Harry Potter Mania

Is film number 6 really the best among the previous entries? Hmm.. Can't wait to find out.

Posted by Matthew Hay Brown at 11:26 AM

Harry Potter, long the bane of fundamentalist Christians, has won a rave review from the Vatican.

L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican newspaper, has given the new film “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” four stars for promoting “friendship, altruism, loyalty and self-giving,” Catholic News Service reoprts.

The review in Tuesday’s edition marks an about-face for the newspaper, which 18 months ago called the boy wizard “the wrong model of a hero,” and charged author J.K. Rowling with transmitting “a vision of the world and the human being full of deep mistakes and dangerous suggestions, even more seductive since it is mixed with half-truths and compelling storytelling.”

Pope Benedict XVI himself, when he was Cardinal Ratzinger, warned of Potter’s “subtle seductions,” which he said “deeply distort Christianity in the soul, before it can grow properly.

But the Vatican found much to appreciate in the sixth film in the series, “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince,” which is due to open worldwide on Wednesday. (Translation from the Italian courtesy of the Catholic News Service)

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The Vatican has given a nod of approval to the latest Harry Potter film, saying it made clear that good would triumph in a battle with evil.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince arrives in cinemas on Wednesday and is the sixth installment in the fantasy series about the boy wizard and his Hogwarts school friends.

The official newspaper of the Vatical City - which is ruled by the Pope - said it was the best adaptation yet of JK Rowling's hit novels.

L'Osservatore Romano said the film's treatment of adolescent love achieved the "correct balance" and made the story more credible to the general audience.

However, the paper criticised JK Rowling for failing to make any explicit "reference to the transcendent" in her books.

Nevertheless, L'Osservatore said the latest installment made clear that good should overcome evil - a fight that sometimes "requires costs and sacrifice".

"In addition, the fitful search for immortality epitomised by Voldemort is stigmatised," the review said.