First off, I'm willing to admit that my rating might (maybe) have been higher if I had been able to watch the movie.

Our son loaned us the BluRay/DVD and we settled down to watch the movie with no per-conceived ideas. We are not Harry Potter fans but did enjoy those movies. We did not even realize that this story was by the same author and in the same universe.

Part way into the movie, we were debating whether our inability to see what was going on was due to (a) lack of lighting in 1924; (b) the director trying to establish a dark feel movie (unlikely based on the apparent subject matter; (c) a cover-up of poor/cheap CGI.

In any case, we just gave up. We like to watch movies but we also like to actually see what is happening on screen.

IMDb claims 4 more in this series. They need a new director.