Harry Potter

Last week I participated in one of my favorite rituals-attending the midnight showing of Harry Potter. The fourth Harry Potter movie, The Goblet of Fire, was released 12:00 a.m. Friday morning. I attended this late-night viewing for the release of the first three movies with my friends at home. Going to school in a new city, with a whole new set of friends was not going to prevent me from continuing this tradition. The excitement starts months in advance with the release of the first teaser trailer. It is a cue for me to re-read the book and try to imagine how all of the action will be portrayed on the big screen. What will be included in the movie and what will be left out? As more trailers are released, my friends and I search online for the international versions because they will often have different clips. We try to satisfy our curiousity by finding out as much as we can about the movie. Fandango.com becomes our new best friend, since it allows us to purchase our tickets online in advance and ensures us that we will get seats for the viewing. While this year I didn't have to worry about waking up and going to school on three hours of sleep, I had to bundle up and battle the chilling 40 degree weather. However cold weather is surely a small price to pay to see the movie the first possible time. The group of twelve people that I went with and I left the dorm an hour early, we wanted to get good seats. When we got to the Bridge we were shocked to see a line of hundreds of people stretching all the way to 41st street. The Harry Potter series is unique in its ability to draw a following of all different age groups. I hadn't expected the Bridge to be showing the same movie simultaneously in six of its theaters. I hadn't expected a woman to be scalping movie tickets on the sidewalk outside the theater. I hadn't expected so many people on a college campus to spend their Thursday night waiting in the cold for at least an hour to view a movie. Apparently, there aren't many limits to what people are willing to sacrifice.