Decoding the Harry Potter franchise: The Harry Potter series as a site of collective auteurship and unintentional negotiation.

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The Harry Potter series as a site of collective auteurship and

unintentional negotiation.

MA-Thesis

Marlieke Hoepman

24th_{of June}

Supervisor: Dr. C.M. (Catherine) Lord

Second reader: Dr. M.A.M.B. (Marie) Lous Baronian 22.937 words

Media Studies: Film Studies Beroepsgeoriënteerde specialisatie

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Abstract

This thesis exploresthe way in which the Harry Potter series can be decoded on an auteurial level based on the implications of its adapted franchise structure. The Harry Potter series can be decoded according to its directors in the sense that each of the directors created a new work based on the catalysts from the pretext coherent with the common thread of their other work. The directors accentuate dominant themes from the novels through their auteurship, never straying from the series’ quintessential theme of finding one’s true identity and enhancing the series’ thematic aspects that directly mirror the dangers of our modern society. In addition, the Harry Potter stories make the extraordinary ordinary and reimagine the past in the present, indicating that the world still copes with the same political and social issues as before technology. By means of mirroring the wizarding world against ours, the stories offer a combination of the real and the fantastical, adding to the relatability of the wizarding world. Furthermore, a negotiation between different strands of auteur theory here provides a

significant decoding of auteurship in the Harry Potter series, in which auteurial structures can be decoded in the Harry Potter series through its franchise-bound, collective auteurship and as a result of the unintentional negotiation of the director with catalysts from the pretext, which enhance the way in which the series thematically mirrors our society by setting the fantastical within the real, therefore substantiating our need to escape into the magical world.

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Introduction:

A change of directorial pace

Happiness can be found, even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light. (Harry Potter and Prisoner of Azkaban)

As Professor Dumbledore speaks these words in the third film of the Harry Potter series,

Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004), he lifts the veil of the darker tone that this

film introduces into the series. The Harry Potter films are based on a series of seven novels written the by previously unknown novelist J.K. Rowling concerning a young, orphaned boy, Harry Potter, that discovers he is a wizard and henceforth goes to Hogwarts School of

Witchcraft and Wizardry. The books, respectively named Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s

Stone, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince and Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, each describe

the adventures of Harry and his best friends Ron and Hermione during the school year. The stories mainly focus on Harry’s battle with the dark wizard Lord Voldemort, who was responsible for the death of Harry’s parents and intends to kill him and take over the

wizarding world. Soon after the release of the first book, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s

Stone, the books gained enormous popularity world-wide and in 1998, Rowling sold the film

rights for the first four books to Warner Bros., resulting in the end in a total of eight films, the last book being separated into two parts. The Harry Potter series is a brand, which started even before the films were made. The novels themselves were already marketed in an almost identical way to film marketing, complete with events and premieres for each of the books’ release. To this date, the Harry Potter series is the second-highest grossing franchise (List of highest-grossing films).

The Harry Potter film story begins in 2001, when the first film, Harry Potter and the

Philosopher’s Stone (2001) was released. The film was directed by mainstream director Chris

Columbus, who had previously directed family-oriented films like Mrs. Doubtfire (1993) and

Home Alone (1990). Being distributed by a major studio, Warner Bros., the Harry Potter

series was launched as a franchise blockbuster. Since franchises involve different structures than feature films, they entail distinctive preconditions. The franchise structure influences the level of auteurship in a film or a film series in its entirety. Here, it is crucial to discuss the rise of the blockbuster and franchises in Hollywood’s studio system in order to fully understand how the Harry Potter films were introduced. Various developments in the studio system have

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influenced auteurship in the Harry Potter series in a positive, but also possibly a negative sense.

In 1975, Jaws (1975) provided a prototype for the modern blockbuster, a high-cost entertainment film with a major release campaign, followed by the release of Star Wars (1977), which surpassed Jaws and “quickly evolved into the model New Hollywood “franchise” – i.e., the blockbuster-spawning entertainment machine that exploited and

expanded the original hit in an ever-widening range of entertainment products” (Schatz, “The Studio System and Conglomerate Hollywood” 20). In the following years, studio-produced blockbusters and franchises became more and more central in the movie marketplace and in the early 2000s, franchises became the key objective of major studios because of their dominant success at the box-office. What’s more, since the 1990s an ever more increasing split between major studio releases and low budget “indie” films has occurred. In “New Hollywood, New Millennium”, Thomas Schatz lists a number of distinct departures from the

New Hollywood of the 1990s, including the emergence of a new breed of blockbuster-driven

franchises and the annexation of the “indie film movement” by the media conglomerates, since the turn of the millennium (20). Although conglomerate Hollywood was extremely attached to its blockbusters, they also recognised potential in the indie film movement and soon began to use this to their benefit. A trend arose of major studios hiring indie auteurs to direct high-stakes blockbuster franchises (Schatz, “The Studio System and Conglomerate

Hollywood” 34). Schatz states that major studios’ tent pole brands are currently almost all

assigned to directors with indie-auteur credentials and ties it as a crucial factor in their immense success (“New Hollywood, New Millennium” 41). Thus, here it is already apparent that franchises involve a complex process of overlapping of two seemingly opposing notions: collaboration and auteurs. Because of the involvement of indie auteurs, franchises imbibe

auteurial influences, whilst staying under the control of conglomerate producers.

This trend was also followed by the Harry Potter series. Although Warner launched the series with two huge hits in 2001 and 2002 directed by Chris Columbus, they soon decided to replace the director for the third film. This was partly due to the fact that the concurrent at the time, The Lord of the Rings films from New Line were claiming far more critical appraise and demographic reach, thanks to the talent and stature of indie auteur Peter Jackson. Warner Bros. decided to replace Chris Columbus by attaching indie auteur Alfonso Cuarón to its high-stake franchise, hereby “underscoring the vital importance of directorially “re-authoring” an established narrative formula via distinctive, stylized treatment, to enhance its prospects for a successful revival” (Schatz, “The Studio System and Conglomerate

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Hollywood” 35). The previous films had been primarily focused on a child audience, with Columbus being an expert in casting children and bringing out their best in an adventure-driven film, underscoring his common theme of searching for a family or the redefining of who your family is. Additionally, Columbus was the one to set the tone and create the

universe that the next films would all take place in. Alfonso Cuarón was not the most obvious pick to direct a Harry Potter film, since his previous film, Y Tu Mamá También (2001), was a quite explicit Mexican coming-of-age drama about two boys who embark on a road trip with a young woman. His film explicitly deals with the process of sexual discovery. In an interview, J.K. Rowling reveals that even though Cuarón’s film A Little Princess (1995), revolving around children, influenced the decision to hire him, Y Tu Mamá También was the deciding factor, since she really loved that film and because it showed that Cuarón understood teenage boys (Creating the Vision). Rowling and the producers realised that Prisoner of Azkaban turns boys into teens, while Y Tu Mamá También turned teens into men. In addition, A Little

Princess demonstrated Cuarón’s ability to work with children, also thematically in line with

the Harry Potter series.

