Harry Potter leaves mark on muggles

With a swish of a wand and a flick of the wrist, Harry Potter put the muggle world under his spell.

After J.K. Rowling's seven-novel series sold more than 400 million copies and reaped billions in the box office, the final installment of the story that has gripped audiences for a decade hit theaters at midnight Thursday.

Bearing a lightning bolt scar and rimmed spectacles, Harry Potter faces off against the forces of Lord Voldemort in the battle ending it all in "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2." The film concludes one of cinema's most successful series, and for the first time is offered in 3-D.

At Cape West 14 Cine, nearly all of the midnight showings were sold out by Thursday afternoon, according to Kelly Hoskins, Vice President of marketing at Wehrenberg Theatres. In anticipation of the final film, the theater showed the previous Harry Potter movies Monday through Thursday.

Potter fan Kacie Eidson attended the showing of "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets" Monday night.

Eidson has read all the books and seen all the movies multiple times. She remembers waiting on her 11th birthday for an owl to swoop into her room and deliver a wax-sealed envelope with the Hogwarts emblem inviting her to attend the school of witchcraft and wizardry.

"I sat by my door on my 11th birthday waiting for an owl," she said. "I was so sad that one didn't come."

She is among the millions who hoped an owl would deliver an invitation to Hogwarts, who crowded into bookstores and movie theaters for midnight premieres, who use words like "muggle" and who know what a bludger is.

In the series, Harry struggles through his childhood with angst, awkwardness and courage -- his story is more than the tale of a boy wizard. Fans who were children when the first book came out have tackled their teen years right along with Harry, leading some to call this the "Harry Potter generation."

The release of the last movie signifies for some like Southeast Missouri State University college student and avid Harry Potter fan Allison Dohogne that a chapter of childhood is closing and the time for adulthood has come.

"The movies are coming to a close, and I have recently started working my first real job; its like the end of my childhood," Dohogne said.

Earlier this week The Discovery Playhouse celebrated the release of the new Harry Potter film with wizarding family activities. Children, mostly ages 7 and 8, attended the celebration dressed as characters from the movies.

"We had face paint, a potion station, spooky snacks, a sorting hat and everyone got a magic wand," said Jennifer Mullix, executive director of the children's museum.

Mullix said the celebration was for the final movie's release and also for the imaginative story that has sparked new ideas for playtime with children.

"The story of Harry Potter is not confined to the screen," Mullix said. "Children use the imaginative world of Harry Potter to play and take ideas from the books and movies to create their own adventures."

As Harry Potter encourages imaginative playtime at the Discovery Playhouse, it's also believed to have a positive effect on children's reading. A study by Scholastic's The Kids and Family Reading Report from 2006 indicated that 51 percent of Harry Potter readers ages 5 to 17 years old say they did not read books for fun before they started reading the series.

Sharon Anderson, the youth coordinator at the Cape Girardeau Public Library, agrees that the Harry Potter series has helped create young readers.

"Harry Potter has helped children to not be intimidated by big books," Anderson said. "They discover what it's like to get lost in a book, that's what makes a reader."

In a way that was previously rare for books, Harry Potter piqued worldwide interest and led to the coining of a new term to describe the phenomenon: Pottermania. The movies helped fuel the Potter hype, spawning the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios Orlando, video games and websites like mugglenet.com.

The eighth movie is the final installment of the Harry Potter franchise. With "Harry Potter and the Dealthy Hallows: Part 2" in theaters, Potter fans have nothing more to anticipate. There are no more secrets or horcruxes to find, leaving just one question remaining: What happens to Harry now?

While some might say this is the end of an era for the boy with a lightning bolt scar, Dohogne believes the story won't enter Dumbledore's pensieve as a memory but will be passed on for generations to come.

"Harry Potter is classic material. It's there to stay and I'm very happy that it is," Dohogne said. "I'm saving my tattered books to share with my kids."

rpayne@semissourian.com

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