BATTLE LINES

Despite his newfound confidence as a leader and his open defiance of Umbridge as a teacher, Harry is still plagued by nightmares. Even more terrifying, his nightmares now seem to be foretelling actual events. But what troubles Dumbledore is the growing realization that Harry’s nightmares might not be dreams at all but, rather, an attempt by Voldemort to use Harry’s own mind against him. Dumbledore enlists Professor Snape to teach Harry the art of Occlumency, which will enable him to block the Dark Lord’s attempts to infiltrate his mind. The lessons are both grueling and revealing in ways neither Harry nor even Snape had anticipated, but they are to no avail. Voldemort’s mind games prove too strong for the young wizard.

Harry awakens from a terrible nightmare in which he sees Sirius being attacked behind a door he remembers seeing when he was summoned to the Ministry for his hearing. He knows there is a chance that the nightmare was actually a trap meant to lure him to the Ministry, but he cannot take that chance. Sirius is the only family he has left.

But Harry will not be going alone. Despite his initial protestations, he is joined by five courageous members of Dumbledore’s Army: Hermione, Ron, Neville, Luna and the youngest Weasley sibling, Ginny. If Harry is willing to risk everything to save Sirius, they are willing to risk everything to stand by him.

Arriving at the Department of Mysteries in the Ministry of Magic, the six young wizards make their way into the Hall of Prophecy—a seemingly infinite room filled with prophecies that have each been encased in a myriad of individual glass orbs and then catalogued and stored on endless rows of shelves. Stuart Craig says the original plan was “to physically manufacture 15,000 glass spheres and place them on glass shelves. The whole thing was going to be a crystal palace covered in cobwebs and dust. But then we realized that when the shelves came crashing down, it would be a one-take deal. It would have taken weeks to replace and reset the orbs.” Practicality won out, and the entire sequence was instead shot against a green screen, making the Hall of Prophecy the first- ever completely computer-generated set in a Harry Potter film.

Harry instantly recognizes that he has seen the Hall of Prophecy before, but as they makes their way down the rows of numbered shelves, it is Neville who makes a startling discovery. The label for one of the glass orbs bears the name Harry Potter.

Unaware that the prophecy holds the key to the connection between him and Lord Voldemort, Harry takes it in his hands…and the trap is sprung. The teenage wizards are surrounded by a group of Death Eaters, led by the treacherous Lucius Malfoy. Reprising the role of Lucius, actor Jason Isaacs notes, “At that moment, Lucius’ mask of civility is gone forever. The battle lines have been drawn and there is no pretending which side he is on.”

One of Lucius’ allies is Sirius’ sadistic cousin, Bellatrix Lestrange, a recent escapee from Azkaban Prison and a devoted follower of the Dark Lord. It was she who put a Cruciatus Curse on Neville’s parents, torturing them to insanity—a fate Sirius calls “worse then death.” Her appearance gives Neville a new reason for being there. Matthew Lewis, who has played the role of Neville in all of the Harry Potter movies, comments, “Neville turns out to be a lot braver than even he thought. To take this character on a journey from being this child who you would never think could fight, let alone against Death Eaters, to being a man who will fight to avenge his parents…it was just unbelievable.”

Joining the Harry Potter ensemble for the first time, Helena Bonham Carter relished taking on the role of the evil Bellatrix Lestrange. “If somebody asks you to be in a Harry Potter movie, you have to do it, and I really had fun with this role. Bellatrix obviously has a personality disorder,” the actress laughs. “She actually gets a kick out of being evil. I think she is in love with Lord Voldemort; she was willing to go to prison for him for 14 years. Now that she’s out, she is even more fanatical.”

The six young wizards fight valiantly, using their wands to cast spells that most of them have only just learned. But they are no match for the more experienced Death Eaters. Just as the teenagers are on the brink of death, the Order of the Phoenix sweeps in, with Sirius Black leading the charge and ordering Malfoy, “Get away from my godson!”

The battle is on and despite the danger—or perhaps because of it—Sirius seems to be enjoying the moment. Gary Oldman remarks, “Sirius has been so frustrated, first being in prison for 12 years and, since then, hiding at Grimmauld Place. He has been chomping at the bit to get his hands dirty and now he’s back. It’s like the old days.”

Screenwriter Michael Goldenberg says that scripting the pivotal battle between the Order of the Phoenix and the Death Eaters was his most daunting challenge. “Trying to capture the essence of what was in the book and shape it for the screen was a real balancing act. We wanted to make sure there was a real sense of the danger—that anything could happen and anyone could live or die. That’s what keeps people on the edge of their seats.”

To stage the battle scenes, David Yates enlisted the help of choreographer Paul Harris to infuse the wand-to-wand combat with a style reminiscent of fencing. “David wanted me to set rules of engagement for fighting with the wands, which had not been established in the previous films,” Harris explains. “He wanted a range of movements and positions from which the spells could be delivered, but they had to be unique to the world of Harry Potter.”

In addition to outlining a basic set of movements, Harris worked with the actors to develop their individual techniques. He offers, “Jason Isaacs, for example, has a very formal, pure style, whereas Gary Oldman’s style is a lot more ‘street,’ which befits the character.”

As the battle escalates, there are triumphs and tragedies, all leading to a climactic showdown between Albus Dumbledore and Lord Voldemort. Yates asserts, “The battle between Voldemort and Dumbledore needed to be epic and visceral. I wanted audiences to feel that they were inside the battle, experiencing it firsthand, so we tried to use a hand-held camera whenever possible.”

In keeping with the fact that this was a fight between two powerful wizards, visual effects supervisor Tim Burke adds, “David Yates came up with the inspired idea to keep everything grounded in the elements—fire, water, sand... It’s all very logical and, at the same time, astounding.”

The director remarks, “Ultimately, when you are watching this great battle between Dumbledore and Voldemort, it is the climax of the first five stories thus far. We had a duty to make it the most spectacular battle between good and evil, with Harry at its center.”

“What they are ultimately fighting for is Harry’s soul,” David Heyman agrees. “And in the midst of that, Harry, who had begun the story feeling completely isolated and alone, even among his friends, finally sees that he has been given a priceless and irreplaceable gift in the people in his life.”

Daniel Radcliffe offers, “What Harry realizes is that Voldemort may have the followers and the power, but, ultimately, he will never have what Harry has, which is the true and unconditional loyalty of his friends.”

Heyman adds, “And Harry has been given something by his mother and by his friends that Voldemort will never have—the gift of love.”

Yates concludes, “‘Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix’ deals with some complex and demanding themes, but I think the most striking is the power of friendship and loyalty.”

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ABOUT THE PRODUCTION
It has been a long, lonely summer for Harry Potter as he awaits his fifth year of study at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. It’s bad enough that he must endure living with the odious Dursleys, but he hasn’t received even a note from his classmates and closest friends, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger...