So we all do it, sit down with our friends or family and watch a film,
we’re immersed it a world that’s not like our own for just a few short hours
and when we finish are filled with happiness and have been distracted from our
problems. However, do you ever think how much work goes into a film just so
that you can sit and watch it for those few short hours? These are called the
Pre-Production processes and they are everything that happens behind the scenes
and on screen to make the film come alive. So today guys we’re going to talk
about the magic behind the scenes of a worldwide best-selling film, Harry
Potter and the Philosophers Stone.
Harry Potter and the philosopher’s stone also known as Harry Potter and
the Sorcerer’s stone is a British fantasy film based on the novel by JK
Rowelling. The director was Chris Columbus and the film was distributed by
Warner Bros. Pictures. JK Rowling and Steve Kloves worked together to write the
film adaptation to the film in an attempt to excite many young people into
reading the books once again activating their wild imaginations. The
philosophers stone is the first of 8 harry potter films and was produced by
David Heyman. The film follows Harrys first year at Hogwarts school of wizardry
and the adventures that he has with his two best friends Ron and Hermione after
discovering his family’s history and his hidden magic. The iconic line “You’re
a Wizard Harry!” will forever go down in history with many other epic
statements from films.
Finance
When budgeting for films like Harry Potter, the Production Company, in
this case Warner Bros, have to take into consideration, above and below the
line costs. Above the line costs are all things that are on scene, so actors,
costumes, sets and props. However, below the line costs are much more detailed
and are everything that are behind the scenes like catering, insurance, filming
equipment etc. However, although there are more below the line costs than those
above the line, below the line costs always tend to cost less than those above.
Warner Bros also had to take that into consideration when they began planning
the production of Harry Potter and plan which areas of production would receive
the most of their $125 million budget.
The first above the line cost that came into problems was the costumes.
The designer Judianna Moakovsky had originally planned to create the quidditch
robes that were shown on the cover of the American book. However, after
creating the first robe she deemed it “a mess” and had to redesign the
quidditch player’s costumes. This was a very costly process as it meant that
the original costumes had to be scrapped, new material ordered and Judianna had
to spend more time designing new costumes. Eventually she decided to put the
quidditch players in “preppy sweaters with 19th century fencing
breeches and arm guards." Overall 25,000 items of clothing had to be created to
make the world of Harry Potter that we know and love so dearly. This would have
taken a large chunk out of the budget for the film that Warner Bros would have
to take into consideration.
Another above the line cost would be the set designs. The set designer
Stuart Craig built all the sets at Leavesden Studios including, the Hogwarts
Great hall and he based this on many English Cathedrals. This was time
consuming and expensive because not only did Stuart have to build the set,
which was expensive with materials and staffing people to build various
elements of the scene. Stuart would have also had to travel around researching
what different Cathedrals looked like to ensure his set was perfect. This would
have cost money in fuel for travel. The main cost that wasn’t originally taken into consideration
within the set design would be the building of Diagon Alley. This is because
originally Stuart planned to use an existing old street to film all scenes that
took place I Diagon Alley but after extensive research he decided to just build
the set of Diagon Alley instead which was another unplanned expenditure.
Although as the films continued to be made the costs of set design would
decrease as sets would be re used, the first Harry Potter was very costly when
it came to set design as each set had to be created from scratch using only the
book and Stuarts imagination, this was a very costly element to the production
of the first film.
The first example of a Below the line cost within the production of
Harry Potter was the cost of the filming equipment. Not many people take into
consideration when watching a film just how many different types of filming
equipment’s are being used to make the film come alive. Not only were many
different cameras needed to get the specific shots to create the film budgeted
for, Warner Bros also had to consider the cost of the software needed to edit
the film and the employees needed to film and edit. The cost of personal would
often fluctuate due to mistakes from the actors. For example, many of the fight
scenes in Harry Potter had to be re shot due to actors smiling mid scene. This
would cost extra because more personnel would have to be paid for working extra
hours.
