Got by the gobblers ......................

The one thing this film does really well is to give a stunning visual portrayal of Lyra's world - turn the soundtrack off and you couldn't want for better but that's about as far as it goes - you get a sense of the most tremendous lack of enthusiasm as the film goes on and performances become ever more wooden.This was always going to be a difficult film to make but above all it fails to establish the crucial nature of the relationship between humans and their daemons and all the cruelty and menace of the book is driven by that."Don't worry Billy" says Ma Costa to the severed child"we'll find your daemon." ........now that's really missing the point. If anything's had it's daemon cut away I think it's this film. -

Brilliant for all ages

This really is Disney back doing what it does best. A very clever mix of cartoon (like the original Disney classics) and real time, mixed very well. The actors all work well for the film, and enough humour to satisfy the adult viewer. A MUST SEE film!

Strictly for the Kids

After the recent spate of films for kids which contain adult humour too, it is strangely refreshing to view one which is unadulterated small child level. It does have 'cute' value, but for many the high pitched vocals may be slightly stressful. I'm afraid I was pushed to the edge by the mice in 'Babe', and they only clocked up 3 minutes screentime - so this was deeply traumatising!!
The story is basic; fate matches up troubled, unlucky guy with singing chipmunks - fame and fortune follow - unscrupulous record exec tries to spoil the relationship.
My six year old was transfixed for most of the film, although she seemed to lose interest toward the end.
Definately a weekend film for when you want 82 minutes to youself.
The kids will LOVE it.

I suspect nargals are behind it.

Based on the fifth book in J.K Rowling's"Harry Potter" series,"The Order of the Phoenix" first hit the big screen in 2007. The film opens with the end of the summer holidays approaching, in a playground close to the Dursley family home. Harry and Dudley are enjoying a little verbal sparring, which is unfortunately brought to a sharpish end when a group of Dementors attack the pair. Harry naturally performs the Patronus. However, this leads to a rapidly delivered letter from the Ministry, threatening our young hero with expulsion - although the cavalry, led by Moody and Tonks, aren't long in arriving. Harry is quickly escorted to 12 Grimmauld Place - the ancestral home of the Black family and headquarters to the Order of the Phoenix.

The Order of the Phoenix is a secret society formed by Dumbledore, consisting of people who had fought Voldemort previously. Its members include Mr and Mrs Weasley, Tonks, Professor Lupin, Mad Eye Mooney and Harry's godfather, Sirius. Harry's parents were also members, and Harry is quite keen to join the fight. However, it soon becomes clear there are differences of opinion within the Order on how much Harry should be involved - with his age being only a partial concern. Sirius, naturally, believes Harry should be told everything...however, it appears he's been kept in the dark on Dumbledore's instructions. Still, Harry is relieved to learn the threat of expulsion has been withdrawn - pending a hearing at the Ministry.

It proves to be a tough year for Harry. This year, he's due to sit his OWLs - wizard's exams - so his workload has increased dramatically. Things aren't made any easier by the series of nightmares he suffers from - generally centred around Voldemort. Furthermore, after the events outlined in"The Goblet of Fire", both Harry and Dumbledore are being viewed with scorn by the Ministry of Magic and the Daily Prophet. Neither organisation is willing to believe that Voldemort is back, fully recovered. Therefore, they're attacking anyone who says differently - Harry and Dumbledore are the two biggest targets. (Dumbledore reckons Fudge is anywhere but in his right mind - largely due to fear). As a result, it's barely a surprise that the Ministry decide to interfere at Hogwarts. Dolores Umbridge, a Ministry employee who is devoted to Fudge is appointed to the staff as Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. She proves to be an absolute nightmare : she loves pink, squeaks a great deal, oozes insincerity and inspires more contempt than even Malfoy. As the year progresses, she increasingly interferes with the running of Hogwarts, and bullying anyone she feels isn't following the party line. Additionally her teaching is woefully inadequate. She believes a purely theoretical approach to the Defence Against the Dark Arts will be sufficient as, she claims, there are no Dark Wizards the pupils need to defend themselves from.

