The mettle of a hero

The eagles! The eagles are coming!

Ooops! Wrong movie; maybe even the wrong book. Oh shite! It’s the wrong series.

The Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire mania, the fourth book to be made into film, is up in high gear. Its worldwide release is on the 17th of November. The world premiere, which was held at the Odeon Leicester Square in London last November 6, was a huge success. It’s had its French premiere last Tuesday, November 8, and the US premiere will follow on Saturday, November 12 at Ziegfeld Theater in New York. Critics have said that this is the best Potter movie yet.

The film is rated PG13 for some frightening scenes – well, there’s at least two murders in the book. Like I’ve said before, the books are getting darker and darker, and definitely we’ll expect the films to follow suit. The production team faced a daunting task of putting a huge book (600+ pages) into one compact, interesting movie – not to mention that this is considered to be one of the favourites among fans.

The Goblet of Fire is one of my favourite HP books – probably second on the list. Considering that this is the middle book in the series, everything that happened in here changed the world of Harry Potter upside down. This is the arc, the turning point, the slingshot, and the ominous thing that makes one feel that difficult times lie ahead. This is the book wherein Harry finally became the hero, for in this year he had gone through tests that measured his worth.

So what would one expect from this film? Viewers will be given one thriller ride of dragons, underwater tasks, duels, Quidditch world cup, deceptions, murder and hormonal urges.

Here’s a low-down of what you’ll miss:
1. Dobby the house-elf from Chamber of Secrets and the new “she” elf Winky
2. The Dursleys (that family Harry stays with during the summer)
3. The House-Elf Liberation Front or SPEW
4. Sirius Black as Padfoot (the dog) – though you’ll get a sight of him like a molten lava
5. The other Weasley brothers (Bill, Charlie and Percy)

And here’s what you should look forward to:
1. Quidditch World Cup
2. The Hungarian-tail dragon
3. Harry in a bath-tub with Moaning Myrtle
4. Harry swimming like a fish
5. The Yule Ball (Hermione’s transformation)
6. The Yule Brawl
7. Harry asking out a girl
8. Hagrid falling in love (yucks!)
9. Voldemort (He Who Must Not Be Named)



Get you tickets now! I know I bought mine for the digital experience on the 16th. Yes, you got that right – a day earlier than the release.

As for the first line... Peter Jackson, when do you plan on working on The Hobbit? I miss Middle-earth.