For the second installment of the above topic, I am again going to look at books being made into films but this time on a broader scale. Which is why I've chosen the Harry Potter series to look at. This came about due to my upcoming visit to the Warner Bros. Studio Tour in London, discussions with a friend and my recent re-reading of a few of the books. All of which led me to think about the films - the things they got right, and the things they got ever so wrong. So I thought I'd look at a group of the books and compare and contrast with each film over the course of two articles. Everybody has an opinion on each book and the films and now I'm going to share mine.
Harry Potter - An Overview:
A brief background of the series for those of you who have been living under a rock these past 18 years, Harry Potter is about a boy who is mistreated by the aunt and uncle who are his legal guardians after his parents were killed. At the start of the series, Harry is blissfully unaware how much his life is going to turn upside down over the course of the books. And yes 'blissfully' is probably too strong a word in the positive sense after the way his family abuses him so the audience is overjoyed when Harry is able to escape, after being told he's a wizard and that he's actually pretty famous in the wizarding world thanks to defeating a dark evil psychopath when he was a baby. The books chronicle Harry's acceptance into the fact that he's just been told this life-changing news and his dealings with the evil wizard's rise to power once again all while trying to survive school. It's a basic Good v.s. Evil concept, something that's done before but here it is craftfully done over seven books, each one evidently thought out well in advance.
Got it? Good, onto the books and the film counterparts....