By Victor Ordonez
Harry Potter fans rejoice with the announcement of a new set of films. (Courtesy of Victor Ordonez)
The magic will continue. On Thursday Oct. 13, at an event that simultaneously took place in New York City, Sao Paulo, Mexico City and Rome, Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling confirmed her newest film creation would be a five-part movie franchise.
Her imagination’s newest manifestation, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, “was always going to be more than one movie,” said Rowling during the global fan event. “Calling it a trilogy was a bit of a place holder, but I’ve done the plotting properly and we are pretty sure it is going to be five movies.”
Whether the announcement was all that shocking to the audience, considering Rowling’s eight previous franchise films, was irrelevant as fans cheered upon hearing the news. The audience itself was as large as it was diverse, as it was live streamed to multiple theaters in cities around the world, including NYC’s own AMC IMAX.
Audience members in these theaters were treated with 10 minutes of never-before-seen footage of the new film and had the opportunity to take part in a Q&A with cast members. Those present included Eddie Redmayne, Dan Fogler, Colin Farrel, Katherine Waterston, Alison Sudol, Jon Voight and director David Yates.
The Q&A was brief; those who were in attendance were eager to see the soon to be less exclusive film footage. The footage was played after the Q&A, but first director David Yates could not help but mention yet another not so subtle tidbit about the new franchise. “The next movie will take place in another big capital city,” he said as the film’s lead actor, Eddie Redmayne, appeared to be speechless while hearing the news.
It is unclear whether all of the movies will have their own unique location, but it is certain that New York and its resident Potter fans embraced the film’s cultural relativity. Jessie Parham, a native of Arthur Avenue, a notable recent addition to the Great Avenues of America, was first in line Thursday as she was eager to see her hometown and its magical significance in Rowling’s world.
The footage shown is assumed to be the first 10 minutes of the film. Viewers were shown young Newt Scamander, the main character and keeper of the fantastic beasts, entering rather nostalgically to a 1920s era New York City via Ellis Island.
In order to dismiss even the slightest spoiler about the opening of the film, the footage could be described by the evident themes it displayed. Included, of course, are the fantastic beasts, which, based on the footage, will be causing mayhem and mischief throughout the entirety of the film.
The other theme prominently displayed was the strained relationship between the Wizarding world and the mortal world. A rally is shown in which a mortal crowd is proclaiming the existence of witches and wizards and the chaos that is spilling from wizard world into their own.
This societal struggle in keeping the world of wizardry a secret should bode interesting as it has not been touched on specifically in Rowling’s other works. With that said, this film looks to be significantly different than Rowling’s Harry Potter franchise.
Although existing in the same world as the Harry Potter films, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them promises its own entity, separately exploring other landscapes and intricate social issues relative to the Rowling’s world. Evidently, the issues were displayed in the footage shown as viewers saw Colin Farrell’s character, Percival Graves, investigating an incident that has directly affected the No-Maj world, with “No-Maj” being the new American term for ‘Muggle.’
The footage didn’t necessarily look like a Potter film, which could be due largely in part to the New York landscape. There are wands, wizards and witches and even mystic creatures, but the film is embedded in the human world rather than the wizard school.
Fans will, however, get some hints and nods to the other films. “We do mention Dumbledore in this movie,” said Director Yates. “He kind of features a little bit in a scene between Colin [Farrell] and Eddie [Redmayne].”
Redmayne did not discount the pressure riding on this film either. “We were all fans and we grew up watching these films” said Redmayne during the brief Q&A. “We had quite high expectations on ourselves; we didn’t want to screw it up.”
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them opens in theaters Nov. 18.
