Last time we got a new look at the upcoming (well pushed back until the summer) Harry Potter film it was all about Lord Voldemort. This time around, we get a glimpse into the epic mission Harry and Dumbledore embark upon to eradicate the world from the evil wizard.
You’ve read the books and need little in the way in introduction for this trailer. But I will say, that I’m enjoying how each movie has made the Harry Potter film-universe larger and more magically realistic. This one looks fantastic, like nothing we’ve seen before from this series of films. I like that it seems anchored in the “real” world even as it continues to push the fantasy aspect, it’s almost as if the movie is bulging at both poles. Anyway, bonus points to Harry for using his celebrity to score some chicks at Hogwarts.
Remember when we all finished Harry Potter and the Super Duper Long Seventh Book of Wizarding Awesomeness? That was a good book - full of magic and excitement and sadness because Harry’s tale officially ended.
And we thought that that might be the end of this particular universe, so we slooowly dragged out each and every page as the boy wizard saga reached it’s ultimate conclusion.
Well, J.K. Rowling, billionaire maestro behind this whole shebang, has gone and pulled a George Lucas on us by offering up The Tales of Beedle the Bardthis December.
That’s right, the book of five fairy tales Albus Dumbledore gave to Hermione Granger will be yours for the low low price of $12.99. It’s available for pre-order now and will hit bookshelves on Dec. 4 just in time for that Christmas holiday. Now that’s something straight outta George Lucas’s playbook.
“Oh hey, it’s Christmas time you’re kid would really love another Harry Potter book.” So um, hint hint Mom? MORE »
Harry’s going to some dark places. This looks more like some epic Biblical fantasy movie than it does a family-friendly wizard story. It looks like Harry Potter has grown up. USA Today had posted a few pictures in a generic fluff piece yesterday.
The biggest thing they reveal is that young Tom Riddle, aka Lord Voldemort, is being played by Ralph Fiennes’s 11-year-old nephew Hero Fiennes-Tiffin. That’s good stuff, keeping it in the family.
“His mother (Martha Fiennes) is a film director, and Hero was very focused and disciplined,” [director David] Yates says. “The fact that he’s related to Ralph wasn’t the primary reason for choosing him. It was an advantage that he looked very similar to Ralph. Of course that was useful. But primarily I went for Hero because of this wonderful haunted quality that seemed to bring Tom Riddle alive on-screen for us.”
Yates stressed how hard it can be for very young actors to find the necessary dark place to play such a creepy character.
“But even though he’s the nicest child you’d ever want to meet, sweet-natured and pleasant, he got the corners and dark moods and odd spirit of the character.”
To be honest, until I saw the trailer I entirely forgot what Book 6 was about. I’m still a little hazy around the edges, but I remember Harry and Dumbledore go around looking to destroy the soul of Voldemort.
This has been speculated for quite some time, but now it is indeed confirmed that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows film adaptation will comprise two movies. The first part is scheduled for November 2010 and part two will hit in May 2011.
“It was born out of purely creative reasons,” producer David Heyman told the Times. “Unlike every other book, you cannot remove elements of this book.”
I suppose, just so long as movie part one doesn’t turn into Harry and Hermione’s National Lampoon’s Haunting Camping Trip.
By James Furbush | February 20th, 2008 | 9:00 pm PST
Lots of stuff happened today that we just couldn’t get around to giving proper love to. However, we couldn’t let a few things go by without at least giving mention.
First up, director David Fincher (Se7en, Fight Club, Panic Room, Zodiac) has signed on to replace Alex Aja on the teen horror flick Black Hole. The movie will be penned by Roger Avary and Neil Gaiman and is based upon the graphic novel by Charles Burns. The story focuses on a sexually transmitted bug that gets passed around a group of teenagers.
Oddly, author Lois Lowry spilled some (via) Harry Potter beans in a post on her own blog regarding the developments of her book The Giver. According to her David Yates, who directed Order of thePhoenix and is currently directing Half-Blood Prince, will be back to direct The Deathly Hallows. Ugh. Not terribly excited about this. I like Yates, for sure, but I just wish they would hire a gonzo director for the book 7 double bill and go all out.
Bad news from The Giver Movie front. David Yates, the director currently working on the next Harry Potter film, was supposed to begin The Giver film next. But he has just decided he wants to do the final Harry Potter first, thereby postponing The Giver by several years. Maybe the opening of this film could be held simultaneously with my celebration-of-life service after I succumb to old age? Or the producers will decide to get a different director. Stand by. But without holding your breath.