What’s more, when it comes to the success of the series, I wonder whether someone can be acclaimed for all of this or if it was the result of a collaboration of many different people. Thus, the notion of authorship and auteur theory could provide a relevant analysis of the Harry Potter series. In auteur theory, the director is traditionally believed to be the author of a film, since he is the one that oversees all audio and visual elements of the film (Astruc 161). Despite the fact that franchises will never provide the freedom for an auteur that an independent or feature film does, one cannot deny that auteurship could be visible and present in them. As the Harry Potter films have been directed by four different directors, one of them being known as an indie auteur, these films could provide a relevant case study for this. However, this theory has been widely critiqued and disposed on the basis of all sorts of approaches, mainly from the notion of collaboration, which is also significant for the Harry Potter series according to their franchise structure. The term has fallen into disuse, replaced by the term adapter or in other words a metteur-en-scène, even though a screenwriter would more logically be an adapter than a director. The difference between authorship, playing a leading role in creating a film and auteurship, establishing a claim to authorship that is widely recognized, is necessary here (Leitch 238). In her book A Theory of Adaptation, Linda

Hutcheon states that “films are like operas in that there are many and varied artists involved in the complex process of their adaptation” (85). She therefore recognizes the collaborative nature of filmmaking, but contrastingly notes that the director is still held responsible for the

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overall vision of the film, even though the primary adaptation of a text is formed by a screenwriter before a director takes on the task of giving life to the text.

Furthermore, the Harry Potter series have reached such an immense, global audience, that the reason for their appeal cannot be overlooked as it is, among other things, the outcome of this double imperative of the collaboration between studio-producers and auteurs.As we enter into a darker world, the Harry Potter stories provide a way out for people, a way to escape our anxieties and fears and enter the world of magic instead. This darker, grimmer world is addressed by Dumbledore in the beginning of Prisoner of Azkaban seems to mirror the events in our own society at the time the books and the films came out. While on the surface, Dumbledore’s quote seems merely to bring hope back in dark and dismal moments by remembering happier times, it also represents the counterforces of good vs. evil, one of the central themes to the Harry Potter stories. This quote adequately expresses exactly what place the Harry Potter series fulfils in many people’s lives. Living in an increasingly darker and more dangerous society, the wizarding world of Harry Potter seems to offer people light, mirroring their society against ours. Although the magical world seems to have nothing in common with our world, both are more alike than they seem, as the magical world provides various parallels between both worlds. In addition to class distinctions and an

anti-government stance, the wizarding world raises issues of neo-liberalism and capitalism, with wizards engaging in consumerism and competition amongst themselves, thus dealing with the same issues as our world did at the time that the series came out. However, in a society in which market forces increasingly commodify and materialise us and rob us of any sense of mystery and magic, the Harry Potter series offers precisely that. Harry Potter thus seems to satisfy the need for magic in the over-capitalised world, both preparing young people for the perils of neo-liberalism in a world in which safety nets are disappearing and simultaneously offering them a way to escape from it.

What’s more, Harry Potter also comes with significant constraints in the field of adaptation studies and studio restrictions, which influence auteurship. As this is a dominant trend in film at the moment, perhaps a revision of the auteur theory in relation to franchise films is required since these films, and films in general, are more and more a result of collaboration, instead of being the result of one person’s creativity. Hence, a major, adapted blockbuster franchise like Harry Potter seems to complicate the notion of the auteurship immensely on the grounds of adaptation, social and industrial issues that accompany it. Nevertheless, auteurship can be found in the series in stylistic elements that enhance the series’ thematic aspects that directly mirror the dangers of being enslaved by the capitalism

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system in our modern society. In conclusion, I will argue that auteurial structures can be decoded in the Harry Potter series through its franchise-bound, collective auteurship and as a result of the unintentional negotiation of the director with catalysts from the pretext, which enhance the way in which the series thematically mirrors our society by setting the fantastical within the real, therefore substantiating our need to escape into the magical world.

As a case study serving to illustrate my thesis statement will be one central case study of Prisoner of Azkaban, as it is most likely to entail the most traditional auteurial elements since Alfonso Cuarón is regarded as an indie auteur, however inevitably were looking at the entangling of all the films. The first chapter explores the foundation of the auteur theory, referring to Francois Truffaut’s manifesto essay “A Certain Tendency of the French Cinema”, André Bazin’s “La Politique des auteurs” and Andrew Sarris’ “Notes on the Auteur Theory in 1962”. These theorists could be seen as the founding fathers of auteur theory, for which reason they will provide relevant insights into the foundation of it. Along with Astruc’s founding ideas on auteur theory, the ideas of the Cahiers du Cinema will also be discussed, particularly the fact that an auteur’s style was visible in his work in spite of the restrictions imposed. Furthermore, the difference between an auteur and a metteur-en-scène is laid out and Andrew Sarris’ three criteria for recognizing an auteur are clarified. Henceforth, I will provide a case study on the stylistic elements of the third film in the series, Prisoner of

Azkaban, which was directed by indie auteur Alfonso Cuarón, based on a correlation with his

other work. I will compare this film to the preceding two films, directed by Chris Columbus, mainly on a visual and thematic level and examine whether or not this film has its own

auteurial style based on Sarris’ criteria for recognizing an auteur. This case study will

therefore provide an insight into the Harry Potter series’ auteurship in a traditional sense. Ultimately, the chapter will show that Alfonso Cuarón was able to exhibit his auteurial style in an imminent but simultaneously almost inconspicuous fashion, whilst enhancing the series’ thematic aspects that directly mirror the dangers of our modern society.

As the Harry Potter series has enlisted four directors over the course of eight films, whilst under the coordination of one principal producer, David Heyman, the notion of

auteurship is complicated. In the second chapter, therefore, I will compare Cuarón’s film to

the subsequent five films, directed by Mike Newell and David Yates, and discuss how

auteurship is present in these films and whether or not Cuarón was of influence to how

Newell and Yates directed their films. After discussing the various critique that was formed against auteur theory, for instance from Pauline Kael’s “Circles and Squares” in which she debunks Sarris’ three criteria for recognizing an auteur, I will contradict my statements,

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discussing how modern day forces influence the presence of auteurship in the Harry Potter series. According to this critique, the influential, possibly auteurial role of the dominant producer of the series, David Heyman, will be discussed in relation to each of the directors. All in all, the chapter will examine how the Harry Potter series demonstrates that collective authorship represses the role of the director as the sole author of a film, since all of the collaborators that work on a film add to its auteurship, but also how it does not imply depersonalization, since a film can still infuse a particular style.

