Goblet of Fire, Home Edition

This past week I finally got around to buying a copy of the Goblet of Fire.

The arrival of the movie in our home was greeted with delirious excitement. Jake and Nate had seen the movie in the theater with Grandma and Grandpa and the boys loved it. Max and Rebecca, however, had not seen it because it was deemed to be far too scary by not only by Larry and I but also by Aunt Meryl. Immediately, all four children started to pester me on when they would get to see it. My standard answer, sometime, didn’t cut the mustard and I had to promise that they would get to see it in the next two years (they picked the time line not me, but that I’m complaining.)

I set aside the movie and we all moved onto other things.

Then on Saturday night Nate got sick.

He was supposed to perform at a piano recital on Sunday, but with a temp of 101 that was out of the question.

Nate was crushed. It was to be a very special Mozart themed recital. Everybody would be performing a piece of Mozart, there would be a birthday cake with candles and then the students would receive their trophies. I even think that somebody was planning on showing up attired as Mozart. Nate had been practicing very hard and was looking forward to the recital.

So I decided we would watch the Goblet of Fire after I took Nate to the local walk-in clinic. It was sort of a consolation prize and a reward for good behavior after being poked, prodded and swabbed.

Once we returned with antibiotics in hand and a diagnoses of some sort of Upper respiratory infection (which I disagree with, I’m thinking the boy has Lyme disease. Lord knows he has had a ton of tick bites and our neighbor was diagnosed last year.) I settled the kids down to watch the movie and made some popcorn.

Throughout the movie I would call over Rebecca to cuddle her during the scary parts. Following my lead Jake would tell Max to move a bit closer to him and would drape his arm around his little brother to comfort him. During those moments I was very proud of my eldest son.

The movie was a big hit.

The next day, during lunch, Max told me that “Goblet of Fire is not scary on TV, but I would have been scared at the movies.”

Rebecca then turned to me with her big brown eyes opened wide and side “I was not scared of the movie at home, but at the movies I would scream and scream and scream and scream.”

And that is the magic of watching a movie at home. What would be unbearably terrifying for a four year old in a big and dark theater is far more manageable in the comfort of home in your mother’s lap.

That and the complete access to the bathroom.