A Monumental Moment

So it has come to an end. It seems hard to believe, even harder than laying hands on the book in the wee hours of the morning of the 21st of July, almost overwhelmed by excitement and happiness. The time has come to look ahead at a life in which we'll never again be enchanted by the magic of Potterverse; in other words, to look ahead at a depressingly unmagical life. How brilliant a writer would J K Rowling have to be to inspire such sadness amongst her fans just because she has ended a story, a ludicrously hard-to-believe, unrelatable fantasy? I took more than a day to read the book, withstanding numerous distractions, a truly awful digestive disorder and a splitting headache (all of which were entirely unrelated to the quality of the book), but never even for a moment during those 24 hours did I think I was being silly or childish in setting such great store by a mere book. It's almost immaterial whether the book is good or bad (for the record, I think it is the best book of the series); just the thought of never again experiencing the unadulterated joy of reading a new Harry Potter book is almost too dreadful to imagine. I know this may sound frightfully juvenile, but right now I'm very tempted to call J K Rowling the best writer ever. You can sneer all you want, but you'll find that much harder to do when half of the world's population backs me up on my statement.

So how satisfactory a conclusion to an epic journey is Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows? I must confess that when I first heard that the book was going to be only as long as Half Blood Prince, I became extremely apprehensive, not to mention a little irritated at JKR for cowing down to the greedy demands of the publishers. How could she possibly explain everything in such few words? God knows we Potter fans had done enough research on the first 6 books to know that there were more than a few loose ends that demanded detailed and convincing explanations. It seemed ridiculous, almost impossible to believe that JKR could squeeze in clarifications about things like the mysterious Veil in the Department of Mysteries, the many interestingly weird delicate instruments in Dumbledore's office or why it was important that Lily Potter's wand was good for Charms when, in all fairness, it was incumbent for her to devote all space to Harry's epochal quest to destroy Voldemort's Horcruxes. After reading the book, however, I've realized that it doesn't matter in the slightest that Ms Rowling chose to leave a million things unexplained. What she gives us in place of tying up loose ends is so gripping, so fantastically enjoyable that you can only marvel at her incredible knack for not disappointing her fans in spite of their colossal expectations.

JKR had said before the release that many would loathe the bloodbath in the book, and at times it does seem like she killed off characters just because there were so few deaths in the previous books. We have people dying left, right and centre in this one, and almost all the characters are perpetually injured, but that is to be expected in the final instalment of a series. There are many fight sequences and a grand battle at the end, and though you do tend to think about how spectacular these will look in the movie, the less-than-satisfactory adaptations that have come up till now make you appreciate JKR's writing even more. Dumbledore is a dominating presence in the book in spite of being dead, and the bit about his questionable doings in his youth is one of many masterstrokes from JKR. He always was my favourite character, Dumbledore, but this book makes sure that he will be remembered as the most intriguing Potter character of all, usurping the position from Severus Snape, who's given a bit of a raw deal this time round after his stupendous role in Half Blood Prince. The book moves at a lightning pace throughout, and this is not surprising given the depth of material JKR had to cram in even without the insignificant explanations the lack of which so engaged Potter fans for the last two years. The book is, to use a very clichéd term, a thrill-a-minute page-turner, as were all the other Potter books, but this being the last one makes everything that much bigger and better. The climax is monumental and awe-inspiring, and the fact that JKR manages to explain every little blood-Horcrux-hallow complication so convincingly even with Harry and his companions in the heat of the battle, fighting for their lives, speaks volumes about her narrative skills, though it must be said that the re-opening of the Harry-Voldemort mind connection is a little too convenient and leaves a tiny plot hole. The epilogue, however, is a big let-down, filled with cheesy dialogue and cheesier circumstances, but I guess we can forgive Ms Rowling one minor blemish; heck, I could even forgive her a hundred blemishes, after all that she's given us.

