do that?

Reception
Prisoner of Azkaban is often regarded by critics and fans alike as the best film in the series. On Rotten Tomatoes the film has an approval rating of 90% based on 259 reviews, with an average rating of 7.8/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "Under the assured direction of Alfonso Cuarón, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban triumphantly strikes a delicate balance between technical wizardry and complex storytelling." On Metacritic the film has a weighted average score of 82 out of 100, based on 40 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale.

Despite this half the fanbase considers this one of the best (if not the best) Harry Potter film in the franchise, or at least when the Harry Potter films started getting good. The other half considers this movie to be one of the worst (if not the worst) Harry Potter film in the franchise. The film was mostly better received by critics than the first two, although it was the first HP film not to get four stars from Roger Ebert.