You're Becoming A Dream To Me, Fairytale Fantasy, Nothing Can Ever Compare, An Image To My Memory

--"Umbrella (remix)", Rihanna featuring Chris Brown and Jay-Z

I just got back from watching the latest Harry Potter. While I did enjoy it overall, I did have a few concerns about it. Rather than take my time to go into detail to my smaller quibbles, I'll just reprint a post I did for rilokiley.net:

Coming as someone who's never read the books, but seen every movie opening day, I thought this movie was good. I still like Goblet of Fire better.

From a plotting and story angle, it just didn't flow as smoothly as some of the other films. That's probably because they were trying to include so much from the novel, which is understandable. The climax was really good too and, once again, I was drawn into what would happen with every character, not just Harry. Very few movies can engage the audience's interest in all its characters, not just its main ones, like the Potter movies.

I just wished it felt less like a bunch of separate elements trying to be fused together and had more cohesion to it, I suppose. Not to say that it wasn't engaging throughout, but I was noticing the chinks in the armor for more than any of the previous efforts.

Then again, all those screenwriting classes I've been taking might be stripping the magic of the movies away for me. That's been happening to me recently.

Still, I'd see it again

I don't think that's my main beef with it. I think my main beef and why it doesn't hold up to my scrutiny of it is that I didn't grow up with it. To me, it's just a series of movies. It's a well-executed and imagined series of movies and novels, but it just doesn't hold that extra allure that the entertainment of my youth does for me. Which is to say, the whole series doesn't feel like mine. It feels like it belongs to a younger generation than myself in much the same vein that Avonlea feels like mine or The Cure feels like mine. There's an extra sense of ownership and mastery that comes with having a piece of artistry from the time one is mature and sophisticated enough to decide what one's tastes are. When one picks out a favorite band, a favorite movie, a favorite series of books, &c... one establishes a connection to that entity that goes beyond taste or regard. It treads onto the path of definition, which is a sacred path to tread.

I've always had the belief that a person is defined not by what one does or what one says, but what and who they like. One can tell immediately whether or not you like a person based on common interests. This person likes this band. I like this band. I suppose I could like this person because we share that. It's a type of shorthand. Rather than revolve around weighty issues of personal perspectives and philosophical underpinnings, we make instantaneous leaps of faith based on common interests. When I tell people that I like Rilo Kiley. I'm not just making a choice to like their music. I'm also making a choice to share that choice with that of my peers as a sort-of non-physical badge of identification. I'm defining myself to allow others to make assumptions of me.

That's why I just can't own Harry Potter because I don't know enough about it. More to the point, it hasn't worked its way into my system as soul-altering experience of metamorphosis. I didn't start becoming more of an individual because of this series.

I think that's the deal with the movies, the music, and the people we choose to associate ourselves with. It's not just the actual product we're aligning ourselves with. We're aligning ourselves what those images, those sounds, those memories represent--a time in our lives when we were just a little bit more sure of ourselves, a time in our lives when we were just a little bit more happy, a little bit more hopeful. Sometimes looking back we can see that the actual product might not be up to snuff with what's out today, but we still hold those old favorites best because of the sentimental effect they have on us. We were there when it was new. We were there when it was exciting. We were there when it was all everyone could talk about.

But what we're really saying is that we ourselves were new, we ourselves were exciting, we ourselves were what everyone could talk about. Once. And when we talk about having all-time favorites, it's because we want to hold onto those feelings about ourselves for as long as possible.


told you I'll be here forever

I wonder sometimes if all these Harry fans really enjoy the films and novels as much as they say they do, or if they're hanging onto the feelings these products elicit because they were so much a part of their growth. I wonder if they'll feel the same once it all comes to an end like my beloved Avonlea did. I wonder if they'll rail against the critics who say that their enamoration is built on nothing but nostalgia and that if they were to look at the actuality of it all, the whole mystique about Harry Potter was nothing more than a fad that fades in hindsight.

Then I realize that, even if it's all based on having rose-colored memories, it isn't such a bad thing to lay all your devotion into an object that has done nothing but bring you joy. People build their whole lives around the stuff of dreams and, as far as dreams go, the ones you had as a kid are definitely the best. And, as far as a mythos goes, Harry Potter definitely has been a major landmark in unifying a world of dreamers young and old alike.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers