Harry Skywalker lives to fight another day. My literary track record is stained with two failures: I failed both the Hobbit and Harry Potter even at GCSE level. Never even took ‘A’ level ‘Ring’ cycle or ‘Pottery’, let alone post-graduate Tolkien or Rowling. (However I do have expert technical advice from my teacher daughter who occasionally re-opens her copies of HP to make sure she hasn’t forgotten the words). As it seems to me to fully understand the HP series you also need to be a Star Wars specialist, I’m even a bit light there, being a cursory fan rather than a forensic obsessive about Lucas’s cosmic concept with the earthbound words.

So I can only respond to TOTP (no not Tops of The Pops) as a movie. And as a movie it’s just like a football match (‘soccer’ David, soccer) – it’s a game of two halves. I almost lost the will to live in the first half with so much plot development and lots of jaw-clenching reaction shots to camera that almost, though not quite, made even Hermione seem boring. This likeable band of young actors are great when they have something to do, but go a little rabbit-in-the-headlights when entrusted with a bit of narrative to progress. And TOTP has a lot of plot. My adviser tells me this is all beautifully developed in the book with the practices of the Order of The Phoenix painstakingly and absorbingly described. So out of necessity in a visual medium, David Yates is forced to rush us through the first half plot set-up without the fascinating contextual detail that so entrances millions of children, grown up and not, around the world. He has had to drop Dobby; and Hagrid seems to have shrunk along with his role as the intrepid chums have raced into puberty and filled out – dramatically, as we might say.

A tedious first half then - score: Plot 1 – Actors 0. But all is forgiven in a second half that fizzes with the excitement, tension, and thrills that prove 2 million young readers, salivating for the upcoming Deathly Hallows denouement, know what they’re about. And that JK knows how to tell a rattling good yarn. The confrontation between Dumbledore and Voldemort in the Ministry of Magic is as thrilling as that between Obi Wan and Vader that it irresistibly calls to mind. Just switch high-tech light sabers for low-tech wands and you’re set. Not the last echo of Star Wars either.

Plot-wise, suffice to say that the central themes of the series are developed and explored in TOTP: the mystery of Harry’s provenance, his special wizardly skills, an apparent deep link with the evil Voldemort that sees their destinies as inescapably entwined. Dumbledore, Harry’s mentor (his Obi Wan) keeps his distance to allow his protégé to develop but re-appears at critical moments to rescue him. It is the core of the Harry Potter series that most recalls the Star Wars franchise: the eternal battle between good and evil as represented by Voldemort and Vader. In both cases the young hero who is to be the nemesis for the figure of evil and the dark forces he has given himself up to, is mysteriously linked to his evil protagonist. Vader turns out to be Skywalker’s father. In about 2 weeks we will know whether Voldemort has the same or similar link to Harry.

The TOTP plot line of Ministry of Magic hack Dolores Umbrage (Imelda Staunton – ‘disgusted’ from Tunbridge Wells given power, a whip and clad in hideous non-iron pinkness ) forcing Dumbledore out of Hogworts and imposing a we-know-what’s-best-for you bureaucratic, party-line works well enough as something for Harry and Co to fight against. But its possible political resonance doesn’t really come off. For me the whole ‘Hogworts’ setting is the weakest element of the series. It is so incredibly English Public school, repressed sexuality, ‘chummy’ it sets my teeth on edge. Any moment I expect to hear Harry warning his chums to look out with “‘cave’ chaps” (collective noun including girls). As with the cod Latin ‘expelliamus’ that accompanies the villain-zapping spells Harry teaches his schoolmates. How on earth this oh-so-English, oh-so-Middle Class archness plays to Americans in particular is a mystery to me. And perhaps to them.

That said – if you can put up with being so-to-speak ‘put in the picture’ in the first half, the second half of TOTP is for me easily the best of the franchise so far. Wonderful, visually imaginative special effects that actually contribute to the tension and pace of the action. And once Radcliffe and Co break into a sweat they carry us willingly with them. Not much sweat in Harry’s famed first kiss mind – Cho Chang (Katie Leung) is beautiful, oriental (not tokenism surely?) but left naked - without a shred of plot to protect her I mean. So when Harry suddenly randomly snogs her in the corridor on the way to do something dangerous and important - how English is that? – he looks more likely to be the victim of a harassment suit than undying love. Anyway we all know, what he doesn’t – that really wants to snog Hermione and that she definitely has the hots for him. Quite the most deliciously written scene in the movie is where Hermione does a quick emotional analysis, pretty routine female rigour for the area, and Ron with an archetypal male, rueful smile observes that "no one could feel all those emotions at once!". Hermione dismisses him as having the emotional insight of a teaspoon. Watch it Ron - writing's on the wall girlfriend-wise.

TOTP is great fun. And the Phoenix really does catch fire in the second half. Rowling’s genius is to have written something that can appeal on many levels to embrace everyone from 5 to 95. The great merit of the books my adviser tells me, is the painstaking, coherent assembly of almost entirely imagined detail, to create an amazing world of totally credible, totally fictional reality, that entrances the minds of children and stimulates their imagination. These qualities are so precious, so necessary, so essentially literary, that we all owe a debt to Rowling for having re-awakened them and motivated young minds to rediscover the power of the written word when allied to a curious imaginative mind. In that sense this movie, any movie, is of mere secondary importance. Together with any parallels with Star Wars.


<Added>

Mea Culpa - Hogwarts.

Z

Great review, Z. I'm looking forward to seeing this.

I found your review doubly interesting for the sole fact you haven't read the book. If you had, and as a skilled reviewer, you'd probably have realised your claim of 'JK knows how to tell a rattling good yarn' is a bit...well...erroneous.

In my opinion, the movies are far superior to any of the books, but especially the last two. The last two books have been more akin to how you describe the first half of this film. TOTP (Top of the Pops, love it!) is one of the most boring books I have read in my life. Seeing it portrayed with all the hype of a sensational film didn't surprise me, because that's how all the films have been. The last two books in the HP series plod criminally, and all the action appears to take place in the last chapter (or in TOTP, the last three pages) leaving a whole wedge of plod.

Anyway, this is just my view. I'll still see the film, but again, I'll sit wondering how come they can translate such a boring pile of tosh into cinema gold, but JK doesn't seem able to reverse that process.

Best

JB

I enjoyed your review much better than the film. I did wonder if the book was any better. ie less racist and sexist, but it'll be a while before I can get my hands on a copy.

I think the Americans will like the public school stuff.

I missed the comic characters and the more humorous bits of the early films, although I've only seen the one before and the very first one.

The political comment surrounding the new Hogwarts was muddled. It seemed to be having it both ways with gibes at over-regulation aimed at New Labour - did they say 'nanny-state' at one point, or did I imagine it - but the ministry rep looked like a plump Mrs Thatcher. The underground metropolis-style ministry was good.

It start off in a promising 'This is England' style, with the deserted playground (symbolic of lost childhood - don't kid yourself, Sheila) and the gritty underpass. I liked that part, although the oversized cross-eyed Muggle son was cartoon-like. I agree it became more like Star Wars, towards the end and I'd forgotten how Ralph Fiennes with his nose flattened is connected to the apparently more serious villain with the white hair. It seemed to me Ralph Fiennes was scarier.

The Scottish landscape seemed much more prominent without being too touristy and I liked the cellar with all the different-sized crystal balls on the archive shelves, epecially the high-angle shots of the mini Darth Vaders approaching along the corridors.

All in all, very disappointing.

Sheila

It's one of the very few films I've seen where the audience applauded at the end. In fact, the last occasion I can remember this happening was for Mike Leigh's Secrets and Lies, in an Arts cinema in Cambridge!

