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Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban is where the Harry Potter franchise was finally infused with some visual flair, and it needed it. Without Alfonso Cuaron the franchise would not be where it is today.

I love all of the movies in the Harry Potter franchise, and I enjoy this movie, but I think this is the one film where the complications of the story didn’t translate quite the same to the screen. While the first two films in the series left the most out from the books, the third story is one of the more complex and hard to translate. Half-Blood Prince may have been difficult because so much is told in flashback, but Prisoner of Azkaban has the unique issue of showing the last act twice because Harry and Hermione go back in time to stop events from happening. It’s challenging to show your audience almost identical events in the same film and while it comes across on screen it’s much more intriguing in the book.

Harry: Professor, why do the dementors affect me so? More than anyone else, I mean?
Professor Lupin: Listen, dementors are among the foulest creatures to walk this earth. They feed on every good feeling, every happy memory until a person is left with nothing but his worst experiences. The dementors affect you more than others because there are true horrors in your past, horrors your classmates can scarcely imagine. You are not weak, Harry. You have nothing to be ashamed of.

If I made a list of the most perfect films ever made Children of Men would be one of the films on that list. In 2006 I truly believe that the best film of the year was not even nominated for Best Picture.

Forty years into the future a dystrophic society has emerged; Brittan is forcing immigrants out of the borders, distributing suicide kits to the public and insisting that while the rest of the world has fallen apart they are soldiering on. However, the fact that the human race is now infertile is the ticking time bomb weighing on the mind of the global society, unless it can be fixed humanity will just die out with a sigh, and so far no one can do anything about it. After the world’s youngest person dies Theo is approached by his ex-wife to help in getting a young refugee across the border so that she can meet up with the Human Project, a group of scientists that are working against the destruction of society. On the way Theo’s ex is killed and Theo discovers what is truly at stake – Kee, the refugee is pregnant & she needs to get to the Human Project because this baby could save the human race.

Alfonso Cuaron is one of the best directors working today and Children of Men is his masterpiece. There is not a single thing that does not awe me about this movie; the acting, script, camera work, cinematography & even the costuming is brilliant and completely immersive. This is one of the single most impressive films I’ve ever seen. Part of what Cuaron does to draw you as an audience member in is to build organic sequences that can last for 3-5 minutes or longer without a single edit; in a MTV world this is alarmingly subtle because while the shots stand out when noticed they are so expertly done that they draw you in and have so much energy and movement to them most people don’t know there are no edits.

I also have to say that for the first time in watching a movie with Julianne Moore I enjoyed her character and performance, in fact I was actually upset that she wasn’t in the film more. What can I say? I know she’s a good actress, but Jurassic Park 2 rubbed me the wrong way and she’s annoyed me ever since. Julian is a smart, independent, driven character and Moore was the perfect actress for the part.

I want Cuaron to make another feature film, but I don’t know how his next feature can top Children of Men. I truly don’t think anyone but Cuaron could have made this film, and that if even one element had been changed it would not be nearly the film it is. This is a text book example of a perfect film.

Director: Alfonso Cuaron
Writers: Alsono Cuaron, Timothy J. Sexton, David Arata, Mark Fergus & Hawk Ostby
Theo: Clive Owen
Jasper: Michael Caine
Luke: Chiwetel Ejiofor
Julian: Julianne Moore
Kee: Clare-Hope Ashitey

Miriam: As the sound of the playgrounds faded, the despair set in. Very odd, what happens in a world without children's voices.

About to go off to university two teenage boys mourn the loss of their girlfriends to a post-graduation Europe trip and decide to impress the more mature female cousin of one by taking her on a road trip to “Heaven’s Mouth”, a beach several days away. During their journey the men fight over the woman and she manipulates them finally culminating in the carnal distraction she is after due to the dissolving of her marriage.

Y Tu Mama Tambien is a movie I respect because of the skill put into it by director Alfonso Cuaron, but it is not a movie that I can say I enjoy. The subject matter is quite dark and sexually charged, which I understand that Cuaron was making a very real movie about the complexity of betrayal, relationships and life, but I am not someone who will watch a film this heavy over and over. I truly appreciate the genuinely directed and written situations between these three characters, but seeing their journey once was enough for me to absorb it.

What I genuinely loved about Y Tu Mama Tambien was the use of the omniscient narrator; I can’t recall the last film I saw an omniscient narrator in that fit and made sense, but it worked perfectly for Y Tu Mama Tambien. For those who don’t know what an omniscient narrator does is totally different than what a regular narrator does; a traditional narrator will tell you what’s happening now, what our characters are thinking and the standard fare. An omniscient narrator does much more, he is an all seeing film-centric god who can tell you anything from the standard fare, past and future facts or even things seemingly unrelated to the story unfolding on screen. For this film Cuaron has the narrator tell the audience of the past of our characters and begin to tell us the future that lies ahead of them. It’s a fascinating look at how their backgrounds affect their present, and how their present will affect their future.

