I am all set. Having watched Harry Potter and the order of the phoenix and re-read Harry Potter and the half blood prince, I can't wait till saturday!
We went to the theater, and for the first time, I watched American kids act like Thamizhians during a thalaivar movie. They started applauding when the lights first dimmed, cried and cheered when Neville Longbottom figured out a little magic, and hooted during Harry's famous kiss with Cho-chang. I was watching the movie with Mr.you-know-who who was rather incredulous, but my reasoning was, if we can have our super-star/hero, surely they can have their boy hero? And Harry Potter is a hero for one big reason.....he is not a super hero. He fears, is afraid, gets pure lucky many times, is helped by his friends, makes mistakes, worries about flunking tests, and still ofcourse is the only hope for the planet.
The movie however suffers from the curse of being the fifth movie in a septalogy. Neither do you experience the wonderous thrills of visualizing Harry's world on the big screen for the first time, nor do you have the satisfacton of closure. Also, the Order of the phoenix is an inherently weak book, centered around two major plot disappointments - the obviousness of the prophecy and the shattering weakness of James Potter. However, the movie is bolstered by a superb supporting star cast. Professor Umbridge, Luna Lovegood, Sirius, and Lupin are all played by fabulously talented actors. The most notable character introduced is Bellatrix Lestrange. The scene showing her breaking out of Azkaban is truly spine chilling. The movie is brief but could have lingered more on the increasing angst and impatience felt by Sirius as he is holed away in his ancestral home. Also, the graphics for Hagrid's giant half-brother are really tacky (Grawp ends up looking like the guy on the cover of Mad magazines for some reason)
Anyway, I'm glad i saw the movie, because, despite all it's cinematic flaws, the movies help me put faces to the characters I read about. As I re-acquainted myself with the Half-blood prince this weekend (which to me is the best book in the series), the book played itself out like a movie in my mind. I could visualize Ralph Fiennes as a young Tom Riddle, and woke up at 2 in the morning with nightmares about Inferi!
Our parents can proudly tell us that they saw the swinging sixties, wore bellbottoms, lived and loved with the beatles. And we can some day proudly tell our children of our journey with Harry Potter, of the days we spent breathlessly counting down to each book's release, of the sleepless nights spent to finish 600 pages to find out what happened at the end. Seven times in ten blissful years, every now and then, we could leave our mundane world behind and enter the magical world of witchcraft and wizardry...the world of the "boy who lived" and "he who must not be named". This saturday, the journey will finally come to a bitter-sweet end. Yes, I am happy cos i will find out what happens in the end...all mysteries will be solved...all questions will be answered...but then what? What will then make my dreary muggle existence a little more bearable?
3 comments:
Would you believe it. I have never been inspired to read a single Harry Potter book or watch the movie. I really don't know why. S and S tell me the books are better than Enid Blyton.
I dont know why I cannot pick up the first Harry Potter and allow him to weave his magic on me
I am still on page 400 and that too,still reading Order of the Phoenix!! But I am determined to finish book 5 and 6 and only then move on to the grand finale. Hubby dear by next week would have read and re read book 7 . He did accidently mention(!!) who died in Book 5 but this time no discussions until I read the end myself,which may be 2008!!
ok cousin and sis, you cannot know me and still be muggles. So Su, just take the first step, dip your little toe, and before you know it, you would have plunged headlong into the magic. And sis, the kids can take care of themselves (better still, get them started on the philosopher's stone, its never too early), get reading!
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