Harry Potter and The Higher Budget Than The First One.

Alright, I'll admit it. The first one was alright. A fun family film that you might stick on at Christmas with the box of Quality Street. Enough to build a whole theme park in Watford about? Not so much. With this continuing lack of understanding, I continue with the saga:

Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets or as it probably should have been called - The one you probably shouldn't watch with the kid because it's full of scary bits.

We start in exactly the same place. In fact, it's as if the first film hasn't even happened.Harry is at home with his adoptive family (probably couldn't afford the Travel Lodge) and they still hate him. Fair to say they reason to this time after the whole lighthouse incident of last year. Suddenly there is a small bald elf on Harry's bed. For clarification this is a 'house elf'. I can only assume regular elven creatures are not allowed in homes. In all honesty, I'm surprised this elf is allowed in a house as his first moments include an annoying spate of talking in the first person and a lot of rather mean behaviour aimed at our dear Harry with insults such as 'you have no friends' + 'nobody at school likes you'. I paraphrase of course. None the less, a tad rude.

Of course, Harry is upset at this news. He'd put in a year's hard graft with Hermione and he'd probably miss Ron and the other less important members of the gang as well. Of course, we've all seen the poster and we know that this can't be the case. At that exact moment, Ron rolls up in his new motor. But this ain't no ordinary motor. No, this is a flying motor with a mission. Jailbreak!

That's it Ron. Just back it up there. Plenty of room, mate. During the ruckus of Harry climbing from his barred up bedroom, an elderly man falls from a second floor window to the ground below. He's probably fine.

We rock up at Ron's and we get to see a fun new wizarding transport system. By standing in a fireplace and throwing some magic fairy dust on your feet, the passenger then shoots off to the destination that they shout. Harry decides to balls this up and ends up in a scary museum. Luckily for him, Hagrid is there to pick him up. That's convenient eh. In another act of sheer convenience for the plot, Hermione is just outside the door. She fixes his glasses with a swift Oculus Repairum and leads him by the hand to a shop she wants to go in. Women eh. 

(Ending prediction: Harry and Hermione get married in an oddball wizard church.)

In this shop, everyone knows Harry again. Tom from McFly wants to start a fight with Harry but small female Ron is there and she's got Harry's back. She's my new favourite character. Then in struts Jason Isaacs and he's a bit rude to everyone. Fun fact, I saw him at Old Trafford once. Seems nicer in real life. 

Back to Kings Cross we go. Hoorah, small female Ron is also going to Hogwarts this year. Bad news is, Ron and Harry miss their train and they had a timed ticket. No way round that these days. No refunds. Oh wait. Good thing we have that magic flying car from earlier in the film. Alas, they crash it into a tree. Clearly not content with a tree crash, the film maker's bring the tree to life and it fights back. The car has had enough of this nonsense and drives itself off into the woods. 

Best Cameo of the film: Nomination #1 - Screaming Baby Trees. 

Best Cameo of the film: Nomination #2 - Awesome Tiny Blue Pixies. (Frozen in the air awesome tony blue pixies are even better) 

Fair to say a quick 'this is a school, better show some lessons' scenes including our new friends above are a benefit of the higher budget than the first one. Now for some character development and despite the shock and awe when Harry made the Quidditch team in the first one, it is perfectly acceptable that Tom from McFly is the new star of Slytherin. Reckon Jason Isaacs paid for that. Probably his Black Hawk Down money.

Narrowly missing out on a nomination for favourite character is the irritating little camera boy who likes to document everything. No one cares Colin.

44 minutes into the film and we get our title mention. A new record! Unfortunately, it comes at a cost as someone has killed the janitors cat and hung her from a railing. Gnarly. Hope they catch the blight that did that! The teachers all arrive to this horrific scene and immediately order everyone to leave because obviously no one should have to see this. Except for the three main characters. It's important that they stay. Obviously they need to learn that the Chamber of Secrets is a literal chamber, full of secrets. Who'd have guessed.

Quidditch match too and someone needs to fix the fixture computer. Gryffindor vs Slytherin again. This time however, we have a killer ball that has a mind of it's own. Harry ignores this and has great fun in catching the golden snitch for the second game running. However, the joy is swiftly interupted as our annoying little cameraman get's himself petrified. Oh dear.

One question that was not answered at any point is why is our new ghost friend, Moaning Myrtle, a 40 year old woman. Surely if she was a student when she died she was like 14?? Or maybe there is some kind of Hogwarts Masters programme. Or perhaps a mature student after a career change. Perhaps we'll find out later in the saga.

In an absolute shoo-in for worst character of the entire film, nay saga. The odd celebrity professor who is still yet to show us he can do anything. In this weeks Expeliamus class, he makes Harry speak like a snake. Which is apparently bad. Even Jinny won't talk to him now and I'm starting to feel lke she has a small crush on our eponymous hero.

Everyone forget's this however when Nearly Headless Nick and Seamus are both petrified. Are tiny spiders to blame? Maybe. In a bid to find out what the devil is going on at Hogwarts today, Harry goes on a little mission and finds our good friend The Sorting Hat!


                             

Hermione suddenly has a fantastic idea. She's been watching a little too much Mission Impossible as she decides the best way forward is to transform and pretend to be other people. Ron and Harry chane into Malfoy's henchman, it doesn't quite work for Hermione as she turns into a cat. More like Purr-mione. Am I right? Guys...

Harry has a word with a lad called Tom Riddle through a book and it turns out Hagrid and a massive spider are killing everyone. I feel like somethings amiss here. So much so that they've cancelled Quidditch game 3, which is apparently a rather big deal. In a sudden twist, Hermione is ruled out for the rest of the film as she is petrified by those darn tiny spiders.

Word get's out and Hagrid get's his P45. Time to follow those spiders! Turn's out there's this one big ass spider who talks and he's not happy. Oh well, the car is here to save them again. Good investment that. Saved their bacon many times. However there is more bad news upon their return to Hogwarts as Jinny has been taken. Dropping like flies now. Once again, Harry is the last man standing and he has to save the day. But how do we know who we are saving it from? Good thing your mate Tom is there to help, Harry.

Nope. Tom Riddle is Voldemort. Didn't see that coming. Genuinely. Always thought he was a bit of a tool. No time to worry about all that though as there is a massive snake that is about to get our Harry. It was the snake this whole time that was turning people to stone. All except Myrtle who died instead of turned to stone. Poor lass.

At this point JK had clearly written herself into a corner as there is no real way that Harry can get out of this. No wait, a sword magically appears. A sword that can kill giant snakes at that. Rather helpful really. After all this fun, the way to end everything was to just break the book that Voldemort/Tom Riddle was living in. Simples.


In another tally for the 'all a bit convenient' coloumn, Phoenix tears have healing powers and end up saving the day. Of course. Add to that the ending to this chapter as the faculty of Hogwarts announce that our troublesome trio have all broken many rules and should be expelled but because you saved the world just now, let's just have a party.

And that is it. The Chamber of Secrets is no more. Everyone is happy and we get back on the train to head home. Once again, I wonder where Harry thinks he is going. He ripped a large hole in the side of his adoptive family home last time he was there and that is before we even get to the fact that he inflated his aunt like a balloon and flew her up into the Surrey skies.

All in all, a fair sequel. Some fun new characters outweigh the scary spiders to give us an enjoyable two and a half hours. And all in all, I'm just glad Jinny lives to see another day.

Next up, an adventure to Azkaban. Tune in soon.