Great thread Tom.
It seems that magic is the center of the HP sotries. Everything revolves around it. In the LOTR, magic is almost incidental. I is more about struggle, sacrifice, honor, choosing to do the right thing, courage and more importantly, ordinary beings doing extraordianry things. It is not Gandalf or the elves or any magic that defeats the evil. It is a simple Hobbit who through courage, a sense of duty and honor takes upon himself the burden and perseveres to triumph. It is also about the others who stand up and do their part. The life lessons in the LOTR in my opinion are numerous and invaluable. There are example after example in real life of these attributes, although we seldom hear of them. Saving Private Ryan was not a factual based film, but my favorite scene in the movie is where Tom Hanks character reveals that before the war he was a school teacher. How appropriate. I find HP entertaining, and I little bit of "the moral of the story", but near as powerful as LOTR.
And Tom , you are right about the written word. Movies cam evoke emotion and some thought and entertain. But mostly they are sensory input being thrown at you. When you read, you have to process the word. You create you own imagery and exercise your intellect and imagination. How may times have you read a passage, stopped to think about what you just read or gone bac to reread it and ponderit. The story did not pass you. It waited for you and let you reenter as if you never left. Can't do that with a movie. It's no wonder that books are often bannned when evil begins to take a foothold.
Anyway, I'm rambling now. Thanks for starting the thread Tom, and all the comments have been great.
Terry
It seems that magic is the center of the HP sotries. Everything revolves around it. In the LOTR, magic is almost incidental. I is more about struggle, sacrifice, honor, choosing to do the right thing, courage and more importantly, ordinary beings doing extraordianry things. It is not Gandalf or the elves or any magic that defeats the evil. It is a simple Hobbit who through courage, a sense of duty and honor takes upon himself the burden and perseveres to triumph. It is also about the others who stand up and do their part. The life lessons in the LOTR in my opinion are numerous and invaluable. There are example after example in real life of these attributes, although we seldom hear of them. Saving Private Ryan was not a factual based film, but my favorite scene in the movie is where Tom Hanks character reveals that before the war he was a school teacher. How appropriate. I find HP entertaining, and I little bit of "the moral of the story", but near as powerful as LOTR.
And Tom , you are right about the written word. Movies cam evoke emotion and some thought and entertain. But mostly they are sensory input being thrown at you. When you read, you have to process the word. You create you own imagery and exercise your intellect and imagination. How may times have you read a passage, stopped to think about what you just read or gone bac to reread it and ponderit. The story did not pass you. It waited for you and let you reenter as if you never left. Can't do that with a movie. It's no wonder that books are often bannned when evil begins to take a foothold.
Anyway, I'm rambling now. Thanks for starting the thread Tom, and all the comments have been great.
Terry