Harry feels a real sense of isolation during the year - Dumbledore appears to be avoiding him, while Hagrid is missing for long stretches. Some of the other pupils feel his claims about Voldemort are making their lives unnecessarily complicated and, at times, he even pushes Ron and Hermione away. In fact, at times his letters to Sirius seem to be his only way of getting things off his chest. However, it's not all bad - he makes some nifty progress on the Cho front, and he also finds a new friend in Luna Lovegood. Luna, played by Evanna Lynch, totally steals the show. Luna is something of a conspiracy theorist and is picked on and gossiped about behind her back. However, for all the apparent ditziness, she occasionally gets things that no-one else does and is quite clever in an un-Hermione sort of way. She's also able to get through Harry's defences and offer him a bit of help and support just when he needs it the most.

Unsurprisingly, given the length of the book, not everything makes it into the film. Despite the fact there are OWLs on the horizon, nobody - not even Hermione - seems to be remotely concerned. There's no Quidditch and a little more time spent on Neville would have been nice. While Harry made big progress with Cho, I thought it odd that the post-mistletoe events were brushed over. However, the film is hugely enjoyable : in addition to Luna, Tonks is gorgeous, Gary Oldman was great as Sirius and Helena Bonham Carter was outstanding in her too-brief appearance as Bellatrix. (Hopefully, we'll get much more in the films to come). Some of the sets are fantastic too : Grimmauld Place is very stylish in a tatty and dusty sort of way, while the Ministry is hugely impressive. Great stuff overall, certainly recommended.

Who are the critics writing for?

This film has been not just panned, but viciously berated. No wonder it attracted such luke-warm success. I went dreading it, as His Dark Materials was one of those life-changing books in my life. Imagine my pleasure when I found the film incredibly well done. I just do not know what the critics were carping about. As with the Harry Potter films, there had to be HUGE compromises made to the two-hour limitation of a film, but The Golden Compass FAR OUTDID any of the Harry Potters in condensing a complex and hefty book into a comprehendible 2 hour film. I thought the short cuts and abridgments they did with the Golden Compass were entirely in keeping with and reverential to the book---it was brilliantly done. Sure, there are always differences in interpretations of individual characters on the screen (Craige is far too warm, Kidman should be dark, not blonde...) but the rest of the characters/actors were positively spot on, and Daniel Craig and Kidman did such excellent jobs otherwise capturing the essence of the characters in the minute periods of time they had, that you quickly lent them the benefit of the doubt for starting from a slightly different place than the book. Sure, thousands of details, and side stories were sacrificed to the film's abridgment, and sure, some stories were merged to help condense the story, but even these were masterfully done and retained the spirit of the story.
Hey! A two hour film can NEVER compete with a 600 page book. But it CAN capture some of the magic of a story and portray it with integrity. This film is a first rate film of a remarkable book. I, for one, cannot WAIT for the next two installments. Bravo.

Great but...

I love this film, and so will you if you have watched any of The Simpsons seasons, it should be worth 5 stars, I shouldnt have to be writing that it's not worthy of full marks, but the film is definately worth buying.
BTW - Funny scene Ned Flanders Hot Chocolate Scene.

Better than it had a right to be

Robots the size of houses, satisfyingly convincing transformations and plenty of combat action. Job done. But more than a little time and effort went into the characters, too. So it's not the two dimensional nonsense you might expect. There is a relatively light touch and plenty of throwaway one-liners to keep older viewers amused. Sam's inherited belongings hold the secret location of the life-giving Allspark cube. The transformer goodies and baddies are in a race to get there and humankind's future hangs in the balance.... of course. You get 4 threads to keep the variety going: Sam and Michaela are the teen team with Bumblebee transformer as their wheels. The government has an Aussie geek girl cracking computer viruses. An army squad becomes an unlucky target for evil transformers, and the shadowy Sector 7 knows more than it's letting on. Repeated viewings are pretty much guaranteed, so go for purchase, not rent.

Not just a children's film!

