In her Harry Potter fantasy saga, author J.K. Rowling describes the character Hermione Granger as bushy haired and bucktoothed. In fact, young Granger’s teeth are so fugly that after Draco Malfoy enlarges them as a prank (in Goblet of Fire, I believe), Hermione instructs the school nurse to shrink her teeth to a more normal size, rather than their hideous original appearance.
The casting director for the Harry Potter movie franchise apparently has never picked up one of the books because he or she cast the stunning Emma Watson as Hermione. Nearly all viewers have come to acknowledge Watson’s beauty, though the most perceptive were able to detect her sublimely good looks back in the Sorcerer’s Stone days. In the series’ finale, The Deathly Hallows, the romantic tensions have moved to the forefront of the drama, making Hermione’s miscasting a much more obvious distraction.
In The Deathly Hallows, Harry and Hermione journey through the countryside. Just the two of them. Two heterosexual seventeen year-olds of opposite sexes traveling alone in the woods (staying in the same tent no less) is just about the perfect hook-up scenario. The catch: Harry’s got a fiery redhead at home and Hermione’s jonesin’ for a Weasley of her own.
The Deathly Hallows Part 1 film attempts to play off this tension by inserting a scene of Harry and Hermione flirtatiously dancing with one another while the world around them goes to hell. I’m sure the intent of the scene was to get the audience to think about the characters' motives—especially in light of their respective ginger romances—but my mind was nowhere near that.
If I were reading the book I might have thought, “But aren’t they just friends?” But after an hour or so of watching Watson majestically glide across the screen, all I could think was, “Why wouldn’t Harry try to hit that?" Sure, Ginny’s blossoming into a fine young woman, but Harry’s got a bona fide ten in his own tent! I’m sure director David Yates wanted suspense, but what he got was an entire audience muttering, “It’s about time.” The only thing that took me by surprise was that I had been replaced by a short, spectacled British boy in the fantasy I have enjoyed for years.
I may not even bother to see Deathly Hallows Part 2. I may, instead, opt to imagine myself inserted in the nude make out scene with Hermione for two and a half hours. I would save ten dollars and be far more prepared should the situation ever arise in reality!
