Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is the fourth film in the popular Harry Potter series, begun with the novel by J.K. Rowling.

It was directed by Mike Newell and was released on November 18, 2005 (see 2005 in film). It is rated PG-13 for sequences of fantasy violence and frightening images in the US, 12A for cinema and 12 on DVD in the UK and M in Australia.

The film concerns Harry Potter's fourth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Hogwarts has been selected to hold the recently returning wizard competition known as the Triwizard Tournament. Though Harry does not apply, the Goblet of Fire mysteriously selects him as a second representative of Hogwarts in the tournament.

Three days after its release, the film had grossed approximately USD102 million at the North American box office, the highest first-week tally for a Harry Potter film, and enjoyed an immensely successful run at the box office, earning over $892 million worldwide, making it the highest grossing film of 2005 worldwide and the 8th highest grossing worldwide film of all time. It is currently the second highest grossing Harry Potter film, behind Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.

The film was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Art Direction, but lost to Memoirs of a Geisha while the DVD went on to become one of the fastest selling DVDs of all time.

This is the first Harry Potter film to receive a "PG-13" or equivalent rating, the preceding films having been rated PG or one of its international equivalents.

Taglines

 * Difficult Times Lie Ahead, Harry

Synopsis
The fourth year of Hogwarts rolls around after an attack on the 422nd Quidditch World Cup by Death Eaters. Hogwarts will be hosting the Triwizard Tournament, a traditional tournament which pits three schools against each other. When Beauxbatons and Durmstrang, the rival schools, arrive, the rules are announced. All seventh years interested must insert their name into the Goblet of Fire, and those chosen will be the Champions of their respective school. But Harry, a fourth year, has his name appear out of the Goblet of Fire, even though Harry never entered and isn't even allowed to. Harry soon finds himself thrown into a brutal test of strength and mind only to ultimately find himself in the middle of Lord Voldemort's trap as he plans to return. Now Harry has to face the greatest challenge yet: defeat a revived Lord Voldemort.

Locations
The film was mainly shot in Leavesden Film Studios. Other locations used in filming are as follows:
 * Ashridge Estate, Hertfordshire, England, UK
 * Knebworth House, Hertfordshire, England, United Kingdom (including the Yule Ball Staircase scene)
 * Black Park, Iver, Buckinghamshire, England, UK
 * Divinity School, Bodleian Library, Broad Street, Oxford, Oxfordshire, England, UK
 * Beachy Head, Eastbourne, East Sussex, England, UK
 * Glenfinnan Viaduct, Fort William, Highlands, Scotland, UK (Hogwarts Express)
 * New College, Holywell Street, Oxford, Oxfordshire, England, UK (Cloister, Ferret Scene)
 * Steall Falls, Scotland, UK
 * Virginia Water, Surrey, England, UK
 * Beckley Park, Oxfordshire, England, UK

Alterations from the book and previous films
The layout of Hogwarts Castle and its surrounding landscape has changed in each film adaptation. The following are the new changes made to Hogwarts Castle in the Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire film adaptation.


 * The Entrance Hall has been changed. There is now a courtyard in its place with a Clock Tower which leads to the Entrance Hall.
 * The Entrance Hall has been extended further from the Marble Staircase separating the Great Hall from the Main Tower.
 * The Owlery has been added to the grounds as a tall tower with many levels set atop a stone hill.
 * Two new valleys have been added.
 * One is where the Dragon Arena is found in the first task. This valley is found vertically from the Owlery Tower. Further on in that new valley is a waterfall.
 * The other is where the vast Triwizard Maze located. This valley is behind the Great Hall past Hagrid's Hut.
 * Some scenes in the film take place within a courtyard whose location is unknown. It is definitely not the Clock Tower Courtyard, the Entrance Courtyard, nor the courtyard by the Dark Tower.
 * The design of the three Bell Towers has been altered.

Wyrd Sisters lawsuit
In the runup to the movie, a Canadian folk group called the Wyrd Sisters filed a US$40-million lawsuit against Warner Brothers, the North American distributor of the film, Jarvis Cocker from Pulp, and Jonny Greenwood and Phil Selway of Radiohead for the use of their group's name. In the book, the band is called the "Weird Sisters" after the witches in Shakespeare's Macbeth but was reportedly renamed the "Wyrd Sisters" for the film. Before the film was released, however, Warner Brothers removed all references to either name for the band. Nevertheless, the Wyrd Sisters moved for an injunction in a Canadian court to prevent distribution of the film in Canada. This motion was dismissed by an Ontario judge.

