Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets: Movie & DVD Review (2002)

(Originally published 2002)

Imagine suffering the sort of hellish childhood Harry Potter has had to endure--the murder of his parents by the vicious Lord Voldemont, the feeling of being unwanted and unloved by his abusive relatives, a lightning bolt scar on his forehead and, when this review was originally written in 2002, the official condemnation of Maine's own Jesus Party.

Sure, that last one is worth a snort and a giggle, but when you add it all up, the totality of Harry's situation is enough to make any Muggle feel like a Mudblood.

Mr. Potter's gift--and the main reason he remains so popular--is that he has the courage to carry on in spite of life's potholes, rising above the seemingly insurmountable lows of his situation to scale new highs on his way to becoming a young man.

Getting there has been a tough scrabble, for sure, one peppered with a host of obstacles, such as giant spiders run amok, a towering serpent with a mean bite and a chess game gone berserk. But as "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" proves, it's an imaginative, often entertaining journey into self-realization that's been well worth the trip.

As the film opens, young Harry (Daniel Radcliffe), Ron Weasely (Rupert Grint) and Hermione Granger (Emma Watson), return to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry to learn that evil is looming deep within Hogwarts' Chamber of Secrets. Just what that evil is won't be revealed here, but it's potent and it's dark, just colorful enough to spark dread in any 8-year-old while keeping their parents pleasantly entertained.

The episodic storyline that ensues crams in as much of the book's more dramatic elements as possible while, in the process, sacrificing almost all of its subtlety, just as in the last film. Indeed, director Chris Columbus' focus is less on the book's more introspective moments than on the sort of crowd-pleasing scenes that tend to make a nearly three-hour movie seem more like two hours. Aiding that cause is production designer Stuart Craig, whose rich, beautiful sets are complex and interesting even during those moments when the film is neither.

Fortunately, “Secrets” allows Columbus the opportunity to freshen the pot with Rowling’s new characters, from Kenneth Branagh’s Gilderoy Lockhart, a preening wizard whose ego knows no bounds, to Jason Isaacs’ duplicitous Lucius Malfoy and the bathroom-dwelling Moaning Myrtle (Julie Walters Henderson), a dead girl with a hot temper who steals each scene she’s in.

With Robbie Coltrane back as Hagrid, Alan Rickman as Severus Snape and Maggie Smith as Minerva McGonagall, it’s Richard Harris’ posthumous performance as Prof. Albus Dumbledore that gives the film its unexpected emotional weight and its bittersweet undercurrent. The actor, who died three weeks before the film’s theatrical release, effortlessly grounds the movie, balancing Columbus’ frequently hysterical mood with the stalwart calm and reserve it needs.

Grade: B+