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It’s a double whammy! Potter points

Happening It’s Potter mania in Chennai again with the fifth film and the seventh book scheduled for release within a week of each other. Divya Kumar reports

Photo: R. Shivaji Rao

Hurry for Harry A hoarding announcing Harry’s arrival

It’s every Potter fan’s idea of paradise. The fifth movie and the seventh and final book being released within a week of each other. Getting to see teenaged Harry’s first kiss on screen and fina lly finding out if he will triumph over the evil Lord Voldemort. To say that excitement is reaching fever pitch among Potter-loving muggles in the city is an understatement.

“Will Harry die? Is Professor Snape on Dumbledore’s side or Voldemort’s? Will we find out more about Harry’s parents? Will Dumbledore [who died at the end of the previous book] return?” asks Janani, a fourth-year B.Tech student. “So many things have to be resolved in the final book!”

But first up is the release of the fifth movie in the series, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, fittingly enough, on Friday the 13th. And Janani already has the tickets booked for herself and her four fellow Potter-fanatic friends. They have a tradition — they always go and watch the Potter movies together, mouthing the dialogues they know by heart from the books along with the characters. “We can’t go for the first day first show,” she says regretfully. “We decided to be good and not bunk college. But we’re definitely going on Saturday!”

Movie theatres in the city are gearing up for the craziness among fans — pint-sized and adult — that’s going to erupt over the weekend. “We’ve had an exceptionally strong response,” says Sathyam Cinemas COO Tan Ngaronga. “Since Sivaji is still running, we aren’t able to use our big theatres for Harry Potter, so we’re thinking of holding four shows each in two of the smaller ones.”

Vinod Babu, general manager of INOX, says people don’t just want tickets; they want 10 or 20 at a go and they want them for Friday. “We’ve had so many young moms calling, saying they want to bring a big group of kids and want to make bulk bookings for the first show,” he says.

Meanwhile, fans are keeping themselves going with whatever they can lay their hands on. Like ten-year-olds Shiva and Sai Raghav who have been surfing the web for tidbits and trailers on fan websites like mugglenet.com and youtube.com. “I can’t wait for the movie,” says Shiva, eyes shining. And until they can get mom or dad to take them to see it, there’s always Sai’s collection of four Harry Potter computer games to keep them both going.

But most of the hysteria is reserved for the seventh book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. This is what all the previous books in the series and all the movies have been building up towards. For those of you not in the know, t his is the big one. The one in which Harry, who will turn 17, must vanquish the powerful dark wizard Lord Voldemort or die himself. The wizarding world is in chaos, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry has been closed down, and Harry and his friends Ron and Hermione find themselves without the wisdom and guidance of the principal of the school, Professor Dumbledore…

“I’m very nervous because J. K. Rowling has said a main character is going to die,” says Janani. And Sai, who has waded through all the previous books (the 800+ page Order of the Phoenix took him three weeks to get through, but he doesn’t care) says, “I’m waiting for the book even more than the movie. Either Harry or Neville Longbottom could die, according to the prophecy!”

They’ll all have to wait a little while longer; the book will become available to fans worldwide on July 21 at 0:00 GMT or 5:30 a.m. Chennai time. “We’ll be open, stocked and ready with coffee, snacks and cookies for everyone,” says Landmark COO Himanshu Chakrawarti. “There’s been such tremendous excitement for the last two-three months — it’s a whole different ballgame from when Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince was released. 221; They’ve already received over 2,500 orders, just as Oxford Bookstore has, and Himanshu expects Landmark to finish with six or seven thousand copies being sold in Chennai alone.

Harish definitely hopes to be at the bookstore on opening day — the 16-year-old has read every book twice, and is all set for number seven. “I’m just counting the days till the book comes out,” he says. And so is his nine-year-old brother Sivesh, though he’s going to be rather busy until then — he’s revising all the books in preparation for the seventh.

Prophecies, spells, wizards and witches — Harry Potter mania has swept over Chennai once again and it’s a double-whammy this time. It sure is a great time to be a Potter fan, and even those of you who’ve been resolutely resisting Potter’s charm may just find yourselves touched by some Rowling magic this July.

POTTER POINTS

The six books have been translated into 64 languages

Worldwide, the Harry Potter series has sold 325 million copies

The series has made J.K. Rowling the only billion-dollar author in literary history.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows has become Amazon.com’s most pre-ordered products, breaking the record set by its predecessor, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince of 1.5 million copies.

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