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Harry Potter & the Philosopher’s Stone

Now this is a piece of cinema history. It’s going to be the first-cinema-experience
film for a generation. For my generation this was Disney’s animated
classic Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. I think I got the better
deal.
True, the film I saw featured a pure innocent girl being tormented and
abused by a wicked, thoroughly horrible queen, motivated by jealous
rages. The poisoned apple looked good for food, and she was tempted, and
she ate. How very Edenesque. Just proves that she represented supernatural
evil. And the non-political-correctness of the seven vertically-challenged
bearded chaps must also have affected a generation of children into thinking
that dwarves are, at best, simple, and at worst, braindead. They live
humdrum workaday lives in the lung-busting dusty and dangerous underground
tunnels, rewarded with gruel and a house over-run with woodland creatures
and no security system.
Enough! But Snow White has themes of redemption and
forgiveness as well as destiny and good triumphing over evil.
HP, on the other hand, has been criticised (rightly, in my view) for being
too closely tied to the script of the book, resulting in a form of storytelling
which has no recourse to narrative, while remaining strictly chronological.
This is a weakness. HP is a boy discovering a gift which means he can
have his own way more or less whenever he wants it (watch out, Hermione!).
He has no higher authority to whom he is accountable; he's the classic
fiction character without accountability. He uses his gift for evil as
well as good, and when he faces something more evil than the witchcraft
he embraces, he finds an additional burst of power with which to defeat
it.
It has to be admitted that Harry Potter is a young man with a destiny
and he is merely following the rite of passage towards becoming what he
will be. But I'm not convinced I am all that bothered to discover what
he will be. Chronological filmplotting means we don't see the wizened
old man looking back over adventures, having learned from them and discovered
things about himself.
It’s my 7-year-old nephew's favourite film and his favourite book.
And while I can see that witchcraft theme is a strong plot devise to give
HP the opportunity to explore his destiny, I have to advise parents to
discuss the issues with their kids.
Some Christian parents just say 'no!' (perhaps because
they consider having a point to discuss in the playground is as dangerous
as recreational drugs or going down to the woods with a stranger)…
Others seem to think that investigations into the supernatural are fine,
since God is big enough and tough enough to fight his own corner. But
my reservations are mostly on the grounds that this is a poor movie. I
was disappointed that Quidditch was an individual-skill based game played
high up with a miniscule crowd and apparently no team strategy, despite
sounding very like netball. The bad guys are bad, and the neutral guys
are bad sometimes. Most of the adults are bumbling fools or Satanists,
while the Robbie Coltraine character is amusing and harmless. I was entertained
by the way the characters continually named one another in their conversations,
to help the young, non-filmgoing audience remember who was who.
Rating:
• |
for film quality |
• |
for singlehandedly causing a generation to turn to devil-worship (in
other words, I don't think it will achieve this, despite what some
reactionary Christians may say) |
• |
for excellent opportunities for parents to discuss with children
such issues as adventure, destiny, public schools, gamesmanship,
respect for teachers (even if they make a mistake) and adoption
overall
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