Another example of a below the line cost that Warner Bros had to
consider was the cost of hiring places to film. Over the course of filming, the
production team had to move up and down the country so that they could get the
most perfect and realistic shots. Harry Potter was shot in places such as kings
cross station which would have to have sections cordoned off for filming. This
would be a very costly expenditure as Kings Cross station is usually busy all
day so by parts of it down, the owners lost copious amounts of money. The cost
of renting areas to film would be very expensive and take a large chunk from
the budget.
Harry Potter and the Philosophers stone did not take as long to film as
you would expect. Overall the film took 11 months to make. 7 months of filming
and 4 months of editing. However, the filming took longer than Warner Bros had
originally anticipated, this is due to child labour laws. At the time the main
cast of harry potter (Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson and Rupert Grint ) were
only children aged between 11 and 13. This meant that they could only be on set
for 9 hours a day and they had to take a 15 minuet break for every hour that
they worked. This meant that the original schedule had to be revaluated
The second issue that Warner Bros ran into when filming which caused a
setback with timings was that some of the fight scenes has to be re filmed due
to some of the actors smiling in the first shoot. This would cause problems as
it meant that the filming would take longer than originally expected and this
would cost more money.
There had to be constant hair, makeup and costume checks throughout filming
due to the sheer physically challenging nature of the film. The film used many
close up which required an extensive attention to detail with the actor’s hair,
makeup and costumes. This would have taken up extra time as it meant that the
actors kept having to stop and check their image when filming scenes for the
film.
Special Effects supervisors has to be constantly present on set so that
they could ensure that the filming taking place could have edited the way that
they had originally idealised. Therefore, this meant that often there had to be
retakes due to the filming being unsuitable for the appropriate editing to take
place later on in production. This would have affected the original time scheme
given as the retakes would take up extra time that the production company did
not originally plan for.
There was a vast series of editing that had to be done to Harry Potter
due to the film being a fantasy film. The main edits taken place were sound
effects, editing voldermorts face to look the way that it did, editing the
green screens to have the correct backgrounds, they had to edit in affects to
the wands like sounds and lights, fixing lighting and editing imperfections and
making the mythical creatures look realistic for example the three headed dog
fluffy. These vast different forms of editing that took place when producing
the film took a long time which also had to be scheduled when Warner Bros were
planning the production of the film. Overall the film took four months to edit
which is over half the time it took to film.
The time scale planned
for the production of Harry Potter and The Philosophers Stone was also an
effective element of the Pre-Production of Harry Potter. This is because the
given time frame allowed the camera crew to take various retakes of specific
scenes in order to make them look as realistic as possible and let the audience
immerse themselves within the wizarding world of Harry Potter. One clear
example of this would be in the final scenes of the film where there is a close
up of Harry being strangled by Voldemort. This scene would have taken various
re takes so that Daniel Radcliffe could make his facial expression as realistic
and lifelike as possible so that the audience would be so immersed within the
film that they feel sorry for Harry and scared for him. This wouldn’t have been
possible without the time scale being long enough to ensure there was room for
retakes.
Personnel
The director of Harry Potter and the Philosophers Stone was directed by
Chris Columbus he is a well known for
directing loved films like Home Alone (1990), Home Alone 2: Lost in New York
(1992), Mrs. Doubtfire (1993). He had never worked with the young and upcoming
main actors and actress Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson but
immediately had brilliant chemistry with the young stars and the is expressed
brilliantly throughout the film. Chris Columbus is known for funny child
friendly films and did not disappoint with Harry Potter, creating three young
aspiring wizards that we could all find our own way to relate to and grew up
with. He ensured that everything was made to his vision, working closely with
Stuart Craig the set designer to ensure his set was perfect. For example,
originally they planned to film on a back street of London for the Diagon Alley
scenes but none of the streets fit Columbus’ vision therefore they had to build
a set that then would fit his vision for the scene.