Further critique will be discussed in the third chapter from the perspective of genre studies, ranging from Michel Foucault’s “What is an Author”, to Roland Barthes’ “The Death of the Author”, who note on the shift from the auteur to the viewer as the producer of

meaning, with the text being seen as a polysemic space in which several possible meanings can intersect. Also, Peter Wollen’s Signs and Meaning in the Cinema discusses auteur analysis as tracing an inadvertent structure within films, adding a sense of complexity to the notion of auteurship in the Harry Potter series. Furthermore, Kathryn Hume’s Fantasy and

Mimesis: Responses to Reality in Western Literature explains the difference between fantasy

and mimesis thoroughly, disclosing on the reasons for the franchise’s appeal, having to do with relatability, accessibility and thematic aspects. Taking the first two chapters into account, here I will show that when it comes to franchises, a hybrid form of auteurship is at play. Finally, this chapter illustrates the way in which unintentional auteurial structures can be decoded in the Harry Potter series that enhance the way in which the series mirrors our society, substantiating our need to escape into the magical world.

Personally, the Harry Potter series have always had a place in my heart, since I grew up reading them and watching the films. As I grew older, my love and appreciation of the stories has only increased, as I unravel the depth and layers of them more and more. In my studying of films, adaptations have always piqued my curiosity. However, beforehand, I had never truly thought about the Harry Potter series in a theoretical sense, until I began to wonder about auteur theory and specifically the role of the director in relation to franchises. Because of the rise of quality television with executive producers functioning as writer-creators and hiring different directors for separate episodes, I wondered whether franchises, also becoming increasingly predominant in the current filmic landscape, use a similar structure or if the director should still be considered as the auteur within this format. Furthermore, I wonder if someone can be acclaimed for all this success, or if it was the result of a collaboration of many different people, since the series has enlisted a total of four directors in the course of eight films, Chris Columbus, Alfonso Cuarón, Mike Newell and David Yates, respectively.

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Should all of these directors be considered the auteurs of each of their Harry Potter films? However, the films were all large scale franchise blockbusters produced and distributed by a major studio, Warner Bros., which means that an immense crew is behind each and every one of these films. The decisions made in such a franchise are mainly the result of a collaboration of the producers, the screenwriter and the director, not mentioning the rest of the crew that help create the films. As the series as a whole had four different directors, shouldn’t the producer or screenwriter deserve more credit over the creative control of the films, since they worked on the series from start to finish? Then again, these films are all adaptations, and relatively faithful ones at that, so what of the authorship of the novelist, J.K. Rowling, as she is the one who’s responsible for the stories coming into being. Moreover, I’m curious about the reason for the success of the Harry Potter series, what is it that made these books and films so incredibly appealing to its audiences all over the world? The purpose of this analysis will therefore not be to demonstrate that auteurship is present in franchise films or vice versa, but rather to explore the balances and counterbalances in the auteur theory in relation to adapted film franchises. I will explore the contradiction in auteur theory and its critique in relation to the Harry Potter series as a negotiation between creative influences, demonstrating that a negotiation with the theory is required. Since blockbuster franchises like the Harry Potter series seem to gain more and more momentum in the current filmic landscape and a trend has arisen that they are being directed by indie auteurs, I believe that these films must be tested on the grounds of auteurship. Film franchises seem to be neglected in their auteurship, even though famous indie auteurs are directing them. A negotiation between different strands of

auteur theory will thus provide a significant decoding of auteurship in the Harry Potter series.

In this thesis I therefore hope to shed some light on the state of auteurship in the franchise structure, since I believe that despite all of the restrictions that the franchise structure imposes,

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Chapter 1: Harry Potter through the lens of an auteur

“The film-maker/author writes with his camera as a writer writes with his pen” (Astruc 161). This notion of Alexandre Astruc will be thoroughly addressed in this chapter, specifically in relation to Alfonso Cuarón’s Prisoner of Azkaban, which will serve as a case study. This film will be examined according to the auteur theory after the foundation of the theory is

explained. As this is the only film that was directed by a director known as an indie auteur, it is likely that this film will entail the most auteurial elements of the Harry Potter series. Along with Astruc’s founding ideas on auteur theory, the ideas of the Cahiers du Cinema will also be discussed, particularly the fact that an auteur’s style was visible in his work in spite of the restrictions imposed. In addition, the difference between an auteur and a metteur-en-scène is laid out and Andrew Sarris’ three criteria for recognizing an auteur are clarified. I will then continue to an extensive case study of Prisoner of Azkaban, specifically concerning the stylistic and thematic elements that are striking, after which they are tested on their

auteurship against Sarris’ criteria and compared to Chris Columbus’ preceding films. This

chapter will therefore provide a thorough perspective and starting point on the series’

auteurship in the traditional sense. Ultimately, the chapter will show that Alfonso Cuarón was

able to exhibit his auteurial style in an imminent but simultaneously almost inconspicuous fashion, whilst enhancing the series’ thematic aspects that directly mirror the dangers of our modern society.

The foundation of the auteur theory

In order to gain perspective on auteurship in the Harry Potter series, the third film provides an interesting starting point with Alfonso Cuarón as the director of Prisoner of Azkaban.

However, for the sake of a complete analysis, the origin and context of the concept auteur must be addressed, especially concerning what qualifies someone as an auteur and how one recognizes auteurial elements in a film. Thus the groundwork of the foundation of the auteur theory and the difference between an auteur and metteurs-en-scène must be assembled, discussing among others the essays and articles of Alexandre Astruc, François Truffaut and Andrew Sarris.

Although the question of authorship has always been dominant in film theory, the groundwork for the auteur theory was laid in 1948 when Alexandre Astruc wrote his article “Naissance d’une nouvelle avant-garde: la caméra-stylo” for the French film journal L’Ecran

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français. In this article he calls for a totally independent means of expression in filmmaking, a

total cinema in which every component should have equal importance. He realizes that cinema had up to that point been nothing more than a show, a cinema of attractions and states that cinema will gradually break free of this to become a means of writing just as flexible and subtle as written language (Astruc 159). Astruc calls for a cinema that expresses ideas, which according to him implies that the distinction between author and director disappears. He states, “the film-maker/author writes with his camera as a writer writes with his pen” (161). Astruc refers to this approach with the term ‘camera-stylo’, literally indicating writing with the camera. A modern example of this would be a director such as Wes Anderson, who often makes use of pans and long shots and creates symmetry in almost every single frame. Using these cinematic elements, Anderson is able to add meaning to his film by writing with his camera. Another example would be According to Astruc, cinema has developed itself in such a way that it has created its own language. In any case, directors take more and more control in the making of their films, which is one of the notions of the auteur. Astruc therefore states that the director should be considered as the author of a film, more than the writer of the screenplay, since he is the one that oversees all audio and visual elements of the film.

