Culturewatch

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, directed by David Yates (2009).
This article was first published on Culturewatch, and is republished here by permission. © Tony Watkins

Harry Potter (Daniel Radcliffe) has grown up a great deal in the last few years. Since he first stepped into the Great Hall at Hogwarts School, his wide-eyed wonder and innocence has been ripped away. He has faced the harsh realities of a world in which evil is finding new strength, and is focusing that strength on destroying him. The difficulties Harry experienced living with the Dursley family are nothing compared to the dangers, anguish and loss he has endured since. His friends have stuck by him throughout, Ron (Rupert Grint) and Hermione (Emily Watson) remaining fiercely loyal despite their disagreements. The three of them have learned more about the world than they cared to, and have developed skills which have been tested in the most extreme circumstances.

Harry has also grown tremendously as a result of being mentored by the greatest wizard of the age, Professor Albus Dumbledore (Michael Gambon). It’s a wonderful relationship. As well as giving him wise advice, the old man’s trust in Harry gives him confidence to act courageously and to lead others. It empowers Harry to fulfil his potential. The protectiveness which the Order of the Phoenix members feel for the young wizard means that Harry is in the fortunate position of having a group of good adult friends, who are totally committed to his safety and well-being.

As Harry has changed over the years, so have the films. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is a far cry from the stiff acting, shoddy effects and sloppy direction of the first two films, which strived too hard to be faithful to the books. Later directors (Alfonson Cuaran, Mike Newell and David Yates) have had much more freedom to make the films work well on their own terms, partly helped by the simple impossibility of putting the entirety of much larger books into two and a half hours. While the standard of the films has improved, each instalment is darker than the one before as J.K. Rowling’s epic story builds towards its astonishing climax.

Dumbledore needs a crucial memory in his efforts to defeat Lord Voldemort. He has a version which has been tampered with, but he needs the real one from former potions master Professor Slughorn (Jim Broadbent). Since Slughorn is preoccupied with comfort, security and the status that results from having taught famous wizards, he is easily lured back to Hogwarts by the promise of a bigger office and, especially, teaching Harry Potter. With Slughorn teaching potions, Snape (Alan Rickman) takes over teaching Defence against the Dark Arts, to Harry’s distress. The advantage for Harry and Ron is that the exam requirements for taking Slughorn’s classes are lower than they would have been if Snape was still teaching potions. This means they have arrived without textbooks, and when Slughorn suggests they take old copies from his cupboard, Harry discovers the tatty copy he receives is full of notes written by its former owner, the Half-Blood Prince. In their first potion-creating task, he discovers that the notes in his book are corrections to the recipes, and they work much better than the printed ones.

Storm clouds continually loom over this film, both literally and figuratively. The wizarding world, which at our first encounter seemed so exciting and vivid, is dark, grey and forbidding. So many scenes are gloomily monochrome that the few bright ones come as welcome relief. Many of these concern the adolescent romantic turmoil of Harry and his friends. Harry is beginning to see Ginny Weasley (Bonnie Wright) in a new way, but she’s going out with Dean Thomas; Hermione, somewhat perplexingly, has developed a bit of a thing for Ron, but he’s entangled with Lavender Brown (Jessie Cave). The combination of raging hormones and a powerful love-potion ending up in the wrong stomach provides much-needed humour to lighten the chilling central plot line. But there is perhaps a little too much of it, resulting in a somewhat uneven, episodic feel, although it will appeal to the teenage target market as much as the rest.

The darkness keeps reminding viewers of the pervading sense of menace facing the wizarding world, caused by the resurgence of the Dark Lord and his Death Eaters. Harry’s life is in particular danger from Voldemort, but everything good is under threat from this unspeakable evil. LIberty is curtailed, security is fragile and trust is ebbing away. Those who stand up for virtue, truth and freedom – in particular, members of the Order of the Phoenix – endure the destruction of their homes, physical attacks and even death.

Nevertheless, Dumbledore and his allies are resolute in their determination to fight evil, whatever the personal cost. They are all grimly aware of the risks, but the peril is such that there can be no triumph without great sacrifice. Their courage in resisting evil, and their willingness to lose their lives for their friends are inspiring. We live in a society in which it has been rare for many years to be in such extreme circumstances. Members of the armed forces face them, of course, but the situation in the wizarding world is much more like that faced by Christian communities in several places around the world where churches and homes have been destroyed and thousands of Christians have been killed in recent years – all without the western news media paying much attention.

As the odds they face seem increasingly insurmountable, Dumbledore in particular is driven on by a deep conviction that good will ultimately triumph over evil. This assurance springs from a belief that, as in C.S. Lewis’s Chronicles of Narnia, there is a deeper, good magic that powers of evil cannot comprehend or conquer. Harry was saved from Voldemort’s attempt to kill him by his mother’s self-sacrifice for him, and sacrifice will eventually be what brings about the Dark Lord’s destruction. Meanwhile, Harry and his friends are driven on by the certainty that goodness and truth and freedom are so overwhelmingly important that personal comfort, even life itself are worth expending in order to achieve them.

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It is easy to portray human brokenness and the dismantling of the human soul cinematically. Indeed, the world is overflowing with such films. However, what is rare and exceedingly difficult to portray is the wonder of human redemption, the power of unconditional love, the presence of genuine goodness, the reality of hope and the boundless joy of living a worthwhile life.

