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On the eve of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part I, I find myself preemptively mourning the loss of my constant adolescent companions. I am a member of what I consider the lucky group of individuals who has been in the same age group as Harry and his friends since the very beginning.
It often surprises those who are not familiar with Harry Potter how adults can be so fascinated with a story that exists so fully in the make-believe and hinges often on the seemingly impossible. The truth is that JK Rowling’s ability to create childhoods and adolescences of fictitious characters with such legitimacy, depth and growth in a whimsical world that was conceived on pure imagination is a gift that I cannot sing enough praises for. And the caliber of that imagination is something so striking and extensive, I often wondered as a child whether it was too elaborate to be invented.
As one of these die-hard fans I, of course, I have my qualms with the movie adaptations (uh, the Weasley’s family home being burned in a totally movie created scene with no mention to it afterwards?), but I am pretty sure that you can’t throw a rock
On the eve of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part I, I find myself preemptively mourning the loss of my constant adolescent companions. I am a member of what I consider the lucky group of individuals who has been in the same age group as Harry and his friends since the very beginning.
It often surprises those who are not familiar with Harry Potter how adults can be so fascinated with a story that exists so fully in the make-believe and hinges often on the seemingly impossible. The truth is that JK Rowling’s ability to create childhoods and adolescences of fictitious characters with such legitimacy, depth and growth in a whimsical world that was conceived on pure imagination is a gift that I cannot sing enough praises for. And the caliber of that imagination is something so striking and extensive, I often wondered as a child whether it was too elaborate to be invented.
As one of these die-hard fans I, of course, I have my qualms with the movie adaptations (uh, the Weasley’s family home being burned in a totally movie created scene with no mention to it afterwards?), but I am pretty sure that you can’t throw a rock in a Harry Potter movie audience without hitting at least a hundred people who are dissatisfied with some aspect of its movie counterpart (this all makes for stimulating arguments among fan nerds), who ultimately will continue to wait until the very end in lengthy lines for every single midnight premiere. And it is with great relief, that I can affirm that these films do not resemble the botched up, awkward and poorly casted film adaptations of the Twilight series (JK Rowling has too much class for that).
The fact is, the movie adaptations are awesome and have created an entirely new fan base of people who for the most part really hate to read, so if JK Rowling can dig it, then I can certainly sit through an over passionate Dumbledore yelling his way through Hogwarts- and even mourn his on-screen death.