Okay, so fine. I’m not likely to let my girls watch lots of hand-to-hand combat because I know it inevitably boosts physical aggression in the household for a few hours afterwards.

I’m less sure, however, about another reason we tend to keep our young children away from movies like Mike Newell’s Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005)—because they’re too frightening. Presumably, introducing children to the harsh reality of a world filled with death, evil, hatred, and violence can only confuse and shock them, leading to nightmares, anxiety, and perhaps even panic attacks at a tender age.

I don’t deny that this kind of trauma can occur. I was scared enough by scenes in the comparatively innocuous Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory (1971) and 2001 (1968) to have discomfiting dreams about Oompa Loompas and a big black rectangle throughout my childhood years. Imagine what my imagination would have done with done with the spectacle of a young boy dying horribly at the whim of a merciless wizard!

The question is whether allowing children to be scared in this way is always a bad thing. I don’t think it is. I believe we dismiss the benefits of fear far too readily in our (inevitably futile) efforts to protect our children from anything that might hurt them physically or psychologically.

To my mind, Newell’s film is such an amazing success—and I think it far better than the entries that preceded it for a number of reasons—because it makes us tremble. Evil and danger become quite tangible for our heroes in this latest installment. When Harry faces a dragon in his first trial of the Triwizard Tournament, even those familiar with the book's resolution of this encounter will feel he is truly imperiled. And his little tête-à-tête with Voledmort is terrifying: watching the confrontation on screen drives home how close the evil wizard actually comes to realizing his revenge. For the spiritually minded among us, Voldemort’s malice must necessarily evoke Satan’s own: material fiction echoes immaterial reality.

Novels and films that reveal the very face of evil do us all a favor. (Though J. K. Rowling’s exploration of Voldemort’s history admittedly flirts with his humanity, her most recent book seems, ultimately, to construct him as wickedness incarnate.) Such fiction reminds us that Ephesians 6:12 is no ghost story told to frighten young children into good behavior, but an accurate portrayal of an ongoing battle that should frighten all of us into audacious acts of courage and self-sacrifice. If you do not believe your enemy is real and powerful enough to destroy you—how will you ever learn to recognize his maneuvering against you?