Did you love Akira? The 1988 movie is probably regarded as the highest achievement in Japanese animation. Or at least it is around here.
Mostly because it’s about a gang of superbike-riding pill-eating teens who roam the futuristic roads fighting with rivals and screaming a lot. One of the members gets caught up in a government experiment and develops psychic powers, leading to a massive destructive battle with the gang’s leader. Now it’s getting made into two live-action movies. This time around it’ll be based upon the six-volume manga series, with each movie based upon three volumes.
The movie will be directed by first-timer Irishman Ruairi Robinson. Check out the movie’s badass potential and the director’s potential as well in his short film,Silent City.
Warner Bros. exec Greg Silverman, who previously brought the studio 300 and Batman Begins, brought them Akira and encouraged them to obtain the rights. Although the studio let go of the rights a few years ago, they fought to gain them back in a bidding war, ending up paying in the seven-figures. The studio is describing the film as “Blade Runner meets City of God.” Nuff said.
AICN is reporting that Leo DiCaprio and Joe Gordon-Levitt are starring in the main roles of the film.
Did the WSJ reveal plot details for Pixar/Disney’s in development Toy Story 3? Hard to say and if they did, they certainly didn’t give away much, but Peter’s got the deets over at Slashfilm. “Woody the cowboy and his toy-box friends are dumped in a day-care center after their owner, Andy, leaves for college.” Okay. Sounds good, but what’s the rub? It’s got potential and if I trust anyone it’s Pixar and John Lasseter.
By James Furbush | November 16th, 2007 | 9:24 am PST
Lotsa stuff to get to this morning and rather than try to do each of these by giving them the space to breath, we’re gonna smash them into one extended post and hope we hit everything. Today’s my birthday and per tradition that started in college I take the day off to celebrate me, which usually ends up in me getting drunk at noon and watching bloody disgusting movies that no one else will watch with me. I’m thinking about doing a Hostel Part 2 and 28 Weeks Later movie marathon.
So I’ll be shutting things down after leaving you with some good stuff today. We’ve got two movies reviews from the NW Film Fest to get up and a music premiere that I think you won’t enjoy, but you should find endearing.
I’d also like to give a warm happy birthday greeting to Dwight Gooden and Maggie Gyllenhaal.
On with the news:
- Kevin Smith is getting his inner Judd Apatow on. He’s cast Seth Rogan and Elizabeth Banks as the leads in his upcoming flick Zack and Miri Make a Porno. It’ll be nice to see some fresh faces from one comedy universe transplanted to another one.
- Tim Burton returns to Disney to direct a motion-captured version of Alice in Wonderland! Really would you want any other director doing this. He’s also going to direct a feature length version of Frankenweenie. All I can say is Johnny Depp for the Mad Hatter…
- Speaking of Harry Potter, Worst Previews has a behind the scenes video of the now-filming Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. They’re just cranking these badboys out aren’t they?
- Hulk get angry and smash pretty girls! Just kidding, but the first trailer for the Eric Bana, Natalie Portman, Scarlett Johansson starring The Other Boleyn Girlshas arrived.
- Guud, director McG has been locked into to direct the fourth Terminator flick: Terminator Salvation: The Future Begins.Which was going to be called “Straight To Video” in its original draft.
- Speaking of cool trailers, did you like that transition? How does this sound: Jackie Chan and Jet Li kick some ass in a martial arts picture titled The Forbidden Kingdom.
- The latest Cloverfield trailer has been pirated by a camera cellphone. It’s not difficult to find on YouTube, but we seriously recommend you waiting for the non-pirated version when it hits either today or Monday.
- Persepolis is an animated movie from France about the Iranian revolution and it’s in subtitles and it looks like American animation from 1935 but if you can get past all of that it also looks frakking awesome.
“Pupils are enthusiastic about their work in mathematics and particularly enjoy practical tasks and those that allow them to investigate mathematics. Some pupils said they enjoyed calculations because they knew what they were doing and they liked getting things right.
“They commented that mathematics is fun because they are always challenged and their teachers link it to the work they are doing in other subjects. Lessons observed were taught through the topic being covered in literacy. For example, subtraction was seen as a spell by ‘Harry Potter’.”
