I don’t dislike movies, and agree that there are and have been many with artistic merit. I just don’t think the there is a big box office for artistic merit, so usually the art must be accompanied by some spin that sells (big name actors, big name others). If we are lucky, the big names have big talent and we all win. Alas, we are not always lucky.

Arabella, I liked your description of the Horcruxes in statistical terms, that by dividing the soul and hiding it in multiple vessels, Voldemort tries to reduce the probability of death by sustaining some continuing thread of mortal life. As DD told him, there are things worse than death, but old Voldy never gets that. And by stringing out his soul across numerous objects, he dies in eight separate little pieces, experiencing over and over that very thing he most feared. Gotcha, Voldy.

Thinking some more about the Hallows, I don’t really see the power which the legend suggests can come from uniting them. The 3 Brothers legend has an undertone, that the eldest brother and middle brother were combative and arrogant toward Death, and although Death gave them the “prizes” they sought, those prizes did not keep them away from Death but actually brought them more quickly to Death than otherwise might have been. The youngest, humble brother only wishes to be unseen by Death, so Death “most unwillingly” gives him his own cloak. The story itself does not suggest uniting the Hallows. Xeno says, “those of us who understand these matters” know the power of uniting the three Hallows. DD confirms the legend of uniting them, but again, that seems to be some later interpretation and not essentially of the story itself. What am I missing?

Although Harry is tempted to pursue the Hallows, he does not. Yet eventually, all three come into his possession. The Elder Wand he uses not in combat but for healing (repairing his own wand). The Resurrection Stone he uses for strength (to bring back those who will help him walk into Death without faltering). Both of these are be one-time uses. Harry seems to understand that more than that will not heal or strengthen but will hurt and weaken him. But he understands what DD says is the true magic of the cloak, that is, that it can be used to protect others. He has used it so from the start back in the Sorcerer’s Stone. So what is the magic or chemistry of uniting the three to master Death? Doesn’t Harry master death, i.e. accept it, face on, by throwing off the cloak? While the Stone certainly gave him strength, he has in the past found the strength of those he loved within himself…could he have made the walk without the Stone?

Maybe the final clue is that in Kings Cross, Harry makes another choice, and that is the choice to go back to living, living with an intensity and purpose (to take Voldemort out). And when he makes that choice, does the world look a little more golden, perhaps a sign of ultimate transformation?

Sorry to make a bad attempt at an alchemical pun, but aren’t the Hallows, or at least the uniting of them, a Red Herring?

Didn’t Harry have the one true Hallow all along, the cloak; the Hallow that allows you to live fully with purpose and coexist with Death, to meet Death on your own terms. It’s almost like Ignotus Peverell, in taking the cloak from Death, disarmed Death…expelliarmus, the beginning and the end.

Puffy Griffinclaw

That is a very good question: how the scriptwriter and director will handle the issue of death.

Well, one hopes, and better than well, that they can convey the central and critical role of that issue in the story. That it doesn’t become a side-issue to the pyrotechnics of the Battle of Hogwarts (my fear) or the final duel with Voldemort. The emotional heart of the book (and the series) is the walk in the Forest and the meeting at King’s Cross, and it would be a lame rendering which couldn’t make that clear.

On the positive side, they have at their disposal the medium of images, and those can really help make the point, even better than words in the right hands.

On the negative side, I was not too impressed with the duel between Harry and Voldemort in GoF; the spirits who were released as a result of the priori incantem didn’t really seem very “spiritual”. I’m hoping that Harry’s walk in the Forest will have a stronger sense of destiny and tragedy. And on a really negative note, a lot of the impact of King’s Cross will depend on the abilty of the actor playing Dumbledore to convey a mass of emotion: pride, love, regret, shame, sorrow and hope. Given the player, my expectations are low.

Final note: I am not suggesting that my interpretation of the Horcruxes/Hallows overlay is the correct one. It’s only a guess. Perhaps time will tell, as you say.

Obi went out to play in the sun yesterday and now her ears are sunburnt …

I like Savoy cabbage too–I am Arabella! But these veggies must be properly and crisply cooked. However many don’t care for these vegetables.

I agree with your Horcrux/Hallows argument. I was just took a different “diagonal” perspective. But my agreement stops after the first sentence of your last paragraph. Rowling hasn’t spoken on this, so we can’t know her intent. Certainly the Hallows aren’t specifically alluded to in the first six books. We know about Harry’s cloak, that Dumbldore held back from dueling Grindelwald until it was almost too late (the wand) and learned in HBP about the ring/Horcrux, but not what it was.

So Rowling seeded the Hallows, but didn’t develop them until DH. Perhaps you are right. Time will tell. I wonder how the filmmakers will handle this critical and commanding issue of death.

Kitties don’t like broccoli either, so what do I know?…

No one has ever spoken more eloquently on the subject of broccoli than the 41st president:

” do not like broccoli. And I haven’t liked it since I was a little kid and my mother made me eat it. And I’m President of the United States and I’m not going to eat any more broccoli”

About the distinction between the Horcruxes and the Hallows. I think that Harry’s struggle ended up with him choosing to go after the Horcruxes – and thereby finish the mission that Dumbledore set him. So I’m not sure what that would say about the bodily/spiritual qualities of each.

