If during these Christmas holidays, between a pandoro and a panettone, you picked up a wand (not just to try to erase unfulfilled end-of-year resolutions with a spell) it’s normal. The magic of the holidays arrived not only through hearsay, but also and above all thanks to the free-to-air reproduction of the saga in Harry Potter. The number of films taken from JK Rowling’s romance it’s always the same, but every time it’s presented again it always seems like we’re witnessing something new.
The best-known magician of the contemporary cinematographic and editorial airwaves is becoming a great classic of the winter holidays. Yet the saga was not born as a purely Christmas work. The films, as well as the books, were released at different times of the year. Even near the Christmas holidays, but not only. So why is Harry Potter so popular during the holidays? The answer could be trivial, namely because it is still able to glue adults and children alike in front of the screen. However, there is more. A further series of reasons that push Italian television to show it again free-to-air every time the houses are decorated and fir trees and butcher’s broom prevail.
Harry Potter, the best Christmas gift
The first reason concerns Daniel Radcliff. The actor who brought the cinematic Harry Potter to life has had unprecedented success, but this hasn’t been a good thing. At least not always. The young actor, in fact, was selected for that role when he was very young and then grew up with his character. This allowed him to enter through the front door, but also came a lot of suffering, with respect to cinema and its opportunities. By now Radcliffe was “branded”: Harry Potter’s mask had become a label. This led him to have several problems. Not just work. “When I was filming Harry Potter I drank too much because I could no longer handle the pressure of the character”declared the interpreter.
A psychological journey then helped him get out of what he perceived as a ‘cage’. The other interpreters of the saga also experienced a similar situation. So, seeing them again at Christmas, for many, means dealing with collective growth (which they see on the screen episode after episode). which forces, in some way, to deal with change through some small, great certainty.
A collective evolution
Beyond the structure of the characters, there are the plots of the individual plots. Harry and Ginny, Ron and Hermione, Cho Chang and Cedrig Diggory, Nymphadora Tonks and Remus Lupine, up to the darkest “ship”: that between Bellatrix Lestrange and Voldemort. A series of possible and actual love unions that make the film saga even more intriguing under the tree. If it’s true that everyone is nicer at Christmas, Harry Potter also facilitates the gossip quota. Valid arguments, if desired, even during the family dinner, hoping it doesn’t end up like the last council of the Dark Lord.
Harry Potter is good at any time of the year, but at Christmas in Italy it also takes on another value: that of a great classic as only blockbusters of a certain level can be. The panoramic scenes, the alternation of mammoth castles and breathtaking views. America, England, sea, mountains, woods. There really is everything in seven films, or rather eight, that during the holidays makes you want (this is what fans repeat) to travel together with the protagonists of the saga. There are those who would like to take platform 9 and 3/4 and those who can’t find a direct line to go on a skiing holiday. At least reviewing the film series can help you think that even a spell can be enough to travel, if you want.
The warmth of friendship against the coldness of fate
JK Rowling wrote novels to put her children to sleep. Or better: the Harry Potter saga was born because those events had to serve as an anesthetic for the little ones. From an idea was born not only a business, but also a remedy for loneliness. Harry Potter, first with the books and then with the films, kept company with all those lonely people who – perhaps – even at Christmas do not have particularly pleasant family situations. A fairy tale like that of the most well-known cinema magician also does justice to those who seem to be alone by giving the possibility of revenge. A redemption possible by pressing the Play button.
All this and even more can be contained in a movie marathon, which is why the Harry Potter films (all eight) are becoming a fixed event during the holidays because before the plot, the developments, the evolution of the individual characters, it is the atmosphere that wins. The cold – which does not depend on the season – of a destiny where everything seems to have already been decided clashes with human warmth and the added value of the union of friends who found each other by chance and gave birth to a small, great revolution. The average viewer is realizing that, perhaps, under the holidays, this is the only moral they really need.
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