Boy wizard now working his magic in area theaters.

Byline: MATT COOPER The Register-Guard

Relax - you probably won't need a wizard's wand to make your family appear this weekend at the season's most talked-about movie.

Barring a rush the size of Hagrid the Giant, there should be walk-up tickets available for showings of "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" at Cinemark 17 in Springfield's Gateway shopping center and Cinema World 8 at the Valley River Center in Eugene.

Just go early.

Virtually all of the 15 shows at Cinemark were headed for sellouts Friday, but "Saturday and Sunday there are plenty of tickets left," said Terrell Falk, a spokeswoman with Dallas-based Cinemark USA Inc. "Sounds like people are waiting until just before the showtimes they want."

The slender boy with the broken glasses is packing formidable money-making magic: The screen adaptation of J.K. Rowling's wildly popular book is sizing up 1997's "The Lost World: Jurassic Park" for the title of biggest opening weekend ever, although the results won't be in until Monday.

"This is much bigger than `Star Wars,' ' Falk said. "There is this huge audience out there that has just fallen in love with these stories and these characters. It just translates so well into the Hollywood, visual experience."

Warner Bros. kept Potterites from camping out all night for tickets by making them available three weeks before Friday's opening in some locations, Falk said.

But Nanette Davis of Eugene wasn't taking any chances with her 9-year-old son, Erik - she waited four hours earlier this week for advance tickets for the first show at Cinemark, a 10:15 a.m. viewing Friday.

The younger Davis attended in proper Potter fashion - black robe, wizard's hat and thick black-framed glasses (with tape, of course).

"I like magical stuff and I like imagination," Erik said. "I've waited for this for a loooooooong time."

Truth told, there were plenty of school-age wizard wannabes at the Friday morning show, but it's possible that not all of them were playing hooky. Some schools have seized on the movie as an educational tool.

` `Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone' is a unique book that captures huge issues of life at a child's level," said Kylene Beers, assistant professor of reading at the University of Houston and author of Scholastic's online "Harry Potter" discussion guide.

Those issues include how to overcome adversity through perseverance and how to accept the differences of others. The precocious young Potter also wrestles with schoolyard taunts and the loss of his parents.

Whether Potter can also outwit the twin evildoers Hype and Marketing remains to be seen, but one local professor is keeping score: Elizabeth Wheeler, an assistant professor of English at the University of Oregon, is researching how elementary-school-aged kids feel about Potter - before and after they've been subjected to the marketing blitz.

"If a kid absolutely loves Harry Potter and lives inside a Harry Potter world, what will happen when you attach Coca-Cola to that world?" she asked.

And as many grown-ups will attest, Harry's magic doesn't appeal just to kids.

Eugene dad Ron Bonini put it this way: "It's not just cartoon crap where mom and dad are going to fall asleep."

Some are sure to complain, as did a newspaper in Potter's hometown, London, that the movie fails to achieve the imagination unleashed from the pages of the book.

But 11-year-old Melonie Pyle isn't among them. Pyle, who was in town visiting family on Friday, declared the movie "better than the book" - precisely because it captured her imagination.

"I liked to see what the characters really looked like," she said. "It was adventurous."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

CAPTION(S):

BRIAN DAVIES / The Register-Guard After his mom waited in line for four hours earlier this week for tickets, Erik Davis, 9, arrived at the premiere of `Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone' dressed as the movie's hero.