Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

A ghost party with a rotting fish buffet and a band of musical saws is exactly the kind of thing that didn't make the film, and it shows what the book offers that the screen can't. Rowling fills the second year at Hogwarts with odd, funny detours: Nearly Headless Nick's Deathday Party, Filch's embarrassing Kwikspell course, a History of Magic lesson taught by a ghost who hasn't noticed he's dead, and Lockhart's dwarves delivering singing Valentines. None of them is essential to the mystery, but together they make the school feel lived in. The book also plays fairer as a mystery. Dobby's warnings, the Malfoys' menace and the clues Harry gathers are laid out steadily, so the final revelations in the Chamber land as the pay-off of a puzzle you could have solved rather than a series of reveals. It is also worth reading for what it plants. The diary, Tom Riddle and the question of what separates Harry from Voldemort matter far more later in the series than the film can signal, and Rowling's narration lets you sit inside Harry's fear that he might belong in Slytherin.

Often called the most text-faithful Harry Potter film, Chris Columbus's adaptation keeps the book's structure intact, and its ending is changed only in part. In the novel, Harry stabs the diary with the basilisk fang after Fawkes has healed him. On screen he destroys it first, so Ginny wakes to see him dying before the phoenix intervenes. The sword's arrival is also simplified. In the book Harry puts on the Sorting Hat and calls for help, and the sword drops onto his head. In the film it simply appears in the Hat as it lies on the ground. The largest cut is Nearly Headless Nick's 500th Deathday Party, which fills most of a chapter in the book. The film moves Harry's first encounter with the basilisk's voice to his detention in Lockhart's office. Several smaller scenes are also gone: Lockhart's Valentine's Day breakfast, Malfoy grabbing at Riddle's diary before Harry disarms him, and the Potions-class diversion the trio stage to steal Polyjuice ingredients from Snape. Filch's secret, that he is a Squib quietly taking a Kwikspell course, never comes up. Some characters are reshuffled. Professor Binns does not exist in the films, so McGonagall tells the legend of the Chamber in Transfiguration instead of History of Magic. Penelope Clearwater is petrified alongside Hermione in the book, while the film finds Hermione alone, holding her own mirror. At Flourish and Blotts, Lucius Malfoy and Arthur Weasley come to blows in print but only trade insults on screen. Dobby's tie to the Malfoys is clear early in the novel, while the film holds it back until Harry works it out near the end.