The Becky and I watched the latest H-Pot movie in the theater the other night. It was ok; I like that Sirius Black sports badass wizard prison tats and I enjoyed the big (too-short) fight scene between the gang of good wizards and the gang of bad wizards. I'm not here to ponder the H-Pot phenomenon itself, though. Instead, I'm thinking about it in the context of this massive post-Lord of the Rings glut of fantasy movies.
The only two currently- or soon-to-be- released fantasy films I know the titles of are the critically-panned Stardust (apparently, Robert De Niro plays a drag queen air pirate with a New York accent) and The Golden Compass, which looks kickass. There were previews for a number of other ones before H-Pot hit the screen, however, and it seems pretty clear that fantasy movies starring kids as protagonists are going to be all over the place for the foreseeable future.
The problem is that they all share the hero-kid destiny device: the protagonist is a well-meaning kid who doubts his or her ability to handle big problems but is destined to save the world. For me, this is pretty uninspiring. What makes Lord of the Rings such a revelatory book is that Frodo and Sam were just wimpy hobbits with no special abilities and no special destinies. It was essentially through bad luck that Frodo ended up being the ring-bearer, and it was through a combination of perseverance and better luck that he and Sam actually got it to Mordor. All of these post-LOTR novels and the movies they promptly spawn feature protagonists who were born with something special; they can't help but be at the heart of the most important events of their (made-up) worlds.
For the reader/viewer, this is a let-down. Fantasy is inspiring because of the implied potential of more-or-less ordinary people to do amazing stuff. The original Star Wars movies inspired a generation of kids (my generation) to pretend they were Jedi; it drove us all crazy that Luke was such a whiny little bitch, because we knew that if we had the good fortune to be trained by Yoda, we'd do a much better job paying attention and actually believing in the Force. Like everything else he completely fucked-up, George Lucas ruined the whole Jedi mythos in the later Star Wars films by claiming that one's potential for controlling the Force was based on little microbes in the bloodstream; now being a Jedi was in the blood, not in the motivation or the discipline.
Fortunately, the plot of the His Dark Materials trilogy, of which The Golden Compass is the first book, is much more ambiguous in its treatment of the child-heroine Lyra. Lyra is destined to be special, but she isn't destined to necessarily succeed. Her choices shape the fate of the world, which I think is a much more topical and appropriate approach to fantasy heroics in general than being born to do good. Like everything else I ever write about, it all comes back to existentialism: in the real world, things are ambiguous and things result from choices, not destiny. Thus, fantasy that works with those parameters ends up not only being more satisfying, but it's ultimately more realistic.
8.10.2007
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What is also important to remember with The Dark Materials trilogy is the ambiguity of the prophecy (no one is quite aware of the choice Lyra will have to make until the moment she makes it), and Lyra herself seems unaware of her own role.
Basically, I love these books because the author truly created a unique plot line. There are no trolls or pointy hats. And I think we could all use an armored bear in our lives. The films for these novels may be another beast entirely, but hopefully more attention will be brought to the books afterwards.
Mmmm... I just finished the Golden Compass. A couple things that were unusual about this novel for me: a) I found that I was not guessing the next move the author built up throughout the chapters. I think that's one of the problems of having seen a lot of movies/read a lot of books; you end up having trouble finding originality in storytelling. b) I found that I was thinking about Lyra and her parents for the next couple of days. That usually doesn't happen to me, either.
I need to get the next book, but can't afford the time right now. I'm excited about the movie. Also, according to the movie website, my daemon is named Laefe and he's a jackal. Interesting, no?
One more thing: I did find that the Golden Compass side characters were far less complex and interesting than the side characters in HP. Roger... most uniteresting side character ever.
And here is a difference between the books and the movies. What you find out in Book 5 is that Harry isn't destined to be or do anything, and he wasn't even destined to be
"the boy who lived". There was a prophesy that one of two boys born at the end of July in 1980, with anti-Voldy parents, who would challenge Voldemort. It was Voldemort who made the choice between the two boys (the other being Neville) b/c "and either must die at the hand of the other for neither can live while the other survives" (OOTP, 741). It's Voldemort's obsession with killing the child he thinks will over throw him that sets the whole story into motion and sets Harry up as the inevitable hero. This is also the book where Harry finds out that he may defeat Voldy, but will probably die doing so. Dumbledore knows that Voldy will go after Harry and that Harry will have to be prepared. Also, because of what is revealed in the last book, we only at the end find out why Harry has all of this power.
This is my major complaint with the movies. They leave out all character motivation in the interest of cutting overall movie time, and include pointless scenes that are cute or effect heavy. If they had spent 5 min establishing the big deal with the prophecy and another 5 dealing with what we find out Neville in OOTP, the whole thing would have made a lot more sense.
Ok, enough HP dorkdom for me...
wow, i've been excited to see the golden compass movies, but now i think i'll need to reread them. i don't seem to remember all this existentialism...
i do remember the feeling that they were not built the way that children's books tend to be. even i was on unsure how things would go. that along with an armored bear and some other talking animal characters totally wins me over in a book every time.
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