Ahhhh, the difficult second album. How many sequels can honestly say that they’ve surpassed the first? TERMINATOR II, GODFATHER II and JURASSIC PARK II (hey, I’m clearly joking. Part III of all those franchises were the best ones). So could HARRY POTTER AND THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS improve on the original? Well, yes frankly. The kids’ acting is better, the spiders and the Whomping Willow debut, a slapstick, masochistic midget turns up and best of all, Kenneth muthaf**kin Branagh, yo. But before we saw the film, we saw the poster. Surely there hasn’t been so much phallic comparison since Dirty Harry first said ‘Oooh what a big magnum I’ve got.’ I mean, look. We see Harry’s proud, erect Sword of Gryffindor standing firm and dominant, then we voyeuristically turn our gaze to poor Ron, and his limp, flaccid, broken little wand. Freud would prolapse over this poster. Whose will Hermione prefer? Only time will tell.
The first thing we encounter during the movie is Harry’s much deeper voice. It seems The Boy Who Lived has gone through a lot of changes in the last year. His balls seem to have dropped like Neville under a Petrificus Totalus (could that be the nerdiest line I’ve ever written?). Likewise, when Ron and those zany twins come to rescue Harry, we find his voice is now as low as the ankle socks on an ant. In a ditch. In the low countries. Basically they hit puberty. It’s particularly noticeable when you watch the films back to back, and becomes a theme throughout the series. The best transformation is that of Neville, who, over the course of the films, looks like a different person, even more so than Dumbledore.
Now, when discussing HPATCOS, you can’t not mention Dobby the house elf. He is one of those Marmite characters, as he has a yeast infection. Also, you either love him or hate him. After nearly ten years, I’m still on the fence regarding Dobby. Alright, he has a good heart and he’s trying to help Harry, but does he have to be such a nob about it? He does have a compelling story arch, though, both in this film as a stand alone and up until his final appearance in DEATHLY HALLOWS P1. In both instances he has a heroic exit, saving Harry and standing up to his evil masters. As he stands defiant over Lucious, arms crossed, protecting his friend, you can’t help but have some admiration for the brave little fella. And yet, part of me still wants to grab a wand and shout ‘Fuckoffus Bellendioso!’
Also in the first fifteen minutes, we get to meet more of the Weasley family. Ron, Percy and the twins we already know from Hogwarts the previous year. But now we get more time with Mrs. Weasly, the fabulous Julie Walters, and are properly introduced to Bonnie Wright’s Ginny Weasley. It’s easy to miss her in the first film when she was ever so teeny tiny, but she’s there at the station, wishing Harry good luck as he runs at the magical wall. It’s in HPATCOS that she blossoms into a lead character, and she’s not the only seed planted in the first film to grow into a… small… tree (sorry, that metaphor ran out of steam pretty quickly) in the second movie. Remember when Harry talked to a snake in the opening act of PHILOSOPHER’S STONE? That comes to fruition here too. But back to the Weasleys. It’s here that we meet patriarch Arthur, played by fellow British comedy favourite Mark William, who instantly endears himself to Harry and the audience by excitedly asking about their trip in the flying car, much to Molly’s chagrin.
All this takes place in the family home, The Burrow, which is one of the great new sets introduced in this film, the other main one being The Chamber of Secrets itself. The art department did an a terrific job, creating an air of warmth and wackiness, which encapsulates both The Burrow and the Weasleys as a family. You can’t help but like them, particularly Fred and George who are consistently successful as comic relief throughout the series. I suspect that more tears will be shed for Fred than any other character in DEATHLY HALLOWS P2, but until then we have six more movies worth of Weasley twins capering to enjoy.
