 That is essentially the film in a nutshell, a bunch of Ron Mink in a stupid face, and a buttload of Dutch angles. Hey guys this is my review for Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. This is one of my favorite stories in the entire Harry Potter series and I think this is because this is a nostalgia overload in terms of what it was for me as a kid. This was the peak of Harry Potter fandom for me, I was really into the books at this point, as well as the Chamber of Secrets video game. I mentioned that in the last review, but honestly guys this was one of my, still is one of my favorite video games of all time because it let you explore the world of Hogwarts, it let you go on a majority of the entire film's sort of narrative. I just love this game and I think that did give me a bit of rose-tinted glass as when it came to this film because this film is not as good as I remember it being. Don't get me wrong, it's still a very fun and enjoyable film, it's also the longest one and you feel it. However it is a very joyous sort of experience if completely over-dramatized and it's not just Gildroy. Even though I hated Gildroy Lockhart as a character when I was a kid, watching it now again seeing Kenneth Brennan do it, I actually love the character even more. From his over-dramatic characteristics to his just completely scummy attitude to his absolutely fabulous attire in the film, he actually goes to being one of my more celebrated characters of this film because he is essentially a compass of what this whole film is. They changed the DOP for this film because the kids were a little bit better at acting so they were able to add a little bit of variety and the variety is literally just doing this with the camera angle, just butt-load of Dutch angles. And there's a lot of exposition in this film, there's massive exposition dumps that just kind of come out of nowhere and hit you like a truck. There are some very, very corny moments in this movie ranging from Ginny's first reaction to Harry to every single scene with Lucius Malfoy in it. My god, is he over-dramatic. He makes Kenneth Brennan look like he's underhanding it because of how over the top he is, especially at the end of the film where he almost kills Harry Potter over giving his house elf a sock. Which by the way, Potter, Potter, Potter, Potter, Potter. The amount of times that is said throughout this film gets a bit arduous. It is a cool story, it's a cool mystery, you can see that Rowling was trying to take it in a little bit more of an investigative, more mystery sort of children's story tone and I do appreciate that. I was a big fan of the Hardy Boys when I was a kid so the whole figuring out who Tom Riddle was, figuring out what the Basilisk was, figuring out just how the chamber was being opened has always been a cool little mystery to me. Yeah, it gets exposition dumped just like every other kind of mystery story does but it was still an enjoyable experience and funny enough it's a mystery story that I enjoy watching over and over again. Some of the visuals have updated themselves, like I said they were able to do a little bit more dramatic camera angles in terms of the DOP, however you notice that this guy never comes back. It's pretty evident as to why because all he could ever think of was Dutch angles and that's just, it's a very archaic form of visual storytelling now that it's not cool anymore to just keep doing Dutch angles, technically Battlefield Earth ruined it for everyone but this guy just does it too much. The acting from all of the kid actors definitely improves, it's been a year now so they've gotten used to the experience, all of them do a lot better, even Emma Watson does a little bit better in this film too and I do find that certain parts have upgraded themselves and there's also just really good special effects in this film, ranging from Dobby being a pretty breakthrough thing even though people were kind of comparing him to Gollum but Gollum had a lot more work to it, Ergon, Fox, all of the production sets including the Chamber of Secrets, all really, really cool and very, very cool visual elements. The Quidditch match is also very cool, a much more upgraded version of the sport that's just so embedded in Harry Potter culture but again, things just don't come off as well. You can see that Columbus was kind of just going with the first takes on a few things because some lines just don't come off well, certain characters don't get a lot of explanation to them and certain elements of the film are completely mitigating in things that were very necessary to the novel, mainly being Ginny. Ginny is in the beginning of this movie and that she's at the end kind of because she has to be. For a character that's so pivotal to what's going on, she's completely absent from the entire mystery aspect of the story and that doesn't really bode well in terms of the overall twist. We kind of guessed it was going to be Ginny from the very onset because of how little she's in this film and also there's going to be a few departures from this film. Obviously Albus Dumbledore is not going to be played by Richard Harris after this film because he passed away and I actually could see that he was reading lines again at one point in this film. Also Wood, the captain of the Quidditch team, he just disappears after this. I can't remember exactly what happened to him in the books but I always was upset because I like the actor who played Wood. We're also going to be seeing big departures in the third film in terms of place setting, costume design, how the film and the world is visually told. I do like Chamber of Secrets, Don't Get Me Wrong. It's the biggest hit to me when it comes to Harry Potter fandom. It was the peak for me. I remember reading the book again before the film came out and just thinking I wish that this world was real to the point where I think I had a slight crisis as well as the video game too. I'd love the video game if I could ever do a live or capture or a recording of me playing any video game it would be this one but I don't really know how to do that. Maybe it might be something I could do in the future but we'll see. Either way though Chamber of Secrets is still fun but it's definitely more set for Harry Potter fans rather than actual film going fans and even then it's a little bit of a stretch and while I have denied it for a long time I admit that Prisoner of Azkaban is going to be a breath of fresh air for this series and it happens far before the books did so that's also something that's going to be pretty evident. So in the end I'm going to give the Chamber of Secrets a 4 out of 7. It's fun, it's cheesy, some people don't enjoy it and I understand as to why. It is one of my favorite films in the series to me but at the same time this was also because of where I was at that place and time in my life. So anyways guys I hope you enjoyed this review if you did leave a like and if you're interested in more subscribe. Prisoner of Azkaban is coming up next so make sure to stay tuned and I'll see you guys on the next one. Thanks for watching the video my name is Knitz and you might remember me from the animated cult classic TV show Undergrads. It's been a while but I'm happy to say the click is finally getting back together in an all-new movie thanks to a successful Kickstarter campaign but we are still asking for your support. To see any and all updates about the upcoming Undergrads movie be sure to check out and like the Bring Back Undergrads Facebook page and with any luck we'll see you guys soon.