I took a deep breath and took both girls to see the fifth Harry Potter movie, The Order of the Phoenix. It was, I think, the first PG-13 movie they'd seen. I'd heard all of the hype about it being darker, scarier, and for more mature audiences than the first four. But even though I usually wait until someone who knows me sees the movie and says whether they think the girls could handle it, we decided to go. I wasn't going to get away with them not seeing it, for one thing. They've both loved the first four movies, and Madison has Book Five practically memorized. (She kept up a whispered running commentary throughout the movie about book scenes the movie left out or treated somewhat differently, although overall she says the movie was true to the book.)
All of us really liked the movie, and quite honestly I wasn't sure why it was rated PG-13. The "scary" bits were, yes, a bit more violent than we'd seen in previous movies vis-a-vis harm that was done to humans, but the Chamber of Secrets killing of the basilisk (HP #2) was definitely more gory and aroused more anxiety in viewers, at least in my kids. For those of us who understood more of the psychology -- i.e., Madison, who knows the book, and I, who am more aware -- we could tell that this was more grim and ended less on a note of triumph and more on a note of "good we got the bastards this time, but there's a lot worse to come." For me, the experience was very much like I was visiting with these old friends, the kids and adults at Hogwarts, and I felt a warm sense of familiarity that I wouldn't have felt had they not been able to retain the same actors (save for Dumbledore, as Richard Harris died, but his replacement, Michael Gambon, was perfectly serviceable and my kids can't tell the difference).
The best actress, in my opinion, was the creepy-creepy-creepy Imelda Staunton as Dolores Umbridge. And I think the reason that she was so creepy is that we all have seen school administrators who have an Umbridge soul, so the fact that the kids mounted a very effective rebellion was immensely satisfying to the audience. Evanna Lynch was awesome as Luna Lovegood, and I read somewhere that she beat over 15,000 girls for the role.
When I asked the girls if they'd found it particularly scary, the response was a resounding "No!" I find this so interesting. "Well, what kinds of things DO you find scary?" I asked. Monsters lunging for the kill are pretty scary, Ella thinks, if you don't know whether they're going to succeed. But by far what both kids find most "scary" is when a protagonist they like is about to do the wrong thing, to get in trouble. When Harry ran away from the Dursleys at the beginning of #3, THAT was scary because he had just done magic in front of a Muggle and it could get him expelled from Hogwarts. So really, for my lovely little odd kids, many sitcoms are scarier than these kinds of movies. To be honest, I do get dreadfully embarrassed when that kind of thing happens in sitcoms, when you're shouting in your mind at the screen, "No! Don't do it! This is a sitcom and you know you're going to get your comeuppance! It will be embarrassing!" But I am almost positive that I've never expressed anything like this in front of the kids...we certainly don't watch much TV together, other than
their shows and, say, the odd episode of "Trading Spaces" or "Mission Organization" or the Food Network.
Anyway, six mostly-enthusiastic thumbs-up for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. We'll probably see it again with Dario when he comes in a couple of weeks.
