華納兄弟正打造《哈利波特》派生電影

Warner Bros. announced today that more Harry Potter movies are on the way. The studio is working with Potter author J.K. Rowling to create a new franchise of movies based on “Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them” which is a fictitious text book in the Harry Potter world. The story will also follow the adventures of the book’s author, Newt Scamander. Rowling, for the first time, will pen the screenplay.

華納兄弟公司（Warner Bros.）今天宣佈，新的《哈利波特》（Harry Potter）電影正在籌備中。這家電影公司與《哈利波特》作者J.K.羅琳（J.K. Rowling）攜手合作，根據哈利波特魔法世界的虛構課本《神奇動物在哪裏》（Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them），打造全新的系列電影。電影情節也將圍繞這本書的作者紐特•斯凱曼德（Newt Scamander）的冒險經歷展開。J.K.羅琳將首次撰寫電影劇本。

It comes as no surprise that Warner Bros. is trying to keep the Harry Potter franchise going. The films alone have earned $7.7 billion at the box office. The franchise has probably almost doubled those earnings on home video and TV sales. Then there’s the scads of Harry Potter merchandise that fans still snatch up.

華納兄弟公司打算將《哈利波特》系列電影繼續拍攝下去，這個決定並不出人意料。光是原先的《哈利波特》電影本身就獲得了77億美元的票房收入，錄像帶和電視方面的銷售額幾乎在此基礎上翻了一番。此外還有大量的哈利波特特許商品，仍然是影迷爭相搶購的對象。

But at some point, Harry Potter could seem old hat and that’s not something that Warner Bros. wants to see happen. So execs had three choices: reboot the franchise, come up with sequels or spin off part of the Potter world into a new movie.

但有些時候，哈利波特電影還是顯得有些過時了，這可不是華納兄弟公司希望看到的情形。因此，公司高管有三個選擇：重新啓動該系列、拍攝續集或者將哈利波特魔法世界中的部分內容剝離出來，拍攝派生電影。

Without books to support the new stories, the upcoming movies could be a tougher sell for Warner Bros. Harry and friends won’t appear at all in the new movies which will be set in New York 70 years before Harry Potter heads to Hogwarts.

沒有了原著的支撐，華納兄弟公司要推銷這些新電影恐怕不會像以前那麼簡單。該片背景將設置在紐約，故事發生的年代比哈利波特進入霍格沃茨學校早了70年前，因此哈利和朋友們根本不會出現在新電影中。

The new stories will also net video games, merchandise and enhance Rowling’s website, Pottermore.

這個新故事還將網羅電腦遊戲、特許商品，並助推羅琳的網站Pottermore。

Here’s Rowling on the upcoming franchise:

以下是羅琳對即將拍攝的系列電影的看法：

It all started when Warner Bros. came to me with the suggestion of turning ‘Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them’ into a film. I thought it was a fun idea, but the idea of seeing Newt Scamander, the supposed author of ‘Fantastic Beasts, ’ realized by another writer was difficult. Having lived for so long in my fictional universe, I feel very protective of it and I already knew a lot about Newt. As hard-core Harry Potter fans will know, I liked him so much that I even married his grandson, Rolf, to one of my favourite characters from the Harry Potter series, Luna Lovegood.

是這樣的，當初華納公司來找我，建議把《神奇動物在哪裏》改編成電影。我覺得這個想法很有趣，但是想到要請一位作家去充當《神奇動物》的設定作者紐特•斯凱曼德（Newt Scamander）來執筆這個故事，這對我來說有些難以接受。由於在這個虛構的世界中生活了很久，我對這個故事有很強烈的保護欲，而我知道很多關於紐特的事情。哈利波特的鐵桿粉絲應該知道，我非常喜歡這個人物，甚至讓他的孫子羅爾夫（Rolf）——這也是我在哈利•波特系列中喜歡的角色之一——娶了盧娜•洛夫古德（Luna Lovegood）。

As I considered Warners’ proposal, an idea took shape that I couldn’t dislodge. That is how I ended up pitching my own idea for a film to Warner Bros.

我考慮着華納兄弟的建議，腦海中就形成了一個令我無法擺脫的想法。就這樣，我最終向華納兄弟公司推薦起了我自己對這樣一部電影的構想。

Although it will be set in the worldwide community of witches and wizards where I was so happy for seventeen years, ‘Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them’ is neither a prequel nor a sequel to the Harry Potter series, but an extension of the wizarding world. The laws and customs of the hidden magical society will be familiar to anyone who has read the Harry Potter books or seen the films, but Newt’s story will start in New York, seventy years before Harry’s gets underway.

這部電影的背景將設置在巫師和女巫的魔法世界，我在這個世界裏快樂地度過了十七年的時間。《神奇動物在哪裏》既不是《哈利波特》系列的前傳，也不是續集，而是這個魔法世界的延伸。那些讀過哈利波特原著或者看過電影的人，都會熟悉這個隱藏的魔法社會的法律和習俗，但是紐特的故事將在紐約拉開序幕，這是哈利踏上魔法旅程的七十年前。

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