People at West India Quay Cineworld just looked stunned. It was full, too. We had to go to the back row, then transferred to the front because of the all the chattering kids. Maybe that's the answer - the audience I saw it with was too young to appreciate it and I caught the vibes. I think the certificate was 12A but many of them seemed younger.

Sheila

I saw the opening in Brighton of Batman Begins and people applauded at that too. Bit of a pointless exercise, ain't it? Clapping at a screen?

I will go and see this film. I've read mixed reviews so far, and I really think it depends on whether you're a fan or not. HP fans already celebrate a lot that isn't there. People wilfully want it to be that good, but objectionally, I personally don't think it stands up. Good, yes. Brilliant and earth-shattering - absolutely not.

I shuddered on the news just now when I saw a thirty-something woman in a witch's hat complaining that she'll have nothing to do with her life when HP is over. Had I been there, I might have pointed out that she didn't have a life to begin with. JK was interviewed. She said she was a little saddened at the end of the series, but also felt a great deal of relief, so at least she knows, concerning the latter, how the rest of us feel.

JB

Had I been there, I might have pointed out that she didn't have a life to begin with

LOL, JB! Even though we, ahem, differ on the Potter books, that really made me laugh!

<Added>

Oh, and a great review, Zettel.

Look, my view is just that - my view. I'm not saying people shouldn't enjoy it. If readers take pleasure in it, then that's fair enough. [Insert barbed witticism of choice at end of this paragraph]

JB

Thanks all for the kind comments about the review. I love movies and love to write about them but I do use WW to try to improve that writing. Praising a great film or knocking a crap one is sort of easier writing-wise than trying to take a slightly different angle on the immensely popular. Especially as with HP when your 'synoptic hands' are pretty much tied behind your back.

Your discussion so far does raise a number of interesting points. The one that intrigues me most is this issue of quality v popularity.

My feelings are perhaps conditioned by having spent about 10 years from 4 to 14 (when I began to notice something a bit different and very engaging about the 'Hermione's' of this world) I literally hoovered up every scrap of written material that hit my eyes. I even used to read shop fronts out in the car much to my parents irritation. I almost exhausted first Enid Blyton (yes I know - I'm a bit like your lady in the witches hat Waxy) then read every Agatha Christie until I had no idea whether I'd already read the book I'd just started. Finally after a few years hiatus in PE and my share of discovering that the 'Hermione-syndrome' had its downside, I eturned to reading with Philosophy books. Man did that slow me down! never recovered my speed. Or my sanity some say.

Until recently I worked in a bookshop and have done two HP 'midnight shifts'. I have to say, though I can't get on with the HP books, to see young in single figure ages rolling up at midnight clutching with delight a massive 5,6,700 word hardback they can't wait to start reading did the heart good. Whatever the 'weaknesses' of JK the sheer weight of commercial success surely shows she's got something right? I know its tricky argument but I'd say JK is a great deal more valuable to children's literature than say Big Brother is to TV broadcasting.

I take a similar view of the other case that comes to mind - dear old Dan Brown and TDVC. I'm willing up to a point to take and empirical view and say that anyone who can get tens of millions of people to part with their hard-earned cash to actually read a book, has got to be doing something right. (Whereas in TV terms - despite its grotesque popularity I would not say the same of Big Brother).

What do you think guys: is getting kids to read - anything - the one case of an end justifying a means?

Personally I fell a bit muggled about the whole thing.

Regards

K

Most stimulating.

Before attempting an answer could you put me right on:

after a few years hiatus in PE

Physical Education? You did a PPE degree? Papua New Guinea?

(no, that would be PNG. Sorry to be picky. I went to a talk yesterday where all these expats kept saying things like 'When we were with RAS in HK', and it's hindering the write-up. Not your fault - I'm one who still thinks 'sauce' when I see 'HP'.