I can go on and on about every little thing that was so wonderful about the book and the very few things that were not, but the bottom line remains that this is the end, the sad and surreal end. No more looking up fansites for new theories, no more arguing with friends whether Snape is good or evil, no more rapturous delight at every new revelation by JKR in one of her interviews. I'm sorry if I'm sounding too gloomy, but believe it or not, there are probably thousands of people around the world who are crying their eyes out right now because the series has ended. Most certainly, this is a monumental moment, a tragically monumental moment. One thing's for sure, however: no matter what subject JKR writes about in the future, or how trashy her writing becomes, every one of her future books will be an instant best-seller. And I, for one, will not be complaining; she's thoroughly earned every bit of her reputation. In the meantime, I suppose we'll have the Potter movies for another 3 years to keep our spirits up. Ouch.

A Week Before D-Day, and Things Have Turned A Little Sour

Here's an unusual question for Harry Potter fans: Is watching the latest Potter movie the best preparation for reading the newest Potter book? The guys up at Warner Bros must obviously have felt that the answer to that question is yes, a feeling that will most likely be vindicated by the bumper box office returns Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is bound to get. On the flip side, of course, Deathly Hallows is releasing on the 21st of this month, almost exactly one week after the opening of Phoenix, and heaven help Warner Bros if they think Potter fans are going to spare even a sideways glance for Harry's frustrating struggles with Dolores Umbridge when they could instead be grappling with monumental things like Snape being evil after all or horror of horrors, Harry himself going out with a painful death. But that's not the only problem the movie faces. I hate to admit this, but Phoenix suffers greatly from a tad too many over-creative liberties taken by the director David Yates, who perhaps needs to be told by someone that you just cannot fit an 800-page long book into a 2 hr 20 min short movie. Math, anyone?

The best that can be said about OOTP (Order of the Phoenix, for the uninformed) is that it is better than the first two Potter movies. The movie satisfies the hardcore Potter fans in managing to squeeze in nearly every important event from the book, but sadly, that very intent makes many of the scenes look rushed and fleeting. As for the changes from the book, well, let's just say that Yates should have had a serious chat with Alfonso Cuaron (the director of Prisoner of Azkaban) or even Peter Jackson, for that matter, about the do's and dont's of bringing new plot details in a hugely popular book before even thinking of directing the movie. Most of the changes in OOTP seem forced and unnecessary, and it only my fear of being labelled a raving/lunatic/obsessed Potter freak that's stopping me from listing all of those disagreeable changes here. Many sequences in the movie have an unfinished, anti-climactic feel about them (note the vapid end to the scene where Trelawney is sacked or the irritatingly docile reactions of Ron and Hermione to Umbridge's torture tactics). Sirius's death is butchered mercilessly, and Harry's outburst in Dumbledore's office, one of the most poignant episodes in the books, never comes to pass. Bellatrix Lestrange looks like a deranged medieval witch most of the times, and Grawp the Giant looks cute rather than scary. Ok, maybe I am sounding like a raving/lunatic/obsessed Potter freak after all, but who cares?

The special effects are fairly satisfactory, but the acting from the Trio is not. Alright, I'll leave out Rupert Grint from this - he's been consistently decent right from the first movie; but will someone please tell Daniel Radcliffe that he needs to put something on his face, like say, expressions? Emma Watson looks all pretty and charming (which Hermione is NOT supposed to be), but would definitely make things a lot more tolerable for everyone if she just stopped making her eyebrows continually dance like they're preparing for a ballet, or even if she refrained from delivering EVERY line looking like she's terribly out of breath. The older actors, on the other hand, put in very good performances, particularly Jason Isaacs, who as the pure evil/subservient Lucius Malfoy steals the show from everyone (including Gary Oldman in another appropriate Sirius Black turn). Imelda Staunton as Umbridge is almost perfect, specially with the 'Hem, hem' rendition and the revolting girlish wickedness, and there could not have been a better choice to play Luna Lovegood than Evanna Lynch. However, my biggest grouse with the Potter movies remains the shoddy portrayal of perhaps the third most important character in the books, Severus Snape. Alan Rickman may be a fine actor, but it is simply unacceptable that the makers have chosen to reduce Snape to a bumbling, comical idiot whose most significant moment is hitting Ron with a book. It's amazing how I seem to be the only one who finds fault with Snape's portrayal in the movies, but J K Rowling had always intended for Snape to be a no-nonsense, vicious, supremely smug persona, and the movie Snape is anything but that. I seriously cannot understand how they're going to undo all the damage they've done to Snape's character when he comes into its own in Book 6, the title of which, funnily enough, is named after him. In my book, Isaacs would have actually done a marvellous job as Snape, but will anyone listen to the true Potter fan?

