Theatrical Reviews
 Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
"Visuals and characters are Harry Potter’s strength. The kiddies are well acted and even better directed. Missing is some of the bad child acting we have come to expect from any film not featuring the kid genius from The Sixth Sense. The teachers too are fun to watch. All of them are typical crazy old wizards and charming giants with not much personality, but a great deal of flair. Alan Rickman is most noteworthy as a particularly mysterious teacher with something devious hidden beneath his cape. Then of course, there’s the obligatory John Cleese cameo, without which no modern film is truly complete." -Joshua Tyler
 Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
"If he wasn’t going to give this thing more life, more emotion, Columbus needed to at least find a way to recapture that sort of wide-eyed wonder that helped carry the first film. Instead, he’s tried to make it darker and more muted, befitting, I’m told, the tone of the book itself. I say tried, because there really isn’t all that much different from the last, except perhaps there’s less bright and cheery lighting about. Oh some students get petrified and a cat gets hung up by it’s tail, but I don’t really see anything to make me think this is somehow the darker and more moody film that Columbus was going for. Instead, the wonder and magic of the series is only half there, with only a few scant sequences to really make your eyes pop out." - Joshua Tyler
 Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
"Alfonso Cuarón “gets” Harry Potter and as a result Azkaban is more than just the middle of the road kiddie-tainment Chamber of Secrets and Sorcerer’s Stone regurgitated. Azkaban still suffers from many of the annoying and fuzzy plot holes that anything attached to this franchise suffers. However, Cuarón’s vision is so strong and his execution so bright that it easily overwhelms the unavoidable bevy of illogical plot progressions that J.K. Rowling’s stories have already built in. This is a darker, edgier movie that’ll let even adults enjoy Harry Potter. Cuarón brings the Harry Potter series to life in a beautiful and living way we’ve never seen before." - Joshua Tyler
 Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
"Look, it really doesn't matter what I say about any of this. If you're a Harry Potter fan you're going to go see it (in fact you've probably already seen it) and you're going to love it. This is a solid outing for the boy who lived, better in any case than the rather sometimes boring ones Columbus saddled us with. It's not quite the success of Cuaron's version though. It's too long in places, and drags when it should soar. It's rated PG-13, but Newell really never takes advantage of that heftier rating. If you're going to go PG-13, might as well go all the way. Instead Goblet of Fire kind of lives in that place between PG and PG-13, one not-so-grizzly death less and it probably would have been PG." - Joshua Tyler
DVD Reviews
 Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
"Franchise newcomer Alfonso Cuarón breathes a much needed breath of fresh air into the universe of Harry Potter. Under his direction, Hogwarts truly comes alive, for the first time resembling what I’d always expected from the books. Ghosts roam the halls playfully, almost unaware of the breathing inhabitants around them. The images in paintings move from picture to picture and interact with each other and the humans. In Hogsmead and Diagon Alley, wizards use magic with such frequency it’s mundane to them, and one could spend hours rewatching scenes and catching all the little magical tricks the camera doesn’t focus on. Cuarón’s takes everything Chris Columbus did in the previous two films to the next level, making his world for Harry the place of wonder it should have been in these films from day one." - Rafe Telsch
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Let’s just get the gag out of the way now: we’re all just wild about Harry.
