The End of an Era

Rating: Null/10 (23 July 2011)

I was all of nine years old when I first saw Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone...a movie that literally propelled me into another world, as it had propelled countless spellbound viewers before me and countless after me...a fantasy world intricately woven by the literary genius of JK Rowling. I, like billions of others, followed the legendary magical adventures of Harry, Ron, Hermione, Dumbledore, Neville, Snape, Malfoy and innumerable other memorable characters through seven books and seven movies (and even the odd video game or two, to say nothing of the T-shirts and action figures!)...in many ways (most ways, actually), this magical journey came to an end on the midnight of June 21st 2007...but insofar as it was the movies that introduced me to the world of Harry Potter, I only truly considered the journey complete when I saw the epic cinematic spectacle that is 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2'.
It is difficult to be objective about this movie and analyse it as just another movie, even just another Harry Potter movie, for it is anything but that. It is the end of an era, in cinematic history, in literary history, in creative history...in the history of pop culture itself.
And ultimately, the minor mundane details, the perceived 'innacuracies' and omissions, don't really matter much this time round...it matters very little that we don't learn ALL about the Deathly Hallows, or Dumbledore's somewhat dubious past...it matters even less that we don't see Wormtail die and that Neville Longbottom ends up with Luna Lovegood rather than with Hannah Abbott...it doesn't seem, strangely enough...to even matter at all that we don't get even a halfway convincing explanation for how Harry survived his second near-death experience at Lord Voldemort's hands...story has always been important to the Harry Potter franchise, but this time its not about story...its about images and icons...be it that of Harry, Ron and Hermione flying into the London sky on the back of a dragon, or that of Harry confronting Snape in the Great Hall of Hogwarts...Hagrid carrying Harry's seemingly lifeless body back into the castle or the climactic showdown between Harry and Voldemort...these are iconic moments brought to life from the pages of Rowling's magnum opus, which will remain entrapped in our imaginations forever!
I will not commend the cast and crew of this movie, and all the others before it, for I expected nothing less from them anyway. I will instead urge everyone who reads this to take a moment to acknowledge the end of an era...to perhaps even bask in the euphoria of Voldemort's defeat and Harry's victory, which epitomizes the perpetual tale of good's conquest of evil with a radiant brilliance which perhaps few other works of literature have ever been able to muster...JK Rowling may not have been William Shakespeare, but the great bard's writings never brought millions of fans out onto the streets at midnight waiting for the release of his latest book...THAT is the true inimitable magic of Harry Potter!!!