So - have you seen Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince yet? Did it live up to your expectations?
Apparently Harry now has the pope's blessing (as reported in Variety)- really! So while fundamentalists have considered the depiction of magic in Harry Potter incompatible with Christian belief and the Vatican had previously condemned his wizardly ways, the character is decidedly more mature in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, a shift that drew an official thumbs-up last week.
In an article called "Magic is No Longer a Surprising Trick," the Vatican's official daily newspaper L'Osservatore Romano gave the film its seal of approval, noting that Harry "is aware that the world of magic, which he grew up with in the past, is not exempt from malice." It praised the film for promoting "friendship, altruism, loyalty and self-giving."
That's quite a reversal from just 18 months ago, when the Vatican paper slammed Potter for being a negative role model and cited Pope Benedict XVI, who six years ago as a cardinal warned against the boy wizard's "subtle seductions" which, he said, "act unnoticed and by this deeply distort Christianity in the soul."
Now I guess we have to see whether this will mean more people going to see the film!
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3 comments:
That's awesome! Haha.
-Briana
I didn't hear about that! Interesting that they would actually admit changing thier minds
First off: I loved loved loved Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Definitely one of my favorites, probably because of the half laugh-out-loud hilarious and half heartfelt romance we were missing in earlier films. Also, Dan, Rupert and Emma’s acting was superb. As a response to the Vatican’s “Thumbs-up,” I one-hundred percent agree that this film shows Harry’s selflessness and overall maturity, although I don’t think this was lacking in earlier films either. It seems to me that in every book and movie, what appears to be only fantasy and dark magic is in fact rooted in ethical decisions and consequences that we can all relate to.
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