I originally was very sceptical about watching the film - it seemed like another Disney film but it actually is really good! It holds some adult humour which makes it more enjoyable and appeal to an older audience. It's not just for the kids! Most of all the film is funny, and it's definitely what you need when you're down, when you're bored or just need a boost! I really was shocked by how good this actually is! I want to buy a copy for myself and not just borrow my brothers'! Watch it, at the very least rent it if not buy it! :)

Bad enough on non Blu-Ray. Not worth paying even more for it.

This film is poor enough as it is. Why on earth would anyone want to spend even more money on a Blu-Ray version? The following review was written for the other DVD versions of this film.

Only if you've never read 'Northern lights' nor 'His Dark Materials' will this film be in any way worth watching. It is truly, TRULY awful - with 2 capital T's and a massive capital 'A'. The special features on Disc 2 are probably a better buy than the film itself, and then only if you haven't seen documentaries about the making of this type of film before.

I'm not in the least bit surprised that it wasn't a hit at the box office. It's also fairly obvious why, upon it's release, it was being sold off for less than £10 in local supermarkets. If you've not read the books or don't know the depth and breadth of the original stories, it may just be OK. But it's totally one-dimensional to the point of being almost insubstantial. The story as told in the film is shallow, totally linear and bereft of anything that could be called worthy of thought or consideration. The most obvious give-away is the frequency with which a narrator or one of the characters has to explain a major part of the storyline. (Always a bad sign). The first minutes of the film, for instance, are unrelated to the book - that starts in the room where Lyra and her daemon see the poison being put into the drink. The film starts with a narrator trying to explain a major part of the story that only becomes apparent during the first novel. The ending of the film has obviously been set up to lead into the next part - but if this film is anything to go by, I hope they abandon any thoughts of making another. It will be a complete waste of money.

With no disrespect to Blyton, 'The Golden Compass' is such a stripped-down, simplified and dull interpretation of Pullman's book that it is little better than an Enid Blyton version re-drafted for infants.

The two things they DID do well were the daemons and the Alethiometer. Although even there, they overdo the mystical golden dust images in which Lyra sees the answers to her questions.

The bears were OK, but a tad too obviously CGI. Mark you - that's better than men in furry suits.

And as for the song at the end - YEUK!!!! That is so appalingly inappropriate and just plain naff that it beggars belief. I well remember that ages before I saw the first Harry Potter film, I heard some music on the radio. I didn't know what it was, but I'd never heard it before and I remember thinking,"I bet that's the Harry Potter theme". And it was. Whoever wrote the music for 'Compass' ought to return their fee. It is instantly forgettable and has no motif nor character whatsoever.

Without a doubt, 'Compass' suffers dreadfully in comparison to the richness of the worlds created by JKR and in the ways in which those worlds are being brought to the screen in the sequential Potter films. The 'Compass' film makers just haven't had the vision, humour, imagination (or budget??) to get anywhere close and their feeble attempts to create so many varied and 'unusual' modes of transport make the whole thing look like a cheap sci-fi CGI movie of the time-traveller variety.

So, all-in-all, unless you like dreary, shallow fantasy films, or if you have never read or heard anything about the depth and breadth of both the storyline and the complex ideas in Pullman's work, then buy this DVD at your peril. Personally, I'm passing my own copy on to my daughter who will be advertising it for sale on Amazon!!!

A happy, upbeat film for everyone.

My daughter came back from visiting her friend and was raving about how much she loved this movie she had seen. As she is just 13 I'm conscientious of allowing her to see 'teen films' with adult issues, but as this is a Disney film I bought her a copy. We watched it together and I was really surprised to find that I enjoyed it. It tells the story of a romance between two high school students Troy and Gabriella, and their efforts to perform in the school play. The music is modern upbeat pop and is really catchy. This film is not about heavy or gritty issues. It is about the innocence of first love. It is a Grease Lite for the noughties generation, and I mean this as a good compliment. Just lovely!

Miserable clone of the original

The original National Treasure was a fun adventure film but the truth is that NC2 is almost identical except for being weaker at every turn. A classic case of"we made $x,000,000 with the original so if we repeat the formula EXACTLY we must make at least half that with the second one - no risk involved". You'd be better off just watching the original again.

blooming marvellous

wonderful. my 18 year old absolutely loves this programme. it keeps him quiet and contented and it just THE most perfect viewing after he's played with his superskunk. it sets him up nicely for some really intense hallucinations and out-there political opinion-forming. marvellous.

