This blog was going to be called ‘Why It’s Okay For A Man In His Mid-Thirties To Like Harry Potter’. But, as well as being a clunky title, it is also misleading. It shows me to be defensive from the off, as if I’m protesting innocence against some terrible accusation, a self-justifying polemic, railing against people who think I should be strung up for some horrible crime. There’s probably a blog somewhere that starts with the line ‘Why It’s Okay For A Man In His Mid-Thirties To Like Sex With River Mammals’.
But it isn’t like that. My fondness for the Harry Potter films isn’t a guilty secret and nothing that I’m remotely ashamed of. Oh yeah, there are people who may say that people who enjoy Harry Potter should grow up and watch/read something more adult, but these can be easily dismissed – the accusation often coming from some faux-intellectual bore, lacking in the self-awareness that their video game, film and TV choices hardly marks them out as someone exclusively seeking out adult forms of entertainment. Unless we count whacking off to filth in this definition of adult entertainment.
But, no, I’m not ashamed to like Harry Potter. And, as someone who will watch any old shit if it has a fantasy/medieval setting then it was inevitable that I’d be drawn into something set mainly in a gothic school of magic.
I’m also a bit weird, things fascinate me that shouldn’t, I become wrapped up in some things that would be considered unusual for a 36 year old man. However exciting the main storyline of Harry Potter versus Voldermort can be, why am I rather more interested in the sweet relationship between two fictional magic using teenagers? Why has a married, often grumpy, regularly misanthropic sourpuss become enchanted by the love relationship in a kid’s book?
Two reasons.
As a grumpy ginger haired teenager my relationships with the opposite sex varied between the non-existent and the frustratingly non-existent. Maybe there’s some hurt hidden deep down, something that makes me want to see a story where a grumpy ginge gets a loving girlfriend way out of his league. A useless victory for the young me. But also a great help for any young lad getting abuse at school because of his unusual hair colour.
I went through times as a teenager blaming my hair for any misfortune with ladies, and even though now I realise that was bullshit (my problems were down to a combination of a weird face and that I was a supercilious prick – also red is obviously the best hair colour), I still get unexpectedly annoyed if I hear an anti-ginger joke on TV. It can be hard for kids getting abuse for being different, and gingerism is the one I have experience of. The success of Ron Weasley with a pretty lady is a weapon against you light/dark haired haters of us flame haired wonders.
But as well as this, there’s something else. Behind the defensive barrier of a grumpy face spitting out sarcasm and swears is a soppy tosser: a drip who gets swept up in sweet romance between young people. In a film. It’s not even real.
But I still found myself giddy last night in the pay-off after 7 or 8 years of watching these films: the anticipation that Ron and Hermione would get together. And I found myself smiling when it happened, and tapping Hannah’s leg in excitement. Yes, get in you two crazy kids!
But, there is another reason why this blog isn’t really a defence in enjoying the world of Harry Potter. No, it’s because I intended it to be a review of the last film in the series. Yet it’s hard for me to look at them in isolation: either because of some ridiculous investment in the relationship between Ron and Hermione, or because the three main leads in the films seem to be such lovely people. Daniel Radcliffe for instance seems one of the sweetest people you could ever wish to meet. I can’t review it as a standalone piece of cinema because I enjoy more than what I see on screen.
And it’s why, even though large parts of Harry Potter And The Deathly Hallows Pt2 disappointed me, I can’t give it a low mark. How can I give it a 5/10 when Ron and Hermione kiss in it? Or that it radiates nothing but a quaint, overtly British, sense of warmth.
But there are flaws:
Some pretty major characters die in this film. People you’ve come to know and like over 8 films. Their death should be traumatic, yet they are given so little screen time that it has upset many people who have seen the film. Even though the book was split into two films, HP 7 Pt2 has the shortest running time of any film since the first one. There was plenty of time to have shown the reaction to something so traumatic. But why didn’t they? Maybe as these films are viewed by a lot of children it was found that the deaths were too horrible for youngsters to handle. That’s a fair reason I guess but left many feeling short changed.
Ron spends the last half of the film effectively mute. In fact I can’t remember him speaking after the death of his brother. This could have been a deliberate choice, showing he was in shock. Yet he didn’t say anything when he felt his best friend was about to walk to his death, or even when in the mistaken belief that Harry had actually died. There were several silent scenes between the main three characters: pre traumatic encounter, post traumatic encounter, at the ending of the film and in the epilogue. All three staring into space or at each other, lots of meaning in the looks, yet after a while you just hoped one of them would voice what they were thinking. Speak Ron, speak! Hermione is just as bad. Speak girl!
The final battle between Harry Potter and Voldermort was played out without any witnesses. This was a mistake, as one of the running themes in the books/films has been that others (both adults and children) distrust Harry and think he is up to no good. Seeing him actually destroy evil in front of their eyes is vindication for all the hardship he’s received, so why change what happens in the book (apparently) and have this final battle played out without anyone around?
Also, you’ve spent one and a half films telling us about The Deathly Hallows. Why has it been jettisoned in the final half of the second film? What relevance do they have? I haven’t read the book, I need some help here. Does Harry have them all? What was the third one again, I’ve forgotten. Help me out here!
Why won’t Ron speak? Speak Ron! I actually think he has two lines in the last hour. This is my chief bugbear right now, I hadn’t even thought about it until 20 minutes ago and now I can’t think of anything else. Did he speak? Have I missed something? Why didn’t he speak? Gah!
I’m already looking forward to the blu-ray, which I hope will be an extra hour long and rectify all the faults I have with it. Maybe I’ll go watch it again, but this time in 3D. Maybe Ron speaks in 3D. Maybe his kiss with Hermione in 3D will make me cry in the cinema like a girl.
And even with all those problems, I’ll still give it a 7/10 because it’s Harry Potter isn’t it? Ron and Hermione kissed, Harry saved the day and I can’t be mean to those kids I’ve watched grow up and who have made an old grumpy man feel like an excitable 12 year old at various points in the past few years.