After Astruc’s description of the camera stylo, an author literally writing with the camera, the auteurism movement only truly began in the 1950s with François Truffaut’s manifesto essay “A Certain Tendency of the French Cinema” which was published in 1954 in the famous film journal Cahiers du Cinéma. Cahiers du Cinéma was founded in 1951 by, among others, film critic André Bazin and its foundation marked the beginning of film criticism and theory. The magazine soon became a key organ for the propagation of

auteurism (Stam 85). In his manifesto, Truffaut discusses the ‘tradition of quality’, the

translation of French literature into films as a “stuffy, academic, screenwriters’ cinema” (Stam 84). According to Truffaut, the tradition of quality merely translated pre-existing screenplays into films, instead of seeing filmmaking as an inventive adventure with complete creative freedom in the arrangement of elements within a frame or shot, otherwise known as the mise-en-scène. In its place, he applauds the American popular maverick cinema of for example director Orson Welles. Truffaut states that the new film would be stylistically in line with the personality of the director. Auteur theory argued that one would be able to recognize a stylistic and thematic personality of intrinsically strong directors, even when they work in Hollywood studios (Stam 84). Especially the fact that an auteur’s style was visible in his work in spite of the restrictions imposed was an important factor for the Cahiers du Cinéma. Directors in the French cinema of that time had complete freedom in their films, which

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offered the opportunity to put their own stamp on a film. Since this was much more difficult for the Hollywood directors entangled in the studio system, it could be an indication of more expertise and skill.

As co-founder of the Cahiers du Cinéma, André Bazin formed another important and influential figure in auteur theory. In 1957 Bazin published an article called “La Politique des auteurs” in which he summarized auteurism as “choosing in the artistic creation the personal factor as a criterion of reference, and then postulating its permanence and even its progress from one work to the next” (Bazin in Stam 85). In other words, as Truffaut also stated, the personality of the auteur should always be recognizable throughout an auteur’s work, as well as portraying growth or development in the style. However, there is a larger frame of politics behind the auteur theory, demonstrated by several critics and filmmakers who include Marxist ideas of the bourgeoisie's consumerism, the commodification of daily life and activity, and man's alienation in their works. These are all central features of Marx's critique of capitalism and form a constant refrain throughout for example Godard's cinematic work (Jean-Luc Godard). In her book Lessen van Hitchcock: Een inleiding in de mediatheorie, Patricia Pisters discusses the auteur theory in relation to the distinction that the critics of Cahiers du Cinéma made between two types of directors. They used the term metteurs-en-scène to describe directors who sheepishly translated scripts into film and simply adhered to the dominant conventions. The real auteurs used mise-en-scène as part of self-expression, both in formal aspects like a characteristic style as well as in reoccurring themes, motives and objects (Pisters 40).

Around the 1960s auteur theory also arose in the United States of America, where it developed itself mainly at the hand of the theories of film critic Andrew Sarris. Sarris published an article in the American film journal Film Culture in 1962 called “Notes on the Auteur Theory in 1962”. In this article he discusses what he picked up from the French critics’ notions on auteur theory, where a focus on the emphasis on style as creative

expression can be noted. Like Truffaut and Bazin, Sarris describes that the way a film looks and moves should be in line with the way a director thinks and feels (Sarris 562). What’s more, Sarris proposes three criteria for recognizing an auteur. Firstly, he emphasizes the technical competence of a director as a criterion of value. He states that by the auteur theory, a director has to have some technical competence or elementary flair for the cinema.

Secondly, he states the importance of a distinguishable personality of the director as a

criterion of value. Over a group of films, he states, “a director must exhibit certain recurrent

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aspect of interior meaning arising from tension between a director’s personality and his material, which he names the ultimate glory of the cinema as an art (562). Sarris continues on to visualize these three premises of the auteur theory as three concentric circles:

The outer circle as technique; the middle circle, personal style; and the inner circle, interior meaning. The corresponding roles of the director may be designated as those of a technician, a stylist and an auteur. (563)

A director, according to Sarris, hence has to be able to demonstrate technical qualities in cinematography, show a stylistic personal style that is detectable in his works and demonstrate that he can adhere an additional, deeper layer into the film that exhibits its interior meaning.

In summary, these critics constructed the foundation of auteur theory, shifting attention from the “what” (story, theme) to the “how” (style, technique), showing that style itself had personal, ideological and even metaphysical reverberations. Astruc’s camera-stylo indicated that the director should be considered as the author of a film, more than the writer of the screenplay, since he is the one that oversees all audio and visual elements of the film, literally writing with the camera. Truffaut and Bazin added to this, stating that films should be stylistically in line with the personality of the director, as well as portraying growth or

development in the style. In addition, an important argument in auteur theory became being able to recognize an auteur and his stylistic and thematic personality, despite them working in Hollywood studios. This aspect will be further addressed in the subsequent chapters regarding studio-imposed restrictions. Furthermore, the difference between an auteur and a

metteur-en-scène was laid out by the critics of Cahiers du Cinéma, separating directors who sheepishly

translated scripts into film and simply adhered to the dominant conventions from auteurs, who used mise-en-scène as part of self-expression, both in formal aspects like a characteristic style as well as in reoccurring themes, motives and objects. Finally, Sarris proposes three criteria for recognizing an auteur, arguing, in line with Truffaut and Bazin, that a director has a meaningful style when he is able to create a personal statement while taking risks and struggling against standardization. These aspects of auteurship will be of great significance in the following examination of the Harry Potter series and their auteurship.

“Deluminating” the wizarding world

“To Ronald Bilius Weasley, I leave my Deluminator, a device of my own making, in the hope that when things seem most dark it will show him the light.” So speaks Minister of Magic

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Rufus Scrimgeour in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 1 (2010) when he hands Ron the “Deluminator”, a device that turns off/on lights, that Albus Dumbledore left him in his will. When closely looking at Prisoner of Azkaban, a lot of stylistic elements can be found, among which the “delumination” of the wizarding world as the film takes a much darker tone, which seems to be at the courtesy of director Alfonso Cuarón. Hereafter, I will begin by thoroughly examining this film, noting when, where and how various visually striking elements can be discovered. Most prominent in this discussion will be the visual aspects, among which the considerable amount of cinematic techniques and stylistic elements, after which I will turn to the narrative consequences of each of these stylistic emphases, which are in line with the director’s personal style. Henceforth, I will discuss whether or not Cuarón’s style can be regarded as auteurial according to Sarris’ criteria.