Just goes to show you that learning doesn’t have to be stuffy. I learned to read and do math from the sports section of The Boston Globe and baseball box scores, respectively. I’m guessing that sort of learning would be frowned upon here in the States. But it just shows what can happen when you tap into a young person’s imagination and enthusiasm to learn.
By James Furbush | November 13th, 2007 | 11:01 am PST
Well we know he’s gay, the entire known universe knows it to. Does anyone else begin to think that this is just another publicity stunt? I’m not sure why but now that book number seven has come and gone, it feels like we keep getting more Harry Potter “news” than ever before. J.K. Rowling is really trying to keep this in the spotlight, yeah? Or the media just has nothing else to write about. Either way, the kid actors react to the news.
By James Furbush | October 23rd, 2007 | 10:25 am PDT
News stories like the following illustrate quite clearly why The Onion is as great as it is. We’ve got a news story from England about a three-year old boy. Said boy got a traffic cone stuck on his head and it took fire workers almost six hours to get the cone off. Anyway, click on the photo below of the boy to read the story. It’s pretty entertaining, but the pictures definitely make the story. All because he wanted to be Harry Potter, wonder if his mum told him about Dumbledore?
So what’s the verdict? Real or fake news? Either way it’s pretty funny.
By James Furbush | October 22nd, 2007 | 10:33 am PDT
Talk about left field. Harry Potter matriarch J.K. Rowling admitted at a recent reading that Professor Albus Dumbledore likes to cast more than just spells with his wizard wand.
“I always saw Dumbledore as gay,” Rowling said in answer to a fan’s question about whether the wizard ever found love.
The books contain virtually no references to the headmaster’s sexuality and even screenwriters working on an upcoming “Harry Potter” movie didn’t have an inkling, Rowling said.
She was recently reading a script draft in which Dumbledore reminisces about a girl he was once attracted to. “I had to write a little note in the margin and slide it along to the script writer: ‘Dumbledore’s gay,’ ” Rowling said.
Weird. Interesting to see how this news goes over in the coming weeks and whether or not this has any traction or if anyone even really cares.
I’m going to start the rumor right now. Voldemort’s really angry and wants to kill everyone because Dumbledore was a little inappropriate with him as a student.
Is he looking at Fluer or is he trying to sneak a peak at Barty Crouch?
On another related note: J.K. Rowling is insanely rich. I just thought I would point that out.
By now, many of you have been squared away, entranced in the latest Harry Potter book. But we thought we’d take a moment just to let you know of the craziness that went down in Harvard Square last Friday night. It was a zoo, absolute mayhem, with Potter fans jammed into the Cambridge area, standing shoulder to shoulder just to wait six hours in line at one of the myriad bookstores.
Sounds like it was the jam. Just want to thank Varmazis for the photos. They give a great indication just what it was like to be there.
Waiting in line around midnight for the book. And this is the big intersection at Harvard Square below. You’d think the smaht kids were protesting or something, but alas, it was just Harry Potter fans with nothing to do but stand outside.
And now you can go back to reading “The Deathly Hallows” as it’s about 1,000 times more interesting than this bit of news.
As we gear up for the release, sniffle, sniffle, of book 7 in the Harry Potter universe and try to find time to go see movie number 5, we figure why not take the time to cover our bases with a little Harry Potter themed music.
If we’re talking wizard rock, there’s really only one band you need to know about and that’s Harry and the Potters. They’re from Boston and if you’re in the area on July 20, it will be well worth your time to trek over to Harvard Square, when the hotspot will be renamed Hogwarts Square for the day, leading up to the midnight release of book 7.
The odd thing is that despite all their lyrics being about saving Ginny Weasley, Phoenix tears, giant trolls, Quiditch tournaments, etc. the band writes some dope melodies. You’ll be instantly reminded of There is Nothing Wrong With Love-era Built to Spill. Like I said, it’s a dope indie rock sound, with a geekish twist. In about two years, Harry and the Potters have gone from playing basement college shows to drawing tens of thousands of people at Harvard Square. Not too shabby.
And you can bet your moneymaker that we’ll be there. They are also expecting something like 10,000-20,000 people to jam in Harvard Square that day, no doubt dressed up as their favorite characters. It’s gonna be bomb or magic wand or whatever the heck the wizards slang is these days.
