Blog 21

 Christopher Caruso

Blog #21

Case Study Interview Transcript #1

C                     Hello I am Christopher Caruso.  It is April 8, 2013 and I am here with…

M                     Anthony Martin

C                     And today I am going to be asking Anthony some questions about his experiences viewing Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone both in its literature and cinema format.  The focus of this interview is to find a solid answer to whether or not the stereotype is true that the written format of storytelling is superior to the visual and audio cinematic format of storytelling, and if the way that we read and process the information in books vs. the way we read and process information in movies has any contributing factors to this notion.  This will be achieved by analyzing the story of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone in both its original novel format and its movies format.  Do you understand?

M                     Yes.

C                     Alright then, let’s get started! Um, just to begin, could you give us a little background information about the first time that you ever came into contact the Harry Potter series in any format?  How did you first learn about the existence of Harry Potter?

M                     I first learned about the existence of Harry Potter when my mom bought me the first book, The Sorcerer’s Stone, uh, I can’t remember how old I was… probably like (pause) I don’t know how old.

C                     Well maybe six or seven?

M                     I think it was seven.

C                     Okay.

M                     Anyway, my mom bought it for me.  She bought it for me and my sister.  We each got our own book.  It was softcover.  Actually, the one I got was The Philosopher’s Stone before the name was changed.

C                     The original England version?

M                     Yes, the English version, yeah.  I don’t know why they were selling it in the United States but I got it that way.  It was very interesting.

C                     That’s actually amazing.  I have always wanted the original English version.

M                     Yeah.  It’s almost exactly the same, but the writing was a little different.

C                     I see, but still that is pretty cool.  Were you a fan of the series right off the bat or did it takes some time for you to get hooked to the series--

M                     I was interested in it because it was, uh, an interesting idea. So I read it because I was always a bit of a bookworm when I was around that age.  I am not as much anymore but, uh, around that age I read everything that I came into contact with, so… yeah.

C                     Uh, now a bit more about the literary aspect of the series.  When it comes to reading literature in general, even beyond Harry Potter, what would you say is your “reading style”?  Now to clarify on that, uh, are you more of a visual reader, creating more heavily vivid and immersive images in your mind base on the author’s descriptions, or do details and descriptions not matter as much and you basically view the characters and setting in your head how you want to see them?

M                     I would say it is probably around how I want to see them.  Um, I know about the general descriptions but the problem is that over time, as the movies came out, my general views of the characters and the, uh, environment became more specific to what I had seen in the movies.

C                     Yeah, I will admit that that happened to me too.  I actually didn’t read the first Harry Potter book until after I saw the first three films.  So whenever I read the books, I always had, you know, Daniel Radcliff and---

M                     Yeah, I always had their images in my brain because of the movies

C                     Well I have read that a large reason that certain people believe, uh, that movies aren’t as good is because people in their heads have their own ideas about what a character should look like, and when they go to movies and see the settings and the characters, they don’t look like how they envisioned them and they get discouraged.

M                     Which is ingenious because the movies were coming out as the new books were coming out, so eventually people were assuming that the characters in the books were the characters in the movies, which made the movies more popular.

C                     Yeah, but do you believe that that notion is true?  That sometimes people don’t enjoy a certain movie as much because they are just so engrossed in how they viewed that world?

M                     It depends on how much of a fan you are. If you are going for all of the very very specific aspects, like a lot of times hardcore fans of any series… you know Star Wars, Harry Potter, The Lord of the Rings, all of them. There are all going to… um… they are all going to be very nitpicky about it and try to find little tiny aspects, and you can basically say that it was a horrible movie because they didn’t include THIS.

C                     (laughs)  Actually that kind of leads into my next question.  Uh, do you believe that the illustrations that are present in The Sorcerer’s Stone novel play a significant role in how individuals enjoy or visualize the story?

M                     You mean the little illustrations?

C                     Yeah like at the beginning of each chapter or even the covers of the books.

M                     Um, I think it influences the style of how it is supposed to look.  Kind of like the… like uh… not campy but strange.  It’s like… (pause)

C                     Surreal?