Considering Y Tu Mamá También, it can be noted that Cuarón has a fondness for a moving, often handheld camera. This distinguishable camera-stylo can be recognized in the third Harry Potter film as well, for example in the first scene that takes place in the Great Hall at Hogwarts, where not a single shot is stationary. The camera keeps moving around the room, taking everything in from different angles, as well as moving throughout all shots, which adds to the sense of unease and instability that Harry feels in this film. In addition to strengthening the quintessential theme of the series of finding your true identity, these themes are in line with the narrative of this film, which resounds around a notorious killer that is trying to find his way into the school, in order to find Harry and kill him. In further

examination of this film, another film from Cuarón’s oeuvre that was made after Prisoner of

Azkaban provides an interesting demonstration of his film style. In Children of Men (2006),

Cuarón shows his personal style, not only through moving and handheld shots, but most importantly, by literally following the main character Theo with the camera in order to let us experience the film through the eyes of the main character. This is a common technique, but it is one that Cuarón is an expert of, as he also shows in Prisoner of Azkaban. The first two Harry Potter films were not shot explicitly through Harry’s eyes and focused on the friendship of Harry, Ron and Hermione from an all-knowing perspective. Contrastingly, Cuarón invites us to see the wizarding world literally through Harry’s eyes and does this immediately in the opening scene of the film. In the scene, the camera moves closer and closer towards Harry in his bedroom on Privet Drive, where he’s sitting under a white sheet while practicing a magic spell. As the camera morphs through the sheet, a POV shot shows us what Harry is seeing, making us literally see what Harry sees, setting immediate identification in motion. Before Harry goes to Hogwarts, he is often alone in a shot or alone in a scene for a long time, forcing

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us to identify with him especially, therefore deepening the film’s dominant theme of isolation. This simple alteration changes the series and its depiction of the general narrative in its entirety, placing Harry explicitly in the centre of the narrative, deepening the audience’s bond and identification with the main character. At the same time, the intensified theme of isolation creates a parallel with the isolation that normal teenagers also experience during their

transformation into adulthood. Here, the need for magic comes into play for the audience, a longing for the magic that Harry has and which he uses to deal with the dark forces in his world.

Furthermore, Cuarón shows an emphasis on the creative use of composition with emphasis on the foreground and background in many shots in Children of Men. Placing something in the foreground or background often adds a special meaning to something in the development of the narrative of Cuarón’s films. Furthermore, while following the main character, the camera often gets distracted by what is happening in the background therefore actively breaking the identification and showing us things that the lead doesn’t notice. This is a technique that Cuarón has also used in Y Tu Mamá También. Hereby the audience is made aware of the perspective a film takes, telling us not to ignore the background in our own lives. These aspects can also be seen in Prisoner of Azkaban, although in a more subtle manner compared to Cuarón’s other work. In basically all of the shots where Professor Remus Lupin and Harry are having a conversation alone, one of them is in the foreground while the other is in the background, for example when they have a conversation on the bridge. The scene, which is also a long take, starts with both of the characters standing in the foreground, but as the conversation moves to a subject of the past, Lupin moves backwards and literally turns his back on Harry, isolating him yet again, which is in line with the topic, namely how Harry’s mother was there for Lupin in his times of trouble. Once he changes the subject back to Harry, Lupin moves back forward to Harry. Thus, this scene illustrates that the inventive use of composition can create a multi-layered, narratively complex scene, reflecting on how we should pay more attention to things that are in the background in our own world.

Cuarón also adds a few shots where the camera is slightly distracted, adding a level of intricacy to these particular scenes. This technique is the most prominent in two scenes at the end of the film, where Harry and Hermione have just gone back in time and run out of the castle as well as when they are seen running back inside the same route after having saved Sirius Black. In the first of these scenes, another long take, when Harry and Hermione are seen running through a corridor, the camera follows them, but as the characters take a left turn, keeps moving forward through large clock pendulums and bells, after which it morphs

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through glass and returns to the characters who are now running across a courtyard. This shot marks an important narrative transition in the film and simultaneously makes the audience explicitly aware of the presence of time and the passing of it by forcing us to see these clocks ticking by in the foreground. These effects are a clear part of the visual style of the film and helps situate Prisoner of Azkaban within Cuarón’s other work, in addition to stressing the impact of the theme of growing up and finding your identity. The passing of time is emphasized to depict the characters’ transition from a world in which magic is lively and protecting, into an adult world that demands maturity and in which magic is a way of dealing with the dangers of our society.

Another distinguishable stylistic element Cuarón often uses is the long take, which is also noticeable in his Harry Potter film, which includes about three long takes. Contrary to other conventional Hollywood films, the long takes are not used for action scenes or to present exposition, like in Children of Men. Instead, in Prisoner of Azkaban Cuarón uses them in a functional manner to emphasize transitions in the plot. The most prominent of these shots marks a crucial tone shift in the film. In the Leaky Cauldron, Harry has a conversation with Ron’s father, Mr. Weasley, about the escaped prisoner Sirius Black, providing Harry with threatening information. Their conversation begins with a wanted poster of Sirius Black in the foreground, again generating thematic emphasis by the use of composition with foreground and background, foreshadowing his prominent presence in this conversation, and right when the subject changes explicitly to Black, the poster is placed exactly between Harry and Mr. Weasley, while their family and friends are framed in the background. Finally, all still in the same shot, Mr. Weasley pulls Harry into a secluded corner asking Harry not to go looking for Black. Then, Harry himself asks the key question of the scene, while he is framed completely by himself: “Mr. Weasley, why would I go looking for someone who wants to kill me?” (Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban). In this long take, Harry learns of the true danger he’s about to face that year, which is reflected in darker and isolated shot and in order to learn this, Harry is literally separated from his friends. This isolation that is created by both lighting and framing and this pertinent question will keep occurring as themes and motifs throughout the rest of the film. The scene emphasises one of the first real threats of the transition into adulthood for Harry which will continue to isolate him from the people around him, speaking to normal teenagers who feel isolated, but who can escape into this magical world. In

addition, with this stylistically striking scene, Cuarón stresses the quintessential theme of finding yourself, which is an issue that is indirectly dealt with in its narrative.

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Thus, in this critical scene, it becomes clear for the first time that with deeper, more significant peril comes deeper more significant isolation for Harry, a theme that will be reoccurring in the rest of the series, despite the constant reminder of the friendship and the focus on the bond between Harry, Ron and Hermione. Even though his friends continually are there for him and help him reach his goals, in the end, Harry is referred to as “the chosen one” and has to deal with all of the ultimate confrontations with the enemy, Lord Voldemort, alone. Cuarón emphasises this theme whenever he can, for instance having Harry fly away from his friends on multiple occasions or left behind by them leaving for a visit to Hogsmeade. This realisation of solitude is reflected in and foreshadowed by the darker, grimier atmosphere and tone of Prisoner of Azkaban for the rest of the series. This darker tone can be seen in the film through the overall desaturated blue and greyish colouring, that Cuarón also uses in Children

of Men. The change of tone and mood compared to the first two bright and colourful films is

probably the most distinguishable stylistic change that Cuarón added to the series. This cloudy mood is portrayed through elements such as the overall overcast and rainy weather and the narrative of the film, but is also immediately reflected by the Harry Potter logo which is shown in the beginning of the film. In the previous two films, the logo was always shown in a bright gold colour, but from this film on, the logo is a silverfish grey colour, reflecting the dim tone. In this film, the separate letters of the logo are even moving around, thus adding a distorted feel to the film. This trend is continued in the subsequent films, where the logo turns darker and rougher, it is often shown decaying, in line with the darkness of the film it

represents. Significantly, the darker tone of the film coincides with the world at the time of the film’s release, which is turning darker and darker, in line with the themes of the films. As the series progresses, the films lose their sense of youthful innocence, mirroring the

transformation of the children into adults, which constitutes dealing with dark forces and the dangers of being enslaved by the capitalism system.

