Real Magic

Nowadays, movies provide unexpected and peculiar visual experiences: one can face giant insects and ride dragons – quite a progress since first innocent films about moving trains 100 years ago.

What is the magic of the modern cinema then, how to define it? Is it about flying broomsticks, brand new fears, talking portraits, or something different? What is the source of the impression, if there is such, universal for all members of the public?

I have seen all series of the magical blockbuster Harry Potter. As it is world-known, one must admit there is some kind of universality in its influence. Perhaps for teenagers it is about Mr Radcliffe and games in the sky, but my remembrances are rather about the man-in-black called Professor Snape. The voice. The frozen face. The fast and sudden reactions. Maybe he is not the best magician, but he seems to be the most magical figure in the movie. Strange.

This week, I got even stranger feeling when watched recently released “Perfume”, where Alan Rickman performed the father of the killed girl. I attended cinema thrice trying to understand: I saw the same magic in this drama, where he appeared in a dozen of minute episodes but managed to get undivided attention – just as he did when played Sheriff of Nottingham in the “Robin Hood” (I remember I couldn’t understand why Maiden Mary chose somebody else, after all??)

The episodic personage made me follow each move of his face with strange feeling of one-to-one contact. When he tells to his daughter about the decided marriage and makes ‘full stop’ by the move of the eyebrow, ‘I have said’ – this is what makes a great actor. That move is for his decision and also for the parental love regretting about own harshness caused by the necessity and reason. The amazing thing is that Mr Rickman does not have children of his own. He created the perfect image of the perfect father purely by means of the artistic talent.

I found some interviews, filmography and multiple fan sites. Searching the magic, I looked at the chart:

Now it is much easier to understand, isn’t it? What makes people feel that he talks and looks at them and nobody else? That reception between ruler of 1st and exalted ruler of 10th, with ruler of asc in 10th in conjunction with Moon; culminating Jupiter close to Spica is paternalistic and warm. And most of the planets are in Pisces and Cancer, loving the ruler of the asc. This person was born in a working-class family to become world famous and adorable.

The magic of the cinema is not about technicalities and special effects: down that way, there is a crisis for the art. The magic of the cinema is about the depth of the character and personal charisma. Mr Rickman is living proof of this.