The one thing that can be said about OOTP is that it hardly ever gets boring (ok, maybe the first half is a little boring, but you can't really blame Yates for that - nothing much happens in the first half of the book either). It would've been all perfectly good fun if it wasn't for the inescapable fact that it is an adaptation of a Harry Potter book, which naturally makes us pick at and frown at every minor detail which is inconsistent with the spirit of the book. It would also have helped greatly if they'd taken the trouble to explain everything about the plot adequately enough (my non-Potterized friends kept breaking out into perfectly understandable questions like, "what the hell is going on?"). And while we're talking about explaining things, I shudder to think how they're going to do that in Movie 6 with things as complex as Horcruxes flying around, specially if they're going to be hell-bent on sacrificing justice to the books for cash-generating ploys like keeping the length short. Alfonso Cuaron, where art thou?

When Rafael Nadal Almost Made History, Part 2

Just about the only thing that the men's and women's finals at this year's Wimbledon Championships had in common was that one of the players wept at the end of each match. And oddly, the two weeping players did not share the same result; while Marion Bartoli was distraught and disheartened after being overpowered and outplayed by that wonder-woman Venus Williams, Roger Federer's tears were a little more complicated. He did not lose the final against Rafael Nadal, no, but it is not hard to imagine how relieved and ecstatic, not to mention physically and emotionally drained, he would have been at the end. Bjorn Borg watched from the stands as Federer scrapped and battled his way to equaling his record of winning five consecutive Wimbledon titles, but I'm sure he was sorry, as were most people who watched the match, that there could only be one winner.

To say that Nadal is adjusting well to playing on grass, his least favourite surface, would be a gross understatement, and also a little dismissive of the man's amazing fortitude. Nadal didn't just match Federer shot for shot today; on many occasions, it was he who looked like the one at home with the conditions rather than the King of Grass Federer. He served well, played well from the baseline, charged to the net more often that is customary for him and hit some amazing passing shots when Federer came to the net. Basically, he did just about everything that you need to do to win a match against a grass court dab hand. This was his second consecutive Wimbledon final, and he seemed passionately determined this time to create his own bit of history by becoming the first man since Borg to win the French and Wimbledon back-to-back. Is it just me, or does Nadal raise his game several notches higher when playing against Federer? The trouble for him, however, is that Federer is not just a grass curt dab hand - he is an artist, an almost flawless genius. He played the big points exceptionally well (how does he manage to come up with all those aces on break points?), and in the end, he managed to wear Nadal down (surprise, surprise!). Maybe the five matches in a week that Nadal had to play finally took a toll on him. Maybe his knee (for which he took a medical time-out in the 4th set) really did hamper his movement. Or maybe, Federer simply refused to lose to his nemesis on the surface that is so dear to him and his playing style. Whatever be the reason, tennis fans got to witness a classic encounter (it certainly was the best match that I've ever seen live) between the two players who are disturbingly too far ahead of their peers. Nadal gave us enough evidence to emphatically dispel the notion that he's "only a claycourt specialist", and Federer finally showed us that he is willing to be a scrapper and dig deep to win his matches against never-say-die players like Nadal, in the process accomplishing one more thing that Pete Sampras never did - winning five Wimbledons in a row. Bjorn Borg would be proud. Of both of these fantastic champions.

In the women's section, Venus Williams showed us yet again that it's never safe to pass over the name 'Williams' when talking about the potential winner of a Grand Slam event. If Serena Williams was all fire-in-the-belly and fight-till-the-last-breath at this year's Australian Open, Venus was a ruthlessness-and-invincibility act here, at least from the fourth round onwards. Honestly, did any of her opponents stand a chance against her inch-perfect, fearsome serves and crunching groundstrokes? Sharapova was bounced out mercilessly, Kuznetsova was handled with ease, Ivanovic was never really in the game and the surprise finalist Marion Bartoli was taken care of with clinical finesse. And all this after coming into the tournament ranked 31st in the world, a comeback from injury that had been heading nowhere in particular and a solitary title in the bag for the last one year or so. It's things like these that make one agree with repeated assertions by the Williams family that there's no player in the world who can defeat a fully-fit Williams (and that refers to both the sisters). What a pity that Serena couldn't make it an all-Williams final; she certainly seemed the only player who could have given a contest to the rampaging Venus.

