FLORIANOPOLIS - Naughty Teenagers and Santa´s Scary Chistmas

I realised that I couldn´t possibly leave Florianopolis without reporting on a final couple of Phworld worthy occurances. Firstly, Harry Potter. This weekend was basically National Potter Craziness here in Brazil. Not only was Half Blood Prince finally published in Portuguese, but also Goblet of Fire arrived at cinemas. The crazy people were out in force. I queued behind some delightfully scary people dressed in full Hogwarts school uniforms (cloaks, hood, ties etc. etc.) for tickets to the film and got to join in with the pattern of cheering at very bizarre moments during the film (basically, whenever someone died)

Briefly, and because I know I won´t get away without doing it, my review. If you´re not a fan of ponderous prose (although if you´re reading this blog, I can´t see how you´re not) then you´d do best to ignore the next couple of paragraphs and get straight to the pretty pictures.

It´s pretty much fantastic, I´m pleased to say. The script is easily the best adapted of any of the Potter films so far, with most of the redundant plotting from the novel cleanly dispensed with. In fact, there´s serveral things which work *better* than in the original novel including the continued empowerment of Neville Longbottom (something of an underdog hero in the film series) and a much better sense of exactly who´s plotting against whom. But, really, the best thing about it is, like Prisoner of Azkaban, the employing of a director who knows how to make human dramas instead of big fantasy films. Mike Newell may not know much about dragons and broomsticks (although he does well with both) but he knows a heck of a lot about fourteen year olds, school discos and embarassing teenage dating trauma. It´s the series´ greatest strength that it´s taken J.K. Rowling´s edict strictly about having the teens grow up through each entry. Whereas Star Wars and James Bond pump out the same film time after time, the last couple of Potters have given us angst, hormones aplenty and, this time around, our first cuss words and even conversations about underage sex. (Which, when I remembered everyone involved in was meant to be fourteen, I suddenly felt very strange about watching. Kind of like how a parent must feel when their child starts talking about sex at the dinner table) The parental groups probably hate it but I´m more and more impressed how well the series is doing. If it carries on using such interesting directors it might be in danger of redefining the childrens´ movie in the same way the Potter books occassionally redefine the childrens´ book.

That said, it´s not quite as good as Azkaban for a few reasons. The first ten minutes or so are a lesson in how *not* to enduce a headache in your viewing audience. First we´re in one place, then we´re not, then the Quiddich World Cup begins and, then, sort of ends. Very bizarre. Once we get to Hogwarts things slow down a bit and the sparkly dialogue takes over. But, after the Mexican flights of fantasy and big band craziness in the last film, the production and sound design is just a little bit too bland. I´m a big fan of composer Patrick Doyle but the music is all pretty anonymous aside from the odd bit of ´jumpy thumpy´ every so often. And whoever decided that Lord Voldermort´s return should take place on a set designed to look *exactly* like the inside of a studio really needs their head examining. Voldermort prances around his little stage like a pantomime villan (not Ralph Fiennes´ fault given that he´s acting beneath ten inches of bizarre makeup) and that´s not quite right for the lord of all evil. As a result, the high point of the novel becomes a bit silly in the film. But you can´t have everything, I suppose. Other random gripes: (A) The casting of Quddich Goddess Cho Chang as a teeny little girl with a Northern accent. She´s meant to be Harry´s dream girl. Instead, she´s the girl next door. (B) The usual wasting of pretty much every British actor with four seconds of screentime and two lines. Alan Rickman suffers this time around, as does Gary Oldman. But kudos to Mike Newell for finally giving Maggie Smith something to do. (C) Jarvis Cocker´s cameo. Which is every bit as awful as you could possibly imagine.

Basically, it´s great. Really great. Not the greatest kind of great, but much better than bland. And given we´re into the fourth of the series now, when most other franchises start to sink, that´s a big achievement. And there´s swearing in it. What´s not to love?... Okay, I´m done. Now stop asking me about it, okay? (And, before you ask, I won´t see The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe until I get to Chile)


Santa´s Christmas Workshop, Brazilian style. Where good taste and commercialism collide. At least the Alfa Gente kids seem to be enjoying it.

The other big trip of the week was taking some of the Alfa Gente kids to meet Santa Claus. Since, you know, it´s the middle of November and so it´s about jolly time we started dragging kids to these things and getting them thoroughly hyped up about them. This being the Brazilian summer, though, it was obviously going to be a bit different than your average hour in a cold shopping centre. Florianopolis, though, has some very bizarre ideas about such things. They took a rather nice nineteenth century pastel coloured building in the historic centre of the city, covered it in fake santas and then inserted a cookie basking factory onto the second floor. For no particular reason. The other rooms are similarly decked out in plastic Santas of all shapes and sizes, and some very bizarrely crafted exhibits combining period furniture and red ribbon. One room, where Santa is working on his sleigh, looked a little bit too much like him performing a bizarre sex act on his lead reindeer for me to be entirely comfortable bringing ten year olds in to see it. There was no sign of what this three floor building was used for the other ten months of the year but I wonder if they just simply strip out the Santas and have it open as some sort of historical piece. If you took out all the plastic and tinsel it would look like your average museum. It´s really interesting what a complete disregard for taste can do for a building.


Gabi, Attiq, Lucy, Sarah and Jess all awaiting Santa Claus´ judgement and free lollies. But do we think they´ve all been good little children this year, boys and girls?

And then, even as I was thinking about registering my disapproval, I discovered that Santa Claus himself was in residence to answer my queries about his curious sense of interior decoration. So I lined up with the ten year olds to get my turn on his knee. Of course, when the moment came I was torn between having an epic Portuguese discourse about the commercialisation of a Christian holiday and posing for silly pictures. Reluctantly, the adult in me had to give way and let my younger self reign. I blame Santa himself in part, though, since as you can see, he truly was one of the most comically dressed Santas I have ever encountered. I realise that getting truly old people to sit in costume for hours at a time can lead to dehydration, overheating, prematue death and other annoyances but, really, couldn´t they at least have found someone old enough to have some facial hair of his own?


Note that whenever one meets Santa, it is customary to adopt the Macauly Culkin facial expression. This applies in other countries too, not just Brazil.

And so as quickly as it had begun, it was over. After our Santa encounter was completed we were hastily led around the back alley and out of his post colonial pink palace. The whole thing had been weird, trippy and perhaps slightly traumatic. But it hadn´t cost a penny, and had given a group of children all the lollies they could suck on. And then I remembered how in shopping centres worldwide, other Santas were doing exactly the same thing, in much less impressive surroundings and charging money for the privildge. They may have defiled a building, but nobody had to feel physcially poorer for the experience. Just emotionally so. And, really, isn´t that what Santa´s grotto and, indeed, the modern Christmas should really be all about?

Merry Christmas, y´all.