Harry has just seen HARRY POTTER & THE HALF BLOOD PRINCE

More than after any other Harry Potter chapter in this run of films, I want to read the books. I'm frustrated by the film. Frustrated because I'm so unsatisfied with the state of things at the end of this latest film. I feel like there are MASSIVE sections of the book missing. I want so much more - I want more classroom instruction - more Hagrid - more Tom Riddle memories - more of the burgeoning love stories. Basically - I need more. Much more. In fact, I really WANT to know where it is all headed. Who lives, dies, is happy & sad at the end. I want more whimsy to the world again... things that delight me and make me wish I was at Hogwarts. In preparation for this latest offering - Yoko and I sat down over this past weekend and watched all the HARRY POTTER films on Blu-Ray. And we almost re-watched the first one twice, just for the WIZARD PEOPLE, DEAR READER version - Yoko LOVES it. In watching all the Harry Potters to this point, I found myself in this film being a tad melancholy. There is a constant air of menace and foreboding. It feels especially icky. Hogwarts feels like it is dying to a degree. Dumbledore like so many people we cast spells of invincibility in life - is revealing that he is in fact mortal. His body is beginning to show its wear and tear - and it is sad. Even the way that Dumbledore transports Harry places in this one... it's "grab my sleeve" - which feels like Harry is helping Dumbledore - even as he's winked away. So much of the magic of this film is of the dark variety. Take the potion that the potion class must conjure to earn the Good Luck Potion... it is... LIVING DEATH potion - for KILLING. What... the... fuck? That's gotta be a Wizard college course, right? A lot of the burgeoning love is unrequited. And even when it is going the way it should... it leaves broken hearts in its wake. There's hurt feelings, aching desire, homes destroyed and loved ones killed. This feels like an Autumn tale. It was strange, on the ride to see the film today, we turned the AC in the car all the way down and put on RADIOCLASSICS on XM radio which was playing an old Bing Crosby Christmas Radio Special. It was magic - driving through the oven-like atmosphere of Austin, as Bing ba ba ba boomed his way through snowflakes and Santa and told a tale of "The Small One" - as we headed to see our new HARRY POTTER. The theater was nigh abandoned. The parking lot scary and near empty. Walking into the lifeless lobby felt strange. But then I knew the big exclamation of this story. So as a result, I was steeling myself for the moment - and I think that knowledge textured the entire experience. This Harry Potter is exquisitely crafted. It feels like something awful is coming. The entire time. It felt bad. It felt like it was going to hurt. But when that moment came, its handled so much from the vantage point of Harry Potter - that I felt an emphatic bond with Harry. I was a bit pissed off. I don't like that that character was... handled in that manner. And by betrayal. That hurt. But it is supposed to, right? I'm not supposed to just want happy happy joy joy. That's what we'd like, but that isn't this story, is it? Even at the end, as with all conflict - there will be scars, graves and memories that will leave their mark long after the times of these events, just as it is in life. This film series has weight, loss and emotion. That's pretty remarkable for juvenile pop fiction. It makes it feel worth those days of silly jelly beans and leaping chocolate frogs. It makes you remember the faces of these children back at the beginning. Remember when Malfoy was just a bully? Here - he's a ticking timebomb. His face looks clammy, rotting and eaten away with the pressure of his mission. He's a young man recruited to strap a bomb to his chest to kill someone. And it is that knowledge, the knowledge of who his back up is.... and the knowledge that what the goal is... pretty much most of us know... well it creates foreboding, melancholy and a feeling of weight that underlines and holds everything from reaching joy. This is a bittersweet chapter. If anything - there's old magic stirring betwixt our growing children is the hope of the film. That the unspoken magic of LOVE - which so awesomely bitchslapped Voldermort at Harry's scarring... it's happening again. There's moments with Harry and Jenny where I can imagine Harry's parents feeling similar emotions - or even my own High School memories. I'm a little frightened by the coming two final films. It was my final year of High School where I lost my best friend, essentially ended my relationship with my mother, but set out more upon my own. And that is that purpose of that last year. To say goodbye to many "lifelong" friends - and set out upon your purpose. But none of us really had the great war right out of school or dearing school. In a way, I'd have loved to still have my Granny around to tell me stories again of what it was like to graduate High School on the eve of WWII. These kids - they've had a pretty damn hard life so far. Harry is an orphan. Hermione is hit with magical racism. Ron comes from lower economic conditions. At school, they lost friends, relatives, students & teachers to a growing evil. And at the end of this, they're left with the feeling that the future is now in their hands, in their wiles and hopes and luck. This story is wrapping up, I can feel it. I have two more years till the film series is over and I can stay true to my commitment and in 2011 - I can finally read the series in book form. Then I will discover everything I've missed and rediscover the series anew. I'm very interested to see how all of you take this film. I really liked this film, but my favorite is still the third one. How about you?