So at the end of yet another Wimbledon tournament, let's just congratulate the players who produced dazzling tennis and took the game to another lever to emerge champions. Take a bow, Roger Federer, Venus Williams, and bravo to you too, Rafael Nadal! Your time will come, surely.

For Once, Stephen King Is Not Awfully Unreadable

I don't quite feel up to writing much today, but I did stumble upon a fantastic column written by the oft-unreadable Stephen King. The column is about, you guessed it, Harry Potter, and I don't think anyone could've put into words the feelings of us Potter fans as July 21 approaches any better than how King has. Click on the link and be overwhelmed, just as I was:

http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20044270_20044274_20044682,00.html

When Rain Makes Folklore

Fortune favours the brave, they say. To that I must add that it also favours the insanely determined. If you watched Serena Williams battle on in a seemingly hopeless situation against Daniela Hantuchova in her 4th round match at Wimbledon today, you'd know exactly what the hype surrounding her is all about. The woman was so badly injured that she could barely stand, let alone walk (and I mean this very literally), yet she simply refused to surrender the match, limping from one side of the court to the other, trying to finish points with a maximum of two strokes. It was a sight so unforgettable that it seemed ridiculous that anyone could possibly have had any thoughts of writing her off as a 'has-been' just six months ago. "Folklore awaits if she wins this one", one of the commentators piped up rather unassumingly during Serena's Herculean struggle, and Serena promptly went ahead and belted an ace. Not that she could hear him, of course. But nature, it seems, heard her despairing grunts loud and clear, and the rains came pouring down with Serena hanging on in the second set by her very last nerve, down 4-2 in the tie-breaker. That one moment of respite was all that Serena needed, and though she went on to lose the second set when play resumed, she won the third with consummate ease, all power and glory. Poor Hantuchova never really had a chance, and this day was never really about her. Serena Williams may not get past Justine Henin in the quarterfinals considering how much this match must have drained her of her energy, but she did more than enough today to ensure that she'll forever be remembered as one of the most brilliant of tennis champions. Like she needed to, after all those Grand Slam trophies and periods of invincibility.

Meanwhile, Rafael Nadal is locked in a marathon struggle with Sweden's Robin Soderling, and if there's one player who isn't thanking the rains that have so gleefully ransacked the schedule at this year's Championships, it's got to be Nadal. Thanks to the disturbingly inflexible adherence to tradition of the tournament organisers, his 3rd round match that was suspended on Saturday will now take 3 days to be completed, because Wimbledon's middle Sunday, according to the great traditions of yore, must necessarily be an off-day. This also means that many players in the bottom half of the draw (including Lleyton Hewitt - why don't my favourite players ever find favour with fortune? It's not like Hewitt's not brave!) will have to play 5 matches in 7 days if they aspire to take home the trophy this year. And what about the players in the top half of the draw? Roger Federer, for one, has to play just one game in the next 4 days, thanks to Tommy Haas pulling out of his 4th round clash with the World No. 1. Looks like Federer's inherent advantages over Nadal on the green grass of Wimbledon just got plenty stronger.

It is precisely at times such as these that calls for Wimbledon to shed it's lofty traditions and move forward with the times seem perfectly justified. Wimbledon is trying to adjust, certainly - the roof that will presumably be functional by 2009 will definitely ease a lot of the tournament's struggles with the weather - but perhaps what is needed for Wimbledon to keep pace with today's expressly fast game is not a cursory architectural venture, but an unrestrained willingness to adapt to the moment. If Saturday was rained out, there should have been someone among the organizers go, "We've got to react to the situation and keep up with our schedule. The forecast is for wet weather the whole of next week, so let's dump tradition and have play on Sunday for a change". I know, I know, wishful thinking never really does anyone any good.