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Of all the directors in the running, including City of Angels' Brad Silberling and Dead Man Walking's Tim Robbins, Columbus had the sappiest rep after his most recent movies, Bicentennial Man and Stepmom. But he also had two Home Alone movies to his credit, which meant that he knew how to work with child actors. Another plus: earlier in his career, as a screenwriter, Columbus penned the wickedly subversive action comedy Gremlins, which was a hit for Warner Bros. in 1984. Columbus admits that as a director, "I was going down this soft, sentimental road...I'm the guy who wrote Gremlins. I tried to find something after I finished [Bicentennial Man] that would go back to that [Gremlins] area." Despite his A-list status in Hollywood, Columbus agreed to audition for the job by pitching himself to the studio. Heyman says Columbus was hired ultimately because of his "desire to be faithful to the material."
Screenwriter Steve Kloves (Wonder Boys) also convinced the producers that he would respect the novels, and Heyman thought he would supply "a touch of melancholy, a little darkness, which I think is really vital to the story." Some of the movie's most poetic moments come from Kloves' head: after his kindly headmaster, Dumbledore, gives Harry a moving lecture about letting go of his troubled past, the boy strolls out to the schoolyard and watches his pet owl, Hedwig, take a slow, symbolic flight. "Those are the moments that move you and elevate the movie beyond being just sort of a highlights reel," says Kloves. Still, the filmmakers have stayed remarkably close to the novel. "Jo [Rowling] had a tremendous influence," says Heyman.
While the author didn't have final say over the movie, her contract gave her a consulting role, and she will receive a share of the profits. "When I optioned the book," says Heyman, who most recently produced the savagely dark 1999 cannibalism comedy Ravenous, "I made a promise to Jo that I wanted the film to be as faithful to her vision as possible. Her books work. That's the reason 100 million have been sold." Although she rarely visited the set, Rowling was involved during preproduction, when crucial design and plot decisions were being made. Columbus wondered early on where to put Harry's lightning-bolt scar, a souvenir from his infancy, when he had his first run-in with the evil Lord Voldemort, who killed his parents. Editions of the books all over the world showed the scar in various places, so the director went to the source. "I drew a face with a wizard hat, and I had her draw in the scar," says Columbus. She described it as "razor sharp" and drew it vertically down the right side of Harry's forehead.
Rowling also had a hand in choosing most of the adult cast members. She specifically requested Coltrane. Others, like Richard Harris as Dumbledore, Maggie Smith as Professor McGonagall and Alan Rickman as Professor Snape came straight from a wish list of actors that Rowling provided the producers. She gave Rickman and Coltrane precious bits of information about their characters' futures. "There's an awful lot revealed about Hagrid in book five," says Coltrane, "and Jo thought it was important for me to know." Like what? "I could tell you," says Coltrane, "but then you'd have to die."