Despite the fact that Prisoner of Azkaban was made in a franchise context, forcing Cuarón to be faithful to the source material and thus suggesting a role as metteur-en-scène,

Prisoner of Azkaban shows a strong directorial hand. The term metteur-en-scène thus does not

fully encompass the nature of authorship in the film. All in all, as is examined in the preceding paragraphs, it could be noted that Cuarón resembles an auteur and that many stylistic elements can be recognized in Prisoner of Azkaban. In reference to Sarris’ first criteria, technical competence, Cuarón writes with his camera as if it is a pen and shows his competence through shots like long takes, a distracted camera and handheld shots. These shots all require the knowledge of different cinematographic techniques, so here Cuarón

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shows his value as a technician. Secondly, I have shown that Cuarón’s personal style is recognizable in this film, in combination with his previous and later work. Not only the cinematographic elements mentioned above are representable for his personal style, traits like the perspective of the film, the use of mise-en-scène and composition, the creative use of foreground and background, also visualise Cuarón’s as a stylist. Moreover, this film marks Cuarón’s introduction to the elaborate use of CGI, which shows a growth in personal style that occurs through Harry Potter, but Harry Potter also depicts a growth in reference to his previous work, for example in his use of the moving camera, which has grown from handheld shots in Y Tu Mamá También to more elaborate and complicated shots in Harry Potter. These aspects were greatly valued by auteur critics like André Bazin, thus showing Cuarón’s

auteurial qualities.

Lastly, appertaining to the third and last criteria, interior meaning, Cuarón has put a lot of emphasis on the character development in the story and thus has managed to turn boys and girls into teens, while showing their internal consistency. This is one of his major strengths and a theme he frequently addresses, because in Y Tu Mamá También, A Little Princess and

Great Expectations (1998) all involved young people growing up. When taking on the film,

Cuarón set an essay for the three leads to write about their character (Head to Shrunken Head: The Heroes). He told them to ask themselves why their character acts the way that he/she does, what motivates and scares him/her? Because of this, the actors were forced to go in depth in their acting, which comes through in the film as it has a much more personal feel about it and one can see the different sides to the characters. It is also significant to note that most of the visually distinctive moments, for example the long takes, are dialogue scenes, indicating the priority of the inner thoughts of the characters and demonstrating that smaller, character-based scenes can provide visual creativity more consistently than spectacle scenes. In addition, Cuarón adds a deeper layer through cinematographic elements as can be seen in the earlier examples concerning narrative techniques like foreshadowing and enhancing themes like isolation, distortion and finding your own identity. In summary, Cuarón’s

Prisoner of Azkaban supports all of the criteria Sarris set for recognizing an auteur.

In conclusion, immense visual and narrative contrasts can be noted between Prisoner

of Azkaban in comparison to the first two films, directed by Chris Columbus. While

Columbus excelled at working with untrained child actors, he doesn’t have a distinct cinematic style and could therefore be seen as a metteur-en-scène, merely translating the novel and the screenplay into film according to conventional cinematography. The first two films were fun and heart-warming family films about children entering J.K. Rowling’s

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magical world, created by Columbus. Illustrated by the elaborate evaluation of Prisoner of

Azkaban, these films differ greatly in style with Cuarón’s depiction of the world in the third

film. Alfonso Cuarón exposes many of his stylistic characteristics as a director in Prisoner of

Azkaban, thus adding an enhanced sense of narrative complexity to the Harry Potter series.

With wide framing, desaturated colours and advanced cinematographic techniques, Cuarón sets a darker tone that marks the child characters’ introduction to adulthood. With almost every auteurial element, Cuarón complements the dominant themes of isolation and danger and, most importantly, the series’ quintessential theme of finding your own identity. Most importantly, the auteurial elements function to enhance thematic aspects of the Harry Potter series that directly mirror the dangers of our modern society, reflecting the isolation that normal teenagers also experience during their transformation into adulthood. The emphasis on the passing of time depicts a stress on the loss of innocence in the transition into adulthood, which demands maturity. Here, magic forms a way of dealing with the dangers of being enslaved by the capitalism system of our modern society. All in all, Cuarón utilizes these stylistic components not for show, but rather to strengthen the film’s narrative intricacy, always supporting the inherent themes of isolation and danger, but ultimately of finding one’s identity, offering degrees of complexity the Harry Potter series had not seen before. Thus, this contrast in visual style between Columbus and Cuarón shows that Cuarón was able to express

auteurial presence, whilst working on a massive studio-bound franchise such as Harry Potter,

the consequences of which I will discuss in the subsequent chapters. All in all, this chapter has shown that Alfonso Cuarón was able to demonstrate his auteurial style in Prisoner of

Azkaban, skilfully inflicting his personal style in an imminent but yet inconspicuous way,

whilst enhancing the series’ thematic aspects that directly mirror the dangers of our modern society.

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Chapter 2: A brew of collaborators

In relation to the Harry Potter series, it is striking to note that in the course of eight films, the series has enlisted four different directors whilst under the coordination of one principal producer, David Heyman, who produced the series from start to finish. Heyman was the one that bought the film rights to Harry Potter in 1997 and got Warner Bros. on board, whilst retaining the control of the films, together with J.K. Rowling. At the time, Heyman had reassured the sceptic Rowling that he promised to be faithful to the material, which resulted in a trusting relationship between the both of them (Capturing the Stone). However, considering his long and intensive involvement with the films, how much creative control did Heyman actually have over the films and could he perhaps be seen as an auteur, considering the Harry Potter series? Or, should the series be seen as a product of collaboration as a whole?

Firstly, in this chapter, the various critique that was formed against auteur theory will be discussed, examining how and why criticism to the auteur theory came mainly from the perspective of the industry. Here, the way how modern day forces influence the presence of

auteurship in the Harry Potter series will be considered. The notion of filmmaking as a

collaborative art will be most relevant in this study, specifically focussing on the role of the producer and the screenwriter in relation to auteurship. I will then oppose my statements from the first chapter according to this critique, discussing the possible auteurship in the role of the dominant producer of the series, David Heyman, in relation to each of the directors. Along these lines, the auteurial elements of the final two directors, Mike Newell and David Yates, will also be explored, in order to fully grasp the series’ auteurship. Furthermore, the

limitations of the franchise structure are considered, concluding that a complex process of negotiation is at play here and providing alternatives to the director as the sole auteur of a film, for which Cuarón’s Prisoner of Azkaban will once more serve as a case study. All in all, the chapter will examine how the Harry Potter series demonstrates that collective authorship represses the role of the director as the sole author of a film, since all of the collaborators that work on a film add to its auteurship, but also how it does not imply depersonalization, since a film can still infuse a particular style.

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Even in their own time, not everyone agreed with the original auteur theory critics and many attempted to offer opposing viewpoints on the theory. Ever since Andrew Sarris wrote his article, he would soon become involved in a public debate with Pauline Kael, who wrote a response article to Sarris called “Circles and Squares” in 1963. Where Sarris would say that a great director has to be at least a good director, Kael opposes this by stating:

A director must be judged on the basis of what he produces – his films – and if he can make great films without knowing the standard methods, without the usual craftsmanship of the “good director”, then that is the way he works. (Kael 14, 15) Here, Kael denounces the fact that a director has to work according to a distinct set of standards in order to be able to achieve greatness, conflicting with Sarris’ stance on

auteurship. In “Circles and Squares”, Kael debunks Sarris’ three criteria for recognizing an auteur one by one, stating that overall, Sarris’ statements are quite shaky and vague. In

reference to Sarris outer circle, technical competence, Kael states that greatness of a director does not necessarily have to have anything to do with technical competence and following the rules and standards. Greatness can also be achieved by creating new standards through personal expression and style. In addition, she expresses her astonishment with the fact that the auteur critics are, according to her, unable to exercise taste and judgment within their area of preference, in this case the criteria of technical competence (Kael 15). Furthermore, Kael dismisses the distinguishability of personality in itself as a criterion of value, Sarris’ middle circle, because distinguishability of personality does not automatically indicate greatness or creativity. “Often the works in which we are most aware of the personality of the director are his worst films – when he falls back on the devices he has already done to death.”(Kael 15). Just because something is very present and noticeable, does not have to mean that this is necessarily a good thing and could very well favour a repetitious director who never tries anything new. Lastly, Kael writes that the auteur critics’ ideal auteur is someone who directs basically any script and puts his own stamp on it and filling in the script’s blanks with bits of style, hoping to create tension between style and the story.

Considering Kael’s critique, the question arises whether or not another player in the process of filmmaking could, or perhaps even should, be seen as an auteur. The question whether a producer could be an auteur was asked, among others, by Matthew Bernstein in his article “The Producer as Auteur” from 2007. Bernstein calls this question preposterous on its face, because the fact that an auteur’s style was visible in his work in spite of the restrictions

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imposed by the Hollywood classical studio system was an important factor for the Cahiers du

Cinéma. According to Bernstein:

If any one individual could be said to embody that impersonality, those barriers, that money-oriented environment, it was the film producer. If any one person could be accused of insisting that a film’s storyline, characterization and plot development be generic, it was the producer. If anyone demanded that principal photography be completed on time and under budget, no matter how exhilarating or gracious the long take could be, it was the producer. (Bernstein 180)

In other words, how could the film producer be an auteur when he is the one who must define budgetary borders, time-limits and control the expenses, thus rather constricting the creative process than aiding it? In the early Hollywood studio system of the 1940s, when the film producer first arose at the transition from short films to more expensive and elaborate features, producers were often the ones to tell famous master directors like Jean Renoir and Alfred Hitchcock that certain elements in their films were superfluous (Bernstein 180). At the time, producers were seen as the enemies of creation, sucking the art out of Hollywood. At the collapse of the studio system, the second half of the 1940s witnessed the emergence of the

auteur theory, therefore minimizing the producer’s interference in the creative process (Pardo

5). This left the producer, despite now being an independent, a mere financer or manager. The role of the producer has undergone various transformations, from fulfilling a pivotal role in the classic Hollywood studio system to its demise being shadowed by the director with the rise of auteur theory. Even though the role of the producer has long been widely understated in film theory, the last three decades have witnessed increased recognition for the producer. Even though the producer is often divided up into two camps, the creative and the financial producer, in reality, the role of the producer combines these. Today, the term creative producer is defined in John W. Cones’ dictionary of film production and distribution terms as:

A term used by some in the industry to distinguish between a producer who is significantly involved in artistic aspects of producing a motion picture as opposed to an executive producer who may be primarily responsible of obtaining production financing and in related business matters, and on the other hand, a line producer who is more directly involved with the logistics of actual production. (Cones in Pardo 8)

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In general, these days, the producer is seen as both the creative and the financial producer, taking an active part in the supervision of casting, writing, design and editing and so being able to be of considerable influence to the film. Still, creativity is seen as an inherent quality of the film producer, because their job demands imagination and initiative (Pardo 9).

Especially in their role as the “assembler of talents” and their involvement with the concept and script process, the producer must be creative in order to be able to work with and

recognize creative talents. Even though this is the case, every producer is different and has a different level of involvement with the film; some merely serve as financers while others are more involved with the creative process besides financing. Thus, on the one hand, the

producer’s creativity is not exercised in the same manner as the director’s, directly through his decisions that affect the production of the film, but rather in an indirect fashion, by having selected and supervised the creative personnel that works on the film (Pardo 10). Producers can oversee an auteur’s work and should function to help to facilitate it rather than interfering with it.

In relation to this, when looking at the role of the producer in the process of filmmaking, the notion of collaboration is of great importance. A director is by far not the only player in the production of a film. “Auteurism, it was argued, downplayed the collaborative nature of filmmaking” (Stam 90). In all films, even the more low-budget features, a large number of people work together to create a film over an extended period of time. So in fact, no one can be the true author of a film, not even the author of the book if a film is adapted. Perhaps we should start to think of the text as authorless, as a work of

collaboration or as a text with multiple auteurs. Writers, producers or even actors can in some cases be seen as auteurs, so any theory of authorship should always take these diverse

intricacies into account, because the material circumstances and personnel differ in each production (Stam 91). Thomas Schatz, an industry-oriented critic, speaks of not the genius of authors, but rather of Bazin’s “genius of the system”, in his book The Genius of the System:

Hollywood Filmmaking in the Studio Era. By this he refers to the capacity of a well-financed

and talent-filled industrial machine to turn out high-quality films. While auteur theory focuses on personal style and mise-en-scène, industry critics emphasize “the impersonal and

standardized “group style” of a homogenous corpus whose main features were narrative unity, realism and invisible narration” (Stam 91). Schatz states that the auteur theory should not emphasize one particular individual as an artist (The Genius of the System 8). In a

collaborative process the creative functions are shared, anyone who makes a distinguishable contribution could therefore be seen as a collaborator. Thus, in many cases, not only the

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director, but also the producer, writer, cinematographer, editor, art director and so on should be considered as collaborators to the film, a melding of institutional forces. According to Schatz, “studio filmmaking was less a process of collaboration than of negotiation and struggle – occasionally approaching armed conflict” (The Genius of the System 12). Thus, although negotiation can lead to heated arguments, passion and conviction will show in the end-result. Filmmaking is therefore a constant process of negotiation and collaboration between all dominant contributing parties.

