I've worked as much as possible into my essay. You guys are invaluable. CHEERS!

I like Prisoner of Azkaban, only because it's the only stylish Potter film they've made so far (Alfonso Cuaron has a lot to do with that). They did miss a fair bit of stuff out, but the question remains - do you stick religiously to the text, and end up with an overlong, crammed film without any atmosphere until the final moments, a la Goblet of Fire (essentially, a Greatest Hits package), or do you compile the most captivating film you can by liberally cutting and altering a few elements? Yes, the Marauders should have remained, but other than that, I think Azkaban is better for its changes.

They weren't in the books, were they?

http://www.canmag.com/news/3/3/248
http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/movies/a64205/harry-potter-books-vs-films.html?page=3

I skim read those two, but they're from the references on the wikipedia page. I assume you've had a look on that - that has a section on what they've missed as well. Even if you can reference it, it makes for a good start.

Good luck!

Been a while since I've seen it, and I've only got it on video, so this is going off memory. But I remember bitching about that film loads so that should be alright.

Deliberate alterations have to include That Damned Moustache. JKR generally mentions facial hair when it's there. She mentions none on Lupin. And the one the film-makers gave him was just dire.

Other small alterations that annoyed the hell out of me include the ages of Harry's parents' generation. They should be 33/34 in his third year, but they're all blatantly ancient. And it's Moony, not Mooney, and changing it to the latter on the Map was unforgiveable.

Main problem, which I think you're getting at, is the total lack of backstory. I'll see if I can get hold of a working video player tonight so I can give you a breakdown of everything that's wrong with them cutting out the backstory, because my brain's mostly blocked it out. Then I'll send you a lovely long ranting email about it.

We never find out that Remus, Peter, Sirius and James are Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs.

Then Harry and Remus call Sirius "Padfoot" in the fifth movie, with no explanation.

Was the omission of the "parting of ways" scene, in which Sirius and Snape come face to face in the Hospital Wing and Dumbledore explains in no uncertain terms that they are now on the same side and must at least pretend to get along. And then sends Snape on a secret mission. I couldn't believe they didn't include something as significant to their characters and the overall story as that. Now it's too late to do something similar and a lot of that wonderful ambiguity will be missing from Snape's character.

I didn't like the way they did the werewolf at all, either. What was up with the "mating call" thing? How could Hermione mimic something she'd never heard before to such great effect? {= P

~Neshomeh