![]() ![]() Kids who’ve grown up with these movies will be forever spoiled, assuming that all fantasies should look Harry Potter–rich. Who knew that narrative rapture could overcome bladder imperatives?Īnd who predicted, back then, that the series - which had a laborious birth under Chris Columbus’ directorial midwifing of the first two episodes - would grow in cinematic stature under three other directors and become a cohesive long-form work that nearly rivals Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy in expertise, intensity and grandeur? Credit screenwriter Steve Kloves, who wrote every script but that of Order of the Phoenix, with judicious pruning and a knowledge of the epic’s internal pressure points, and the technical crew headed by production designer Stuart Craig for visualizing the landscape of Hogwarts and beyond with such lavish, meticulous creativity. The franchise’s core audience has grown up with them, making it hard to recall that, back in 2001 when Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone made its debut, many skeptics doubted that kids could sit through a 2½-hour movie without a bathroom break. We’ve seen Daniel Radcliffe (Harry) sprout chest hair, Emma Watson (Hermione) cleavage and Rupert Grint (Ron) a foot or so in height. The three leads have spent fully half their lives inside the skins and souls of their characters. Remember the innocence of those early films, when the plot could pirouette on who would win the end-of-term match of airborne racquetball? As a decade passed between the publication of Rowling’s first Harry Potter volume, in 1997, and its conclusion in 2007, so with the films. (See pictures of Harry Potter cast members through the years.)Īh, Quidditch. Instead, they saw their roles as caretakers of a sacred text, transferring Rowling’s young hero and his ageless benefactors and adversaries to the screen with a kind of buoyant reverence that often stirred the spirit and never dropped the Quidditch ball. But the filmmakers could have failed their source material, as the would-be alchemists of countless other books for young readers have before them. “Please, Mom and Dad, can we see just one more episode? It’s only 3 a.m.”Īn eight-part fantasy epic with a dead-serious tone - and the unusual goal in these facetious movie days of being iconic, not ironic - the Harry Potter films of course had the benefit of a bedrock constituency: the tens of millions of worldwide fans of J.K. One imagines future generations will watch it, in its nearly 18-hour expanse, as one sprawling, enthralling story. It is indeed impressive and we mean not just this solid, satisfying final film - in which the Potter saga reaches its climax, if not quite its emotional apex - but the entirety of producer David Heyman’s blockbuster franchise. Follow very impressive, isn’t it?” observes moony Luna Lovegood, the hippie Hogwarts student, in the early moments of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2. ![]()
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