The producer of Harry Potter and the Philosophers stone was David
Heyman. A producer is a person responsible for the financial and managerial
aspects of the making of a film. Although Heyman had never before worked with
Chris Columbus, they worked closely to ensure that Harry Potter fit their
shared vision looking at the sets and characters closely, for example when the
costumes were being designed they worked closely with Judianna Moakovsky to
ensure that all of the costumes could be designed to not only suit their vision
but do so whilst staying within their budget and as producer David did this
very well.
The Screen writer of Harry Potter and the Philosophers stone was Steve
Kloves. Kloves worked closely with JK Rowling to create a film that would
express both his and Rowling’s views and ideologies regarding the storyline.
They wished to keep the story alive within the film and cut out as little as
possible when writing the screen play. For example, Peeves the poltergeist was
cut out because he was an insignificant character who didn’t have a large
impact on the storyline of the film. However, these decisions had to be debated
before they could be made and it was Rowling and Kloves that made the final
decision.
There was a special effects team who had to apply prosthetics and makeup
to the actors each day of filming. Without them, the film would never have
looked realistic. They worked together to created different forms of
prosthetics to make each characters ‘injuries’ as life like as possible.
Then of course you have the cast, the film wouldn’t be a best seller
worldwide blockbuster without the three leading stars Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert
Grint and Emma Watson. After JK Rowelling dropped the bombshell that she would
only allow her book to be on the big screen with English actors, Warner Bros
were at a loss. Then out of nowhere appeared these 3 young budding actors. Emma
Watson was in a school production and her star quality beamed out at the
casting directors on the hunt for young talent. Rupert Grint sent in a
hilarious video rapping about how he should star in Harry Potter and
immediately they knew that he would make a perfect Ron Weasley. Then finally
one day a close friend of Chris’ (the film director) came up to him asking if
it would be possible to give his son an audition. Immediately everyone fell in
love with Daniels acting skills and saw his star quality. The three children
were complete strangers at first and it was unknown weather filming would run
as smoothly as Warner Bros had hoped, but the three of them hit it off right
from the beginning and throughout the course of filming the 8 film phenomenon
they not only found stardom but friends for life. These three actors will
forever have our hearts and made the film the best it could be.
The personnel initially
was not a well-planned part of production of Harry Potter and the Philosophers
Stone. This is because the original director was planned to be Stephen
Spielberg however when he discovered that he couldn’t make the film into a
cartoon and had to use English characters only, he dropped out. Therefore this
means that Warner Bros did not make a good choice regarding their production
team to start with. However, Warner Bros later on pulled it back when they
hired Chris Columbus and made him the director as he was able to create the
magical Wizarding World that the audience immediately fell in love with. The
casting of Harry Potter was also a successful aspect of the preproduction
process. This is because Daniel, Emma and Rupert were able to effectively
portray the characters from the book that the children fell in love with. One
example of this would be when Harry sees his parents in the Mirror of Erised.
In this scene Daniel uses his acting skills to pull on the audience’s heart
strings and make them feel sorry for him. No other actor could have captured
our hearts in this scene the way that Daniel did and this shown in the medium
shot of Harry looking in the mirror and seeing his parents.
Codes of Practice and Regulations
In any job that you will ever walk into, you must have a contract. These
rules, unlike most, do also apply to actors. Every actor or employee involved
in the production had to have a guarantee, this is their contract which ensures
they only work their agreed hours for their agreed pay and ensures that there
are no attempts at unfair dismissal or disgruntled workers wanting to sue the
production company. It guarantees that they still get paid, if through no fault
of their own they are released from their contract. This is informally known as
a pay or play contract and is a very common contract for actors.
Warner Bros had to copyright all of their ideas regarding the film and
had to pay JK Rowling for the rights to the book so that they could legally
create the film. They had ensure they had the rights to use the music within
the film abiding to copyright law. This was to avoid being sued later on when
the film was released. Warner Bros had to ensure they had insurance when
carrying out production so that if there were any accidents, everyone including
the actors, workers and the production company were protected. A basic post
production insurance package would cover the following: Cover for the repair or replacement cost of equipment if there was an
electrical/mechanical breakdown this would include the cost of temporary hire
to replace the broken items. Cover provided in the event of a walk-in-theft.