FABULOUS!!!!

I'm sure you all know the story by now so I'll keep it short - this movie ROCKS!!!

If you liked HSM you'll LOVE this - it's so lovely and summery and happy, and just makes you wanna get up and dance and sing! The soundtrack is really good - full of bright happy tunes, and the dancing and script are really fun to watch too. Plus Zac Efron is HOTT!! haha

So if you like a good, happy, cheesy musical to cheer you up every once in a while (...or everyday in my case!!) then buy this DVD!!!!

Enjoy :) xxx

Absolute Classic - And kids still love it

Our oldest (almost 3 years) loves Mr Benn! She is re-enacting his adventures pretending to be a pirate or a dinosaur and loves it.

It is nostalgic watching all those episodes again, it amazes me how much I still remembered.

This is a no-frill Mr Benn DVD, all episodes ever made, no extras, but who needs them anyway?

Best Kids Movie Of The Year ?

Is the Bee Movie the best animated movie we've ever seen? No. But, defying the critics, I took my 11 year old daughter (who didn't really want to go) and my 5 year old son to see the movie and we all really enjoyed it. Most importantly, the story and humor of the movie operates at multiple levels, so it appealed to all of us at our individual age level.

What is beyond dispute is that the visual feel of the movie is incredible. Some of the bee hive interior and flight scenes were just breathtaking. My kids were spellbound.

To me the best judge of a movie is how fast it moves along. This one kept us all entertained throughout and its 90 minute running time felt like half that. So, ignore the critics, and take your kids. They'll have a great time, and even if you're not a Seinfeld fan, so will you.

The little fella wasn't happy

Bought this for my boy and what can only be described as earth shattering noises expelled from his gob as he opened it. the wife insisted on it but I did tell her it was a girls film. Christmas was officially ruined. Thanks alot Amazon - you let me down. Again!

Martin

Reasonably family orientated fun

To be blunt, I get the feeling that people are looking for certain meanings in this show without getting the essential wonder of it. It isn't Dr Who, it isn't meant to be. Nor is it supposed to be War and Peace.

What this show has got going for it is the wow experience. Imagine if you could go back in time, and experience these creatures, these time frames, the Permian, the Cretaceous, the Jurassic, whenever? The cast is wholly believable as people brought together by unusual circumstances and trying to make some kind of sense of it all while trying not to unmake the world.

Created by the same guys who originally developed Walking with Dinosaurs, this programme opens up a world that personally, I wish I could explore. I love it simply for the breadth and depth of imagination, beautifully realised.

Best educational extras I've seen on a DVD

This DVD was worth the purchase for the Learn the Alphabet extra feature alone. This held the attention of my 3 year old and has the added bonus of being interactive. Simple for kids to navigate using arrow and OK buttons on your remote control.

dissapointed

I grew up with this novel, it was one of my favorites. I was really upset to find they couldn't stick to the story line, especially over the finding of the key and the garden. Its a nice enough film as long as you don't remember the book in any great detail.

Childhood favourite

When I was a nipper I sat and watched this film a lot, I'm told at least once a month. I still smile every time I watch it, not just because it reminds me of the years before I had to go to school, but because it brings out the child in all of us.

It must be every child's dream to go to the place where all their favourite sweets are created, and it is this dream that inspires this film (and book of course). If real chocolate factories were as colourful and fantastic as Willy Wonka's then the workers would never go home.

There's also the story in there that it doesn't matter how much money you have in life, if you are a good person then you will get the luck you deserve.

The songs, the characters and the sets are what make this one of the best family films ever. The chocolate room with thrill the youngsters, and for the adults there are Wonka's witty remarks and seeing the lengths people have go to to get a Golden Ticket (the one with the computer is the best).

I saw the recent one and thought that was to busy trying to out do the original. This one is far better, Gene Wilder really owns the character of Wonka, and young Charlie is magnificently played by Peter Ostrum.

Fun for all ages.