Wild about Harry – but Daniel is set to move on

Radcliffe, who celebrates his 21st birthday today, may be about to break the curse that so often afflicts child actors and other juvenile prodigies of the movie screen.

Not content with playing tragic photojournalist Dan Eldon – murdered by a baying mob in Somalia in 1993 – in Journey is the Destination, Radcliffe has been tagged as the star of both Erich Maria Remarque's All Quiet on the Western Front and Susan Hill's The Woman in Black, the latter for the recently resurrected Hammer Films.

What's impressive about Radcliffe's casting is that he is still largely untested as a viable film performer. Unlike his stable-mate, Rupert Grint, who has bounced around our screens in several British pictures to make an effective break with Hogwarts' Ron Weasley, Radcliffe's limited canon is dominated by the Potter franchise.

In truth, he's had little opportunity to flex his muscles and earn his spurs. The TV movie, My Boy Jack, in which he played the baby-faced soldier son of arch patriot Rudyard Kipling during the First World War, saw Radcliffe badly miscast. What's more, his lack of character experience arguably undermined the film.

Now, suddenly, he's elevated beyond the security of the repertory that comprises the Harry Potter phenomenon to lead two mighty giants of 20th-century literature as they are transformed into very 21st-century movies.

Of course, one has to expect that the central actor at the heart of one of the most popular film sagas of all time will be in demand. After all, Radcliffe has a sizeable fan base, courtesy of scarred Harry and his magic wand.

Yet the choice of such projects seems to hint at Radcliffe moving swiftly and determinedly away from Harry Potter so as to make a clean and permanent break with all things wizard-related. Maybe it's time to put Harry and pals away in a box marked "Youth".

The hero in Hill's story is an ordinary, decent young man thrust into a nightmarish ghost story. Remarque's German Everyman is an ordinary, decent, earnest and naive young man who is dehumanised and wearied by his experiences in the trenches.

Radcliffe exemplifies decency, goodness and honour. It's writ large across his wide-eyed golly-gosh expression. Like it or not, it's typecasting and he will struggle to shake it off. I fear for him. Few child stars have made the transition to adulthood and survived to have a durable career. Prodigies – think Macaulay Culkin, Haley Joel Osment and Drew Barrymore – don't often metamorphose into bankable grown-ups without some distress.

And some actors are forever associated with one role to the detriment of all others. Mark Hamill is living proof of that. He might be 60 next year, but he'll always be Luke Skywalker.

Here's hoping Daniel Radcliffe avoids having to wear the same artistic strait-jacket. At just 21, time is on his side.