:-)

Sheila

PS

I needed one more HP book. Then the delightful Hermione would have been a fully adult woman and this little 'thing'* I've always had for the character would not seem like some kind of repressed perversion. I blame all that Enid Blyton and the Dark Deeds at St Kilda's that followed it. (God, please tell me I' not the only adult male in the world to like Hermione).

God (again I am getting desperate) - that's a knock at the door. Haven't even posted this yet. Can't be the CID surely. Finding Hermione engaging isn't illegal is it? Yet.

PPS

Nerd department. Have you noticed that Voldemort is an arch poncey anagram?

'Volde' = loved
'mort' = death.

"Look you guys, you can take my hard drive and do what you want with it. Maybe you could defrag it whatever that means. I only printed off a picture of Hermione for research purposes OK? I'm a writer for chrissake! What do you mean you've read my stuff and can't see the evidence to back that claim up?....."

Have a nice Sunday folks.

* perhaps not the most felicitous expression for a so-called writer to use here - given the context.

Z

Physical Education Sheila.

I'm one of Davey Cameron's target dumbo's - don't even know where Papua New Guinea is. Hell I have trouble finding Watford - and that's just down the road. And I mean down.....

Z

What do you think guys: is getting kids to read - anything - the one case of an end justifying a means?

As an ex-teacher, and the daughter of a teacher, I'd say a resounding yes to this. If children learn to associate reading (or, if you're really desperate, listening!) with pleasure, then they're at the start of a path which will give them joy throughout their lives, and might take off, at any point, in any direction. My mum used to get parents who wrung their hands because their son would only look at the Beano and yet he had all these Children's Classics on his shelf, and she'd say to them, 'At least he's reading something, independently and for enjoyment. You don't know what he'll move onto.'

I gave up teaching full time in 2003, but I still go in every week on a voluntary basis to help out at my local primary school. Two years ago I struck up a friendship with one roughish lad when I was supervising top infant library visits. This boy was a bit of a rogue but a keen reader, and told me at length about what he liked, and after a while I got to lending him books from home and he lent me books, too. But a few weeks ago I saw him on his own in the corridor (he's a middle junior now) and asked him what he was currently reading. He just shrugged. 'Books are boring,' he said. I was gutted. What went wrong there?

Lammi

Don't know what went wrong. Sadly most teachers have similar tales to tell. But two perhaps hopeful thoughts.

At least JK has broken through the 'boredom' barrier for loads of kids. Not for me. But for the kids and that's what counts.

My son is 23. He went through the whole, computer game, books suck bit. Gave up A level English after only couple of months because didn't "want to analyse a few boring books out of existence for two years" (how could I argue with that?).

But he got in to Portsmouth to do a degree in Film Studies and because he was passionate about the subject it suddenly turned out he could write like a dream! He lacked a few of the technical niceties but he soon took them on board. He destroyed what I had always assumed to be a necessary truth - that you won't write well unless you read lots. Well he read, but not that much. I guess at the heart of good writing is good thinking and I'm not sure that the activities of boys that they get hooked on and that we all worry about (me too), may be progressing their thinking skills and then with a motivation to express themselves about something they love - maybe they cope better than we think. It is true once he began to write, my son began to read more. A reversal of the usual assumption.

regards

Z

I think film and tv can be a useful way in for reluctant readers. What a heartening story, Zettel.

I should add, my older son was never interested in fiction till we found the Dav Pilkey books, and that seemed to get him going. But although he could read as in 'decode' from an early age, he was late in reading for pleasure. He's 9 now, and is working his way with enthusiasm through some modern-day fantasy books based on the quests of Hercules. He won't entertain Harry Potter at all, even the films.

<Added>

There's a way in, a breakthrough moment, for everyone with reading, I suspect. It's all a matter of finding the book or the writer who lights your candle. My husband never read much fiction till he discovered Terry Tratchett, who he came to through a book one of my Year Nines had lent me.