I think that both the Horcurxes and Hallows are about mastering death. Voldemort distributes his soul amongst the Horcruxes so that the chances of his being totally destoyed become small. And legend tells that the person who unites the three Hallows will master death. But it turns out that the only way to master death is to accept it, and thereby transcend it. So both sets of objects are doomed to fail, at least literally.

I think that both sets of objects reflect one of the major themes of the stories: transcending death. I still don’t understand why JKR had to build both. If I had to venture a guess, I’d guess that after HBP, and knowing what was to come in DH, she still wasn’t satisfied that she’d expressed everything she needed to say about death. She had to add one more teaching story, one more symbol (three actually), one more metaphor about death. And realizing that three entirely new objects would be too much for even the most accepting reader to swallow entire, “nested” the “new” objects inside existing objects: the cloak, one Horcrux, and Dumbledore’s wand.

I liked the 11 parts of each in dividing DH, too. PG has a very organized mind. But, even though I prefer the books, I don’t see the films as brain candy for those who haven’t read them as they contain very potent points.

I don’t feel the Horcruxes and Hallows were too similar. In a very simplistic way, the Horcruxes were about how long you lived corporeally. The Hallows were about how you lived in spirit. The struggle Harry endured choosing to pursue one over the other was a defining character motif in the book. And the Hallows had serious WizWordl historical significance, where the Horcruxes had temporary (LV’s “lives” were going to run out at some point) and tawdry personal significance.

If kitties chose a Hallow, it would be the Invisibility Cloak…

You had me until you compared books to broccoli – if I got the analogy right. I preferred your earlier analogy: the broad spectrum covered by books.

And I do think people can get deeper meaning from movies, given a great script, a talented director, and good acting. Movie making is big business, considering the investment of money, but it can also produce art. There are too many examples to count.

I do agree with you in principle that movies are not books (how could one disagree!) and that the movies of HP don’t need to be “true” to the books but stand on their own. But since the movies and the books are so similar in this case, it’s only to be expected that the lovers of the books want a more exact match than would be practical, workable or even successful, given the difference in the mediums.

I do think you’re being a little biased, thinking the viewer who hasn’t read the books can’t capture the deeper meaning of the story. The scene in the Forest was made to be filmed, as was King’s Cross, as was Dobby’s grave, as was Godric’s Hollow. They will work even better on the screen, with the benefit of music, and facial expressions and gestures (hope the actors are up to it!), and the visuals. Those scenes are so potently potentially photogenic that I sometimes wonder if JKR wrote them with the eventual filming in mind.

And as for the distinction between the Hallows and the Horcruxes, well, any confusion over those two closely linked concepts I will attribute to the author and not the medium. I don’t agree with her decision to introduce two such similar story-organizing devices in consecutive books. If the scriptwriter can manage to keep them distinct, my hat’s off to him. And you know what – heresy of heresies – I think the story could be told without the Hallows. I mean, the resurrection stone and the invisiblity cloak are already there as Horcruxes. The only missing piece is the Elder Wand, which is also already there. Just add that Dumbledore’s wand is unusually powerful and has interesting attributes and, Bob’s your uncle, you’ve covered all the major plot points.

With regard to the HP movies, they are not the books and they are only a visual slice of the story, an interpretation. I think we have to get over the fact that they won’t be “true” to the books and let them stand on their own, if they can. Since I’ve read all the books endlessly, I can’t judge the movies from a context-less point of view, but I suspect that the movie-story-line is enough to hold the non-reader-movie-viewer’s attention and make sense or the Box Office would not be so robust. I personally found the IMAX version of OOTP to be an audio-visual thrill, regardless of my mourning the absence of the “full scope and tragedy of the thing”.

I am in the more-or-less Silver Doe camp vis a vis Parts 1 and 2. I can see 11 parts in each (kind of like 11 sickles/galleon). Part 1: Dursleys Departed, 7 Potters, Wedding, Tottenham Court Rd, 12 Grimauld, MOM, Forests, GodricsHollow, Silver Doe, Xeno/3 Brothers, Capture. Part 2: Malfoy Manor, Shell Cottage/Dobby’s Red Grave, Gringotts, Hogshead Revisited, Diadem in Fyre, Battle of HW, Prince’s Tale, Forest Again, Kings Cross, Golden Duel, Epilogue. I think they have to include the Xeno/3 Brothers in Part 1 so that viewers don’t walk out burping popcorn and thinking, “What the heck IS a Deathly Hallow? Did I fall asleep again?!” Breaking off with the capture by the baddies leaves viewers hankering to see how they get out of that mess. Maybe I’m a snob, but I just can’t see movie viewers (who haven’t read the books) grasping more than the surface of Hallows vs Horcruxes, much less any deeper meaning. Do people go to movies for deeper meaning? Not enough to earn $4.5 billion.

The movies are great fun and I truly adore them. But they are brain candy. Compare it to liking both fudge and broccoli…fudge is fun but it won’t feed you. Was the decision to make DH in two parts financially motivated? Yes, but why should that make it any less fudgy?

Puffy

On a different note, again late to the party (of this discussion), I doubt they’d choose to end after Silver Doe, because it’s too neat an ending– that is, we have to leave them in some horribly desperate situation. That way, even if some people don’t really like the movie, they feel like they have to see the next part. Plus suspense always creates excitement.

~Nzie