Reaction
The film was received very positively by critics, garnering an 89% rating at Rotten Tomatoes. The New York Daily News praised the film for its humor and its dark tone. The young actors were praised for demonstrating a “greater range of subtle emotions”, particularly Daniel Radcliffe whom Variety described as delivering a “dimensional and nuanced performance”. New cast members were also praised: Brendan Gleeson’s portrayal of Mad-Eye Moody was described as “colourful” ; Miranda Richardson’s scenes were described as “wonderful” ; Ralph Fiennes's portrayal of Lord Voledmort was described as “sublime villainy”.

Negative criticism included the film’s pace which The Arizona Republic described as being “far too episodic,” while CNN.com described the film as “clunky and disjointed”. Another criticism was that the many supporting characters did not get enough screen time. Fans criticised the film for changing and leaving out too much of the source material, particularly those parts that developed character and those parts of the story that set-up events that occur later in the series. These negative criticisms are similar to those made about the previous film.

Box office
After an opening day of $40m at the North American box office, Goblet of Fire enjoyed a successful run at the box office, running for 20 weeks in theatres and closing on April 6, 2006. The film set numerous records including the highest non-May opening weekend in the US and the most successful opening ever in the UK, earning £14.9m in its opening weekend. Goblet of Fire then drew $102.7 million from 3,858 locations its opening weekend at the North American box office, setting a new opening high for the franchise and selling about as many tickets as the first movie, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, did in its opening weekend. The debut marked the sixth $100 million weekend in history, behind Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest&#39;s $135 million, Spider-Man&#39;s $114.8 million, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith&#39;s $108.4 million, Shrek 2&#39;s $108 million and X-Men: The Last Stand&#39;s $102.8 million.

As of April 6, 2006, Goblet of Fire has earned $892.2 million worldwide according to Boxofficemojo, making it not only the highest grossing international and worldwide release of 2005, but one of the few films to have ever passed $600 million in international box office receipts. It has joined four other titles that have passed the $600 million mark, including Titanic, Return of the King, and the first two Harry Potter films. Its worldwide total includes $290 million from the U.S. and Canada.

The film was also released in IMAX theatres and grossed a total of $20,033,758 million worldwide for a cumulative per screen average of $188,998 thus setting a new record and a new milestone for a digitally re-mastered 2D IMAX release (Source: YahooFinance).

In January 2006, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire surpassed the box office takings of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, to become the eighth-highest grossing film of all time, and the second-highest grossing film in the Harry Potter series so far, behind Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.

The film ranks third in the North American box office (domestic) behind Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith and The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe for 2005 though both films rank lower than Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire in worldwide terms.

DVD
The film was released on DVD in North America on March 7 2006. It was available in one- and two-disc editions, as well as part of an 8-disc boxset that includes all four films to date. The bonus disc features three interactive games, as well as seven behind the scenes featurettes. The film was also released in UMD format for PSP.

Wal-Mart had a special bonus disc available for purchase alongside the single-disc editions that features extra features and a sample of the Harry Potter edition of the Scene It? DVD game.

On its first day of release in North America, over 5 million copies were sold, recording a franchise high for first-day sales. Within its first week it sold over a total of 9 million units of combined sales of both the widescreen and full screen versions of the DVD.

The UK edition was released on DVD on March 20 2006 and became the fastest selling UK DVD ever, selling six copies per second on its first day of release. According to the Official Charts Company, the DVD sold 1.4 million copies in its first week alone. It is also available in a two-disc edition with special features similar to the North American two-disc edition.,

The DVD currently holds the Guinness World Record for being the fastest selling DVD of all time. The achievement will be added to the 2007 edition of The Guinness World Records book which will be released this coming August and will include a picture of the award being presented at Leavesden Studios in April. 

Future Shop has an exclusive promotion including a holographic cover for the two-disc edition.

Warner Home Video announced the HD DVD edition of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, was to be released on April 11 2006; however, due to the delayed release of Toshiba's HD-DVD player, the HD DVD edition of Goblet of Fire was pushed back to April 18 2006.

The Chinese DVD edition was released 2 weeks before the North American release as an effort to combat DVD piracy in the country of China. The DVD was sold at a low price of $2.73 USD.