In the meantime, check out this great article in the Washington Post about the entire Wizard Rock scene. Who knew there was actually a scene built up around the Harry Potter Universe. That’s just nuts.
Check out more of their tunes over at Virb. Or just feel free to download these two.
At some point we all knew that J.K. Rowling would close up shop on the Harry Potter universe. Most assume she’s going to retire and swim naked in the piles of cash and coin being kept in a vault. But no one had any idea that Universal Studios, makers of theme parks and increasingly better Harry Potter movies, has decided to build a Harry Potter Theme Park in Orlando.
“The Wizarding World of Harry Potter,” will open in late 2009 in Orlando, officials said Thursday.
“The plans I’ve seen look incredibly exciting, and I don’t think fans of the books or films will be disappointed,” said author J.K. Rowling, who has been working with a creative team to make sure the park resembles the books and films.
The Potter park will allow visitors to view the iconic locations in Rowling’s magical world, like Dumbledore’s office in Hogwarts and the shops in Hogsmeade. Some locations may be in upcoming books, Trowbridge said.
Trowbridge said while there would not be any character lookalikes at the park, fans wanting to see Harry Potter and his magical friends wouldn’t leave disappointed.
Did you hear that faint sigh? Cause Daniel Radcliffe just heard the news and realized his plans for a post-Harry Potter acting career have been put on hold indefinitely. No character lookalikes, cause they’ll coerce the real actors to play the parts!
The studio will spend no expense and they’re thinking it may look similar to this:
We’re chewing the fat on just about anything Harry Potter related. We’re counting down the days until the new book streets and we just got word on a new international trailer for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix. When the first trailer dropped we weren’t all that excited for the movie, afterall the book is okay, but not that great. It pales in comparison to both Goblet of Fire and Half-Blood Prince.
But now that’ve we’ve seen this trailer, with Dementors flying in the hallway, Harry’s world expanding into London and what’s with those desert shots? Anyway, we’re excited now.
Well well seems that the veil is slowly being lifted on Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. What promises to be one of the mega hyped publishing release dates of the century now has cover art for the books. Both Scholastic and Bloomsbury released the covers for all to see. Bloomsbury has two versions for their British books, one for the kids and one for the adults. The American version, released by Scholastic, features wraparound artwork by illustrator Mary GrandPré.
The Bloomsbury children’s cover, drawn by Jason Cockcroft, depicts the fictional boy wizard and his friends Ron and Hermione in their cloaks, looking shocked and surrounded by what seems to be a magnificent treasure. The Bloomsbury editions will sell in Britain and elsewhere outside the United States.
The adult version of the Bloomsbury book cover is a photograph of a silver pendant inlaid with a snake-like green S, which could be a reference to a locket discovered by Harry and linked to his nemesis Voldemort.
Scholastic’s U.S. edition was created by Mary GrandPré, the acclaimed illustrator of all six previous U.S. editions of the Harry Potter books.
“The front cover of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows features a dramatic sky of oranges and golds. It depicts 17-year-old Harry with arm outstretched, reaching upward. The structures around Harry show evident destruction and in the shadows behind him, we see outlines of other people,” said David Saylor, Scholastic’s Vice President and Creative Director on the company’s Web site.
The books hit store shelves on July 21. Get ready for the ground swell. The deafening buzz will be almost too much to handle once Memorial Day goes away. And though we won’t be dressed up, we’ll more than likely be there at midnight blogging and buying a book.
When Warner Bros. began the epic Harry Potter film franchise, there were many who wondered if the three principle stars Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter), Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley) and Emma Watson (Hermione Granger) would look too old to finish the franchise or if they would even be able to go the distance of seven films.
As the three have grown into the roles admirably, with the next film better than the last, Variety reports the three stars have just inked deals to appear in movies six and seven. The U.K. tabloids have suggested recently that Watson had no desire to finish the series, and Radcliffe has taken some heat for his racey turn in the West End play “Equus.” It’s also reported that Rupert Grint still has red hair. Regardless could you imagine Harry Potter without these three? It’s impossible!
No word on how much any of them will be paid, but any amount of money to ensure continuity is welcomed in these parts. In case you haven’t heard, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenixwill come to theaters on July 13.
And ah, that final book in the Potter saga, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, drops at your local Barnes & Noble on July 21. Which are you more excited for?
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Did you love Akira? The 1988 movie is probably regarded as the highest achievement in Japanese animation. Or at least it is around here.