It’s in Diagon Alley that we meet Hermione again (just another four years or so, everybody) and we’re introduced to two new characters. First, the sssss-spectacularly ssssss- sibilant Lucious Malfoy, father of the dastardly and particularly arian Draco. Jassssssssson Issssssssacs clearly relishes playing someone so insidious, hissing his deliciously serpant-like dialogue. He comes across as a truly nasty piece of work, bullying and demeaning the poor Weasleys. He couldn’t come across as more instantly unlikeable if he spray painted a swastika over a baby’s face. He pops up throughout the sequels, oozing malevolence, but he never matches how unpleasant he is here, probably because in this film, our heroes look (because they are) so tiny and young, which makes his bullying and elitism all the more alarming and horribly satisfying.
In the same sequence no less, we meet one of my all time favourite Potter characters. The fantastically over the top, celeb wizard adventurer and author, Gilderoy Lockhart, played with borderline comic genius by Kenneth Branagh. Its been said that he is funny but essentially hollow, but I feel this isn’t giving the character or the actor anywhere near enough credit. He embodies so many different aspects. Obviously shallow celebrity culture, comedy cowardice, intelligence over run by arrogance, these are not new facets to any character, but Branagh plays them beyond the limits while remaining utterly believable. The flicks of his curls, the pointing and the winking, everyone of these is a Brechtian gestus, a tiny gesture which says so much about the character’s attitudes and ways of being. This is summed up beautifully during Lockhart’s entrance into the Defence Against the Dark Arts class, where he passes a painting of himself painting a picture of himself, and they wink at each other.
He also represents what Harry could become, were Harry to embrace the dark side. Not that of Voldemort, but celebrity culture. Potter is just as famous as Lockhart, maybe more so, and Lockhart attempts to mentor him in the ways of fame, offering such pearls of wisdom as ‘celebrity is as celebrity does.’ We know there’s no chance of our hero ending up like Lockhart, but it is one of the many paths he could take, which is a theme explored in later films. For those who haven’t seen HPATCOS, I shan’t give away Lockhart’s secret. But it makes him one of the more interesting villains, as he is not motivated by evil, is not a killer and doesn’t actually mean any harm to anyone. He seems to genuinely like Harry and is regretful when he turns on him, but turn on him he must when he is discovered. Lockhart’s self promotion and self preservation are what make him such a dick, and what this series does so well is not divide people into easy categories of good and bad. It’s not just Harry and his allies versus Voldemort and his, characters do exist outside of that duality. Lockhart is memorable for that, but more so for being a joy to watch and a true scene stealer.
Other than Branagh’s stand out performance, the other most memorable aspect of HPATCOS is Aragog and the spider sequence. As soon as Hagrid tells our heroes to ‘follow the spiders,’ you know the sh*t is gonna go down. And go down the sh*t does. As Harry and Ron wander into the Forbidden Forest, they’re stalked by some horribly good CG giant arachnids, but it’s when they meet Aragog, Hagrid’s mahooooosive pet spider that the chills really start to run. I think it’s because he’s really there. As he doesn’t have to move much, the art department created an actual physical giant f**king spider to interact with the actors, so that bastard was real and probably helped Radcliffe and Grint achieve their levels of fear. They gradually become surrounded by CG spuds and man, I remember the screams of the kids in the cinema as they chase, scuttle and jump (f**king full on leap) after the poor children. That’s CHILDREN that are almost eaten alive by these eight legged freaks. It’s a horrific scene and really well executed, and having read this paragraph back I realise how much I swore. I think I was swearing to myself under my breath at the cinema out of pure panic. That’s gotta be a sign that it worked, and I suspect I may do the same as the b*stards are set to return for the big finale in DEATHLY HALLOWS P2. F**king ugh.
(That Pulitzer is MINE, I can feel it!)
If I had time, I would go into, y’know, plot and such. The diary, the flash backs, Tom Riddle and what not. I should probably mention the big finale in the Chamber where Harry pounds the python, and the other seeds planted like the first Horcrux, the Sword of Gryffindor and the Basilisk fang. But as fate would have it, it’s the premiere of DEATHLY HALLOWS P2 tonight and the live stream starts any moment. I can’t miss the last ever one I’ll be damned if I’m gonna wait longer than necessary to see whatever Emma Watson will be wearing. See you in Azkaban! x