Trivia

 * Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire was the top grossing film of 2005, making $892.2 Million at the worldwide box office to date, making it the eighth top grossing movie of all time worldwide.
 * The face of Moody's pocket watch has a picture of a biohazard symbol, an homage to Gleeson's role as Frank in 28 Days Later.
 * The producers first talked about filming the movie in two parts with a six month separation between them such as The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions. This idea was later overthrown when Alfonso Cuaron, who directed the third Potter film, insisted to the filmmakers that it would ruin the excitement of the story.
 * This film is the first Harry Potter film to be rated PG-13 by the MPAA. Rating in other countries were: 12A in the UK, 12 in the Netherlands, M in Australia and PG in Canada.
 * Jonny Greenwood and Phil Selway of Radiohead, along with Pulp frontman Jarvis Cocker, bass player Steve Mackey, Jason Buckle (of All Seeing I) and Steve Claydon (of Add N to (X)) appear in the movie as members of the band called The Weird Sisters, whose name was included in the fourth book as an homage to Shakespeare.
 * An official picture released by Warner Bros. incorrectly showed Voldemort's father's name to be "Tom Marvolo Riddle" with an impossible birth year. After much dismay from the fans, this mistake was corrected in the final film by digital manipulation.
 * The "spider" Mad-Eye Moody demonstrates the curses on is a Tailless Whip Scorpion.
 * British contortionist Richard Rosson was hired to play the Death Eater named Avery. He shot scenes in which Avery suffers torture, but they were cut from the final cinematic edit.
 * The song Hermione and Hagrid sing as Harry finds Crouch's dead body is the Hogwarts school song.
 * The names on the graves in the graveyard scene are of the crew of the movie, in order to avoid legal issues with other names.
 * In the original posters for the movie, the tagline on the posters read Difficult times lie ahead Harry, which lacks a comma. After a few months, the newer posters corrected this mistake to read Difficult times lie ahead, Harry.
 * Before being offered this film, Mike Newell was set to direct The Constant Gardener. Coincidentally, that film also stars Ralph Fiennes.
 * Mike Newell is the first British director in the film series, having been preceeded by American Chris Columbus and Mexican Alfonso Cuaron.
 * Gary Oldman and Ralph Fiennes have both played villains in the Hannibal Lecter films. Oldman played Mason Verger in Hannibal, and Fiennes played Francis Dolarhyde in Red Dragon.
 * The band playing in the Maze grandstand scenes is composed of young musicians from the Aylesbury Music Centre in the UK. However, the music itself is dubbed, as the band were playing "magical" instruments. Despite a drum being played on the screen, percussion is notably absent from the audio track.
 * At the end of the credits you can read the sentence "No dragons were harmed in the making of this movie".
 * To play Voldemort, a large majority of Ralph Fiennes' facial features (most noticably his nose) were digitally altered in post production. To help the visual effects team, Fiennes had coloured dots painted onto his face during principal photography.
 * When Harry and the others are at the Quidditch World Cup, when Amos and Cedric Diggory split from Mr. Weasley and the others, Amos Diggory tells Mr. Weasley that it is "the parting of the ways", the title of chapter thirty-six in the book.
 * The scene with Professor McGonagall teaching Ron to dance was never in the book.
 * This film went through a total of 12 script drafts.
 * When the announcer in the Quidditch Stadium says it's the 422nd Quidditch World Cup, he makes reference to Braydon Wilde's birthday, which is also on April 22.
 * This is the first film in which Harry's relatives, the Dursleys, do not appear.
 * The character of Nigel was created for the movie and does not appear in any of the novels

Movie stills

 * Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire pictures
 * Goblet of Fire Pictures at Cinema.com

Movie sites

 * Official Goblet of Fire site
 * Official movie series site
 * Official UK site
 * Box Office Totals

Reviews

 * Movie Review - Mark Sells, The Oregon Herald
 * musicOMH.com Review
 * Mugglenet Press Screening Fan Review
 * Harry Potter Movie Pictures
 * Movie Review Xdafied.com.au
 * Full Effect: The Movie vs. the Book
 * Full Effect: The Movie vs. the Book

Trailers

 * Theatrical Trailer released September 15 2005
 * Quicktime (33MB)


 * International Trailer released August 24 2005
 * Real Media (15 MB)
 * Quicktime (17.5 MB)
 * Windows Media (16.1 MB)


 * Teaser Trailer released May 7 2005
 * Real Player
 * QuickTime
 * Windows Media


 * Trailers from Movies.com
 * Harry Potter Trailers