M                     Surreal kind of like, uh, almost like a steam punk-esque kind of style when you stop and take a look at it, like the little technology things that they show.  Uh, the illustrations from my experience they are mostly just drawings of, uh, of like, uh, for example the front cover is a drawing of Harry, and uh, I don’t know it exactly.  The cover of mine was totally different from the American version.

C                     I know that the English version had, uh, Harry in front of the Hogwarts Express while the North American version was him diving for the golden snitch. So--

M                     That’s true.

C                     Do you think that the international covers or different illustrations, because different regions had different illustrators, and maybe that too has an influce.

M                     Maybe.  I think that the art for the British one and the American one were very similar though because I remember seeing both of them and they were… even The Chamber of Secrets and The Sorcerer’s Stone they were very similar in art even though I had the British version.  I had The Philosopher’s Stone.

C                     Yes, yes. (pause)  While books are limited to their text and their occasional illustrations, movies are able to convey their tones through music, lighting, camera angles, special effects, and so on.  How big of an impact would you say these aspects have to enjoy The Sorcerer’s Stone as opposed to reading it?

M                     Personally, I The Sorcerer’s Stone book more than the movie.  However, as they went on, I enjoyed the movies more than the book as as the story as the new books came out.

C                     Could you go into that a little bit more?

M                     Um, it was like in The Sorcerer’s Stone I was kinda like, uh, I was kinda like… when I read it, I had… I was reading it more of a dark sense kinda like the later movies.

C                     Yes.

M                     Where it wasn’t as (pause) kid friendly as the movie was.  Which, if they made the movie… I mean, it was still horrifying at the very end of the movie, of The Sorcerer’s Stone movie, but it was still kind of a family-friendly movie.  As they got along, the movies got less and less—It became PG-13.  It was PG when the first movie came out (pause) I think right?

C                     Uhhhh….. (checks notes) You’re right!

M                     Yes, I was pretty sure.  Eventually it became PG-13 because… because Harry grew up with us and he became more mature, and then generally the movie became more mature.

C                     Mm-hmm…. But do you feel like the special effects in the first film--

M                     Sorry.  Yeah, I think the special effects blew people away in the first film because… because it was so, uh, something that we haven’t seen before.  Something, I don’t think very many movies have really good special effects of people riding on brooms.

C                     (laughs) Yeah.

M                     And that’s something that sounds like, as a filmmaker, well because I am a film major, as a film maker I think it would be very difficult to make a, a uh, realistic aspect of flying on a broom, and the way they did it, mixed with, um, J.K. Rowling’s descriptions of how the brooms were.  They had little, um, uh, what are they called? Things for your feet.  And like little things like that she actually explained in the books.  Not in the first one, but I thought it was interesting.  Like the Nimbus 2000.  They are relating brooms to cars in the book!  So you kinda have to make this really important in the movie.  And they pulled it off!  The one thing I was interested with is that, is the, um, lack of CGI and the, uh, computer generated images in (pause) the Harry Potter.  I thought there would be, in the first one at least, there is more in the later ones, but in the first one I thought there would be a lot more CGI.  Most of those them were actual sets, like gigantic sets. They used an actual castle for Hogwarts.  A little bit of it was CGI, but I thought the entire castle would be because it would be very difficult to do that.

C                     Well there were some parts of the castle that were CGI.

M                     Stuff that would be impossible to film though.

C                     Yes like the moving staircases.

M                     Yes.

C                     But, uuum, do you feel that these special effects and these camera angles compete with the novel?

M                     I think that they… if they weren’t in the movie.  If they tried to do it without the special effects, obviously since it is a magical film, you are going to have a problem with that.  I think that the magic was a lot more powerful in the book.  It was it was, um, it was very visual and you could relate to it in the movie, but if you think about it with your own imagination it becomes so much more amazing.

C                     Basically you are saying that the imagination does not have a limit, while the technology of the time basically limited how extravagant this magic could appear.

M                     Yes, exactly.

C                     Okay.  Um, how