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Mexican PoA Press Conference Transcript -
with the director and 2 producers Summary:
Fran from Totally Harry Potter and The Magical World of Harry
Potter (Fan-Club México) had the chance to attend to attend the June 5th Mexican press conference for PoA's release.
Article: Mexican PoA Press Conference Transcript
Fran from
Totally Harry Potter and The Magical World of Harry
Potter (Fan-Club México) had the chance to attend to attend the June 5th Mexican press conference for PoA's release, which included director Alfonso Cuarón, producer David Heyman and executive producer Tanya Seghathcian.
To see pictures from the event, go
here and scroll down to the last link. To read the entire transcript, hosted by TLC, go
here.
Here is a rather nice photo of the director, with his two producers.
Alfonso (director) on PoA:
Quote:
In this movie the only thing I
tried to do was to remain faithful to the spirit of J.K. Rowling’s book.
When I had doubts about taking this project or not, Guillermo del Toro was
the one pushing me towards doing it. He told me I had to, and that if I did,
I shouldn’t try to mess anything up with my stuff, that I should just try to
be faithful to the book’s spirit, and that if I did, if I just served and
didn’t mess things up with my staff, I could end up doing a more personal
movie. And he said this to me honestly. So what happened is that I was just
serving the material and that was what connected us.
Alfonso on the condensing process:
Quote:
These books have so many
plots and narrative lines, that you have to do a lot of discriminative
labour. There is so much information, that we decided that instead of having
scenes of 5 minutes of “blah blah blah”, unless it was a conflict and
dramatic shock scene such as The Shrieking Shack when all the characters are
gathered, that we would try to remove as possible “blah blah blah” scenes in
which stuff is explained. In fact those scenes are very limited in the film,
and we tried to find visual equivalents to explain the same information.
This was due to a petition from J.K. Rowling, who asked us not to be literal
but faithful to the spirit of the book. Because she understands the
creative process, and she knows that films and literature are different
environments and that they have to be adapted a little bit.
Alfonso on the use of reflective shots in the film (Hogwarts Express window, mirror in the DADA wardrobe and in the lake):
Quote:
And about the reflections - wow, you alone counted them. [laughs] There’s a
lot going on in the movie, and it’s obvious in the first reflection in the
window, about this kind of mirror games in which you don’t know anymore
where the reality is and where it’s not. In the boggart scene the camera
enters a mirror and passes through it, and you stop knowing if you’re seeing
things through the mirror or from the outside. And there’s also this thing
in the movie about Harry not searching on the outside, but inside. So as a
part of this, he gets scared of his own reflection.
Alfonso on his boggart:
Quote:
I wanted to ask you: if you had a
boggart in front of you right now what shape would it take?
AC: Um… it’s over there in Iraq! [laughs] And the Riddikulus would be Bush
dressed as Santa Claus or something… [laughs and applause]
David Heyman on working with Alfonso:
Quote:
Alfonso makes everybody around him better. It’s not really easy because
he pushes, he pushes, he pushes… [laughs] he pushes. Everybody, I think,
from my experience, from the people doing small jobs, to the biggest jobs,
really feel I think, at the end of the experience, that they are better at
their jobs, thanks to having worked with Alfonso.
David Heyman on Alfonso leaving the HP franchise:
Quote:
My only sadness is: it’s over.
Tanya on working with Alfonso:
Quote:
And he fools you to think that
you’re teaching him things but everything you do is about him teaching you.
Alfonso on having read the Harry Potter books and how it made him feel:
Quote:
But the truth is, when I read the books I understood how bad it is to be
narrow-minded, isn’t it?
Alfonso on Hollywood:
Quote:
Yeah, but at first you mentioned the Academy and if someone drew me out
of the classroom and the shock because now I’m certified by Hollywood… and
that’s not right. If you were telling me this because it was a good move, I
might believe you, but when you involve Hollywood as “he did it” that’s
awful cause filmmakers don’t have to go to Hollywood.
David Heyman on Alfonso's previous work and how it helped him with Potter:
Quote:
First he had done “A Little
Princess”, which is a great adaptation, and it’s a movie that worked great
with children, a movie that has a lot of magic and is very graceful. And on
the other side I think this movie needed to move forward, in the sense that
“Y Tu Mamá También” is a movie about adolescence, while this movie is a film
in which the main three characters, Ron, Hermione and Harry, start entering
adolescence, and it was time for them to look a bit older. You saw what
Harry was doing under his sheets with his… “wand”. [laughs] So in Harry
Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban they’re moving from childhood to
adolescence. Alfonso understands teenagers beautifully, and at a certain
point he is a teenager, really [AC: Yeah, right] Also, he directs with
reality, in “Y Tu Mamá” we see truth to those characters, and it was
important to us in the third Harry Potter to make the characters grow real,
you see them wearing their own clothes a little more, a little grittier, the
shirts are out, the ties run down, it’s a lot more naturalistic. And by
making it more naturalistic, it makes the magic more magical.
David on WB's reaction to the suggestion for Alfonso as director:
Quote:
When we pulled out the name of Alfonso, I’ll be honest, the studio didn’t go
“OH yeah, great idea!” [laughs]… It was “Are you out of your mind?!” But
ultimately it’s not us who is paying the bills, it’s them, and they had the
courage to decide, I think we all have to thank them, for having the courage
to say “Alfonso will make this film”. And again, I don’t normally thank the studio, but in this case I
really have to thank the studio, they’ve been great.
Source:
TLC.