Greg Jesson, ‘Defining Love Through the Eye of the Lens’ in R. Douglas Geivett and James S. Spiegel (eds.), Faith, Film and Philosophy: Big Ideas on the Big Screem (Downers Grove, Il., IVP, 2007) p. 52

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Nothing is so beautiful and wonderful, nothing is so continually fresh and surprising, so full of sweet and perpetual ecstacy, as the good. No desert is so dreary, monotonous, and boring as evil. This is the truth about authentic good and evil.

With fictional good and evil it is the other way round. Fictional good is boring and flat, while fictional evil is varied and intriguing, attractive profound, and full of charm.

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It was interesting to come across this quote again last night after thinking about Lars von Trier yesterday. Some critics have applauded him for having the courage to show evil and despair so unflinchingly. I’m not convinced. I think what Weil’s quote suggests is that von Trier has taken the easy road, since it’s not difficult to portray evil in increasingly dramatic ways. Mike Leigh faced a much harder task with Happy-Go-Lucky, having a central character who is genuinely good.

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Almost as soon as I’d posted, the feed from Ebert’s blog brought news of a second, more in-depth post on Antichrist. He starts by noting that the film ‘will not leave me alone’ and goes on to say, ‘I rarely find a serious film by a major director to be this disturbing. Its images are a fork in the eye. Its cruelty is unrelenting. Its despair is profound.’ He quotes one of the comments on his blog, which asks, ‘If it is in fact the most despairing film you’ve ever seen, shouldn’t it be considered a monumental achievement? Despair is such a significant aspect of the human condition (particularly in the modern western world) so how can this not be a staggeringly important film, given your statement?’ Ebert acknowledges that there is some truth in this, and remarks

In the first place, it’s important to note that “Antichrist” is not a bad film. It is a powerfully-made film that contains material many audiences will find repulsive or unbearable. The performances by Willem Dafoe and Charlotte Gainsbourg are heroic and fearless. Von Trier’s visual command is striking. The use of music is evocative; no score, but operatic and liturgical arias. And if you can think beyond what he shows to what he implies, its depth are frightening.

I cannot dismiss this film. It is a real film. It will remain in my mind. Von Trier has reached me and shaken me. It is up to me to decide what that means.

With its very explicit theological connections, and since von Trier is extremely interesting on spiritual issues, I’m very interested in what the film has to say. The trouble is, it sounds so shocking that I have absolutely no desire to watch it. Ebert says he thinks it’s an ‘exercise in alternative theology’, a reflection on the beginning of Genesis (Ebert says Exodus) where humanity is driven from Eden after rebelling against God. He writes:

The Prologue, a masterful sequence lovely b&w slow motion, shows a couple, He and She, making love while their innocent baby becomes fascinated by the sight of snow falling outside an open window, climbs up on the sill, and falls to his death. This is Man’s Fall from Grace. Consequently, She (Charlotte Gainsbourg) falls into guilt and depression so deep she is hospitalized. That is one half of Original Sin. The character named He (Willem Dafoe) insists she cut off her medication. He will cure her himself. That is the other half. Her sin is Despair. His is Pride. These are the two greatest sins against God.

These are not quite the greatest sins against God, though pride is very close to it. The greatest sin, the fundamental act of rebellion against God, is to put something other than God at the centre: idolatry. This is why the first of the ten commandments is ‘You must not have any other god but me’ (Exodus 20:3). Pride is close to this because it puts us at the centre; it makes us our own gods. All other sins follow from this basic act of defiance.

He and She go to Eden, where He psychologically tortures She, and She phsyically tortures He. Ebert explanation of this gruesome-sounding film is:

The title Antichrist is the key. This is a mirror world. It is a sin to lose Knowledge rather than to eat of its fruit and gain it. She and He are behaving with such cruelty toward each other not as actual people, but as creatures inhabiting a moral mirror world. As much as they might comfort and love each other in our world after losing a child, so to the same degree in the mirror world they inflame each other’s pain and act out hatred. This would be the world created by Satan.

If I am right, then von Trier has proceeded with perfect logic. Just as a good world could not contain too much beauty and charity, an evil world could not have too much cruelty and hatred. He is making a moral statement. I’m not sure if he’s telling us how things are, or warning us of what could come.

All of which leaves me asking ‘Why?’ On the evidence of this, von Trier would seem to be very conflicted, even disturbed, character. According to Wikipedia, he was brought up in an atheist family by Communist parents who were also nudists. Several childhood holidays were spent in nudist camps, which may explain why his films have featured very explicit sexual content. He describes his upbringing as ‘unbelievably lax’, to which he attributes his well-known neurotic nature. He has been interested by religion, perhaps as a result of religion being banned in his childhood home.

I’m not yet sure what he’s trying to say in Antichrist, whether he is now attacking Christian faith with a parodic inversion of the account of the Fall. Ebert’s phrase, ‘It is a sin to lose Knowledge rather than to eat of its fruit and gain it,’ might be the key. He misunderstands the Fall again at this point. It is not knowledge itself which is the problem in Genesis 3, but that human beings wanted the ‘knowledge of good and evil’ for themselves so that they could be like God. It is an expression of idolatry again, wanting themselves at the centre, not God. The issue was that they declared themselves to be the ultimate moral authorities in their lives and grasp at a kind of knowledge from which human beings should be free (since our knowledge of evil is from the inside, as evildoers, not the objective, external knowledge of a God who is absolutely untainted by evil). But He and She are not losing this knowledge, they are embracing it more wholeheartedly – leading to the despair Ebert referred to. What they do lose is the knowledge of Good because they turned away from their responsibility to protect it, to protect innocence. In which case, it sounds like von Trier has expressed with conviction the madness and despair that ultimately results from turning away from God.

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