Another book that challenges film critics’ view of focussing on the director is Making

Films in Contemporary Hollywood by Alan Lovell and Gianluca Sergi. In their book they

argue that filmmaking is a form of collection expression and defending the terms “collective authorship” and “collective expressiveness”. Regarding collective authorship, Lovell and Sergi state that the “authorship of a film always has to be established, it cannot be taken for granted. It is likely to be collective” (116). In relation to collective expressiveness, they note that with personal expression, mediation has to be taken into account, because this often blocks and changes personal expressiveness, for example of a director or a cinematographer. These remarks greatly support the fact that in order to establish the creative responsibility of a film, there is a necessity of measuring the level of contributions of all of the people that are involved in the making of a film. Here it could be convenient to differentiate between the notion of ‘creator’ and ‘creative’. A creator could be applied to someone who creates from scratch, for instance the traditional authors of a film like the writer and the director, whereas the creative would then be referring to someone who creates from pre-existing material, contributing to the creation of the film. Nevertheless, this consideration of filmmaking as collaborative does not necessarily oppose the notion of auteurship. In other words, collective authorship does not imply depersonalization (Pardo 12). Despite being the product of

collaboration, a film can still infuse a particular vision or a certain style.

To conclude, the notion of collaboration provides an intriguing case for auteurism, complicating the matter of the director as the author of a film. According to Pauline Kael, greatness can also be achieved by creating new standards and states that distinguishability of style is not necessarily an indication of creativity. In her critique, there is room for

interpretation in the sense that she does not confine the role of the auteur to the director. Seeing the producer as an auteur does not seem a likely association on the face of it, since they are often seen as the enemies of creation. Moreover, with the rise of auteur theory, the producer’s role was minimized to the role of a mere financer or manager. However, a fine producer can also oversee an auteur’s work and help to facilitate it. Since he also fills the part

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of the assembler of talents and is involved with the creation of the concept and script process, he can indeed be influential to the film in a creative sense, even though this is always in an indirect fashion, through decision making. A producer could also function as a creator, depending on how on the level of influence his vision is adhered to. Then again, filmmaking is, in its nature, collaborative and therefore no single author can be coupled with it, since the creative functions are always shared. Anyone who makes a distinguishable contribution should be seen as a collaborator, including the director, producer, writer, cinematographer and so on, creators and creatives working together. As the making of a film is an ongoing process of negotiation between all the collaborators that are involved, its collective authorship must be considered. This does not necessarily oppose the notion of auteurship, it merely secludes the role of the director as the sole author of a film, but does not imply depersonalization, since a film can still infuse a particular style. Here, then, we could also speak of collective

auteurship, since it is possible for auteurship to be shared amongst collaborators. Auteurship under the Cloak of Invisibility

In order to gain a complete perspective on auteurship in the Harry Potter series, alternatives for recognizing the directors as the sole auteur of a film have to be provided. It is vital to note that the producer of the series, David Heyman, served as producer on all of the eight films in the series, while hiring a total of four different directors to direct the series. Since these choices made by the producer can be considered greatly influential to the series as a whole, this suggests a certain sense of auteurship in the role of the producer. In addition, the

auteurship of directors Mike Newell and David Yates has to be examined. Did the decision to

hire Cuarón influence the way Newell and Yates directed the final instalments of the series and do these directors also demonstrate an auteurial style? Finally, how does screenwriter Steve Kloves’ auteurship come into play?

Although it is difficult to attest a producer’s involvement in the production of a film, behind the scenes footage and interviews can develop insight here. Heyman has stated that he urged not only Cuarón, but every director he hired to make the film his own, explaining: “It’s important that any director come into a situation like this and feel the freedom, feel the power to make it their own. That’s how you’re going to get the best films” (Creating the Vision). This suggests that Heyman mainly functioned as an overseer and helped to facilitate the directors’ work, wanting them to feel at liberty to create their own film, but still operating as both a creator and a creative. What’s more, the hiring of Alfonso Cuarón advocates the producers wanting to add a more art house quality to the film, thus deepening the thematic

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aspects of the films. With these choices, this assembling of talents by the producer is best illustrated in the hiring of the four different directors in the course of the films, which had great creative influence on the series.

Continuing on this, even though the series has worked with multiple directors, there has been a sense of continuity throughout the series. Referring to the series’ third director, Mike Newell, David Heyman states:

He had an innate understanding of British schools, their anarchy, their humour. I was a little concerned when he talked about making it as a Bollywood film, but I see what he meant – it has this big, theatrical feel. (Heyman in Gilbey)

This quote not only shows the freedom and trust Heyman offered his directors, but also illustrates why Heyman selected Newell for the fourth film. Before taking on Harry Potter, Newell was famously known for his Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994), besides directing films like Mona Lisa Smile (2003) and the Donnie Brasco (1997). Considering this

combination of genres, in addition to a film with a boarding school setting, Newell’s previous work is in line with the themes of the film, with more romance and emphasis on the school situation. Producer David Heyman made intentional choices in the hiring of each director, which is visible in the thematic alignment of each director’s previous work in relation to the dominant themes in their Harry Potter adaptations. Being the first British director, Newell added that sense of British boarding school to the film, in an attempt to keep the focal point on the characters’ emotional state in the midst of the immensely large-scaled, action filled production that the film involved. With this, Newell accents the neo-liberalist micro-society of the private school that the characters go to, an environment that commends individualism and competition. Newell did not intentionally demonstrate an auteurial style in Goblet of

Fire, but he did show a more forthcoming directorial style than Cuarón did, with his big

personality and personally getting involved in the scenes, for example when he personally fought with Fred or George, rolling on the floor while directing a scene (Reflections on the Fourth Film). This directing approach is apparent in the film’s energetic and dynamic

atmosphere, reflecting the further transition of the children into adulthood, complete with the perils of romance and death. Moreover, this results in an unintentional auteur aspect

enhancing the encompassing theme, which is the relationships and loyalty and disloyalty between groups, which noteworthy constitutes as a dominant theme in his Harry Potter instalment. Thus, even though Mike Newell would not immediately be perceived as an