Y Tu Mama Tambien is the film that launched Cuaron’s career internationally and it’s pretty easy to see why. This is the kind of film that is so well put together it attracts attention from scholars, critics, the industry and film coinsures; it’s a film with a clear message about the fleeting nature of life and that is a message that is universal.

Director: Alfonso Cuaron
Writers: Alfonso & Carlos Cuaron
Tenoch: Diego Luna
Julio: Gael Garcia Bernal

Julio: Truth is cool but unattainable... the truth is totally amazing, but you can't ever reach it.

This is not Shirley Temple’s A Little Princess, it’s the classic you know, re-told with a greater sense of fantasy.

Sara Crewe is pulled out of India where her soldier father is stationed and sent to a school for girls in the U.S. while her father helps the British army fight in WWI. After a few months of the dean Miss Minchin spending Sara’s money they are informed Sara’s father was killed in action. Instead of throwing Sara into the street Miss Minchin forces Sara into servitude. What no one knows is that Sara’s father survived but has amnesia and doesn’t know he even has a daughter…

Alfonso Cuaron is one of my favorite directors, and strangely enough this is the movie I discovered him with. I used to work at a video store, and one of the free screeners we received was A Little Princess; I didn’t remember Curaon’s name after watching the film, but I remembered his visuals. A Little Princess is one of the most stunningly visual children’s films I have ever seen. The name didn’t come back to my attention until he was given Prisoner of Azkaban.

No film based around a child character can really work unless you have a compelling child actor; great examples of this are The Phantom Menace & The Sixth Sense - one of those worked and one didn’t…I’ll let you guess which is which. A Little Princess is helmed by a good child actress – Liesel Matthews. Matthews hasn’t done much in the acting world since A Little Princess but I think perhaps that’s because she developed other interests as she grew up.

A Little Princess is not Cuaron’s best film, but now that I’ve seen most of his films I can safely say that Cuaron has not made a bad film.

Director: Alfonso Cuaron
Writers: Richard LaGravenese & Elizabeth Chandler
Sara Crewe: Liesel Matthews
Miss Minchin: Eleanor Bron
Capt. Crewe: Liam Cunningham

Miss Minchin: Don't tell me you still fancy yourself a princess? Child, look around you! Or better yet, look in the mirror.
Sara Crewe: I am a princess. All girls are. Even if they live in tiny old attics. Even if they dress in rags, even if they aren't pretty, or smart, or young. They're still princesses. All of us. Didn't your father ever tell you that? Didn't he?

In Harry Potter’s third year at Hogwarts life does not get easier. In fact he finds out that mass murderer Sirius Black has escaped Azkaban prison and is dead set on finding him. As the year marches on Hermione seems to be everywhere at once, the Divinity professor drives Harry & Ron crazy with forebodings of doom, and the three friends discover that perhaps there is a mysterious secret the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher is hiding. Much to Dumbledore’s chagrin, the Ministry of Magic begins to interfere with Hogwarts by sending Azkaban’s Dementors to protect the school from Sirius Black.

Part of what I love about each installment of the Harry Potter series is the new cast that gets added to each film. In The Prisoner of Azkaban we get Gary Oldman as Sirius Black, Emma Thompson as Professor Trelawney. They are great characters and fabulous actors that become enjoyable parts of the rest of the series. Also, Azkaban is the first film with Michael Gambon as Dulbledore; Richard Harris died between films two and three and Gambon masterfully fills his shoes and still makes the role his own.

The Prisoner of Azkaban is also the first in the series to be directed by someone other than Chris Columbus, and let me say I shouted “halleluiah” when I found out he was not going to do all of the films. For this film the masterful Alfonso Cuaron took the reins and for the first time the Harry Potter series had something is never had in the earlier films – atmosphere. Suddenly, Harry was the dark, tousled boy he always was in the books, and the world was not as shiny and friendly as Chris Columbus portrayed it in the first two films. This film was a directorial turning point in the series, and while Azkaban is one of the weakest in terms of what it does to the franchise in continuity, it gave the series the starts of the tone that needed to be set.

While I do think that the front end of the Harry Potter films were weaker than the later films there is no bad film in the Harry Potter franchise. I am excited to see how the films finish out.

Director: Alfonso Cuaron
Writer: Steve Kloves
Harry: Daniel Radcliffe
Sirius Black: Gary Oldman
Ron: Rupert Grint
Hermione: Emma Watson
Professor Lupin: David Thewlis
Dumbldore: Michael Gambon
Professor Snape: Alan Rickman
Professor McGonogall: Maggie Smith
Hagrid: Robbie Coltrane
Professor Trelawney: Emma Thompson

Harry: He was their friend, and he betrayed them. He was their *friend*! I hope he finds me! Cause when he does, I'm gonna be ready. When he does, I'm gonna kill him!