Cover for irresponsible actions regarding your client’s property.
Warner Bros had to ensure that they had Public Liability insurance so
that they could film in public spaces like Kings Cross Station and if there
were any accidents involving the public then Warner Bros would be covered and
not at risk for being sued. This was a very important form of insurance that
was key to safe and protected production.
Finally, Warner Bros had to ensure that they kept to the Child Labour
laws when they were filming with Daniel, Emma and Rupert. Due to the young ages
of the actors they were only allowed to spend 9 hours on set per day and they
required a 15 minuet break for each hour that they worked. By keeping to the
restrictions of this law meant that all of the production of Harry Potter was
completely legal.
This was a successful part of the production of Harry Potter and the
Philosophers Stone because no one was injured in the production of the film due
to the extensive health and safety checks and Warner Bros ensuring that they
followed the codes of practice to such an extent that there were never any
risks of people getting injured.
Facilities
Harry Potter was mostly filmed in Leavesden Film Studios where all of
the sets that Stuart Craig designed were kept. However, some filming had to
take place outside of the studios and they had to travel further afield to film
certain scenes for the movie. For example, the scene when Harry and Ron first
run on to platform 9 and 3/4 was filmed in Kings Cross Station. This meant that
the actors and all of the equipment had to be moved to the station, parts of
the station had to be rented out for the day and this is also where the public
liability insurance would have come in handy.
There was a wide range of equipment needed in order to film Harry
Potter. Editing software was needed to carry out the editing of cutting out
imperfections and bring the magic to life following filming. During filming,
Warner Bros used the moving picture company, they used a range of pioneering
camera tracking technology to create some of the more eccentric scenes, such as
the chocolate frog scene. Warner Bros also had to buy a range of different
cameras to capture the magic as it happened from all angles, choosing the best
one later on during the editing stages.
The facilities were a successful aspect of the production of Harry
Potter. This is because all of the scenes had a realistic look and the editing
was so sophisticated that all special effects looked real. One example of this
would be when Harry runs through the wall to get to platform 9 ¾ and this was
effective as the special effects team was so trained and smart that the made it
look real that Harry was running through the wall with Ron.
Classification
Harry Potter and the Philosophers Stone was rated as a PG film. A PG
film is a film that is suitable for general viewing however some scenes may be
unsuitable for general viewing. A PG film shouldn’t unsettle any children aged
from onwards. Any child of any age is allowed to watch the film however parents
are advised to consider if some of the content is suitable for their children
as the content may upset some younger or more sensitive children. In order to
fit this classification, Warner Bros had to ensure that there weren’t any excessively
violent scenes within the film, there was no strong language and no sexual
references.
This was also a successful aspect of production because any the film fit
perfectly with its classification therefore it did not scare the young children
that were watching the film and it didn’t break the law by not fitting the
specifications to become this classification.
Box office
The film was budgeted $125 million and at box office made $32.3 million
on its opening day, which broke the single day record previously held by Star
Wars: Episode I – The Phantom Menace. On the second day of release, it
increased to $33.5 million, breaking the record for biggest single day again.
In total, it made $90.3 million during its first weekend and remained at number
1 for 3 consecutive weeks. In total, the film earned $974.8 million at the
worldwide box office instantly making back the budget and sending them soaring
into a $849.8 million profit.
In conclusion, I believe that Warner Bros successfully produced Harry
Potter as no matter how large a problem they ran into, they quickly found a
successful solution and carried out the production of Harry Potter and the
Philosophers Stone safely, legally and effectively in a short period of time.
They managed to stay within budget and made an incredible profit on the film,
meaning that the production of Harry Potter and the Philosophers stone was a
success.
So guys I hope that you’ve enjoyed finding out about the pre-production
processes of the well known and loved Harry Potter and the Philosophers Stone
and ill speak to you again soon.
Have a magical day!
Holly x
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