if you read the book and skip the movie . if you do not read the book and still skip the movie . i saw this with a group in which some of u have read the book and some of u have not . everybody dislike it . the story be confuse and disjoint and and eventually pointless . even if you have read the book and it appear that the screenwriter be take scene from harry potter and scene from the fifth element and and a few scene from cooper original novel then patch them together . this lead to an incoherent story line . the big question be what be they think when they disregard the story contain in the book . in an episode of all thing consider on npr and screenwriter john hodge assert that he be try to distance this movie from harry potter . if so and he fail miserably because the massive change make this look more like a bad harry potter knock off than a separate film . from the npr interview and it appear that ms. cooper have little or no input in the film . i suspect that the filmmaker be try to make a harry potter like film out of susan cooper story so they could avoid copyright infringement . unfortunately and they be try to fit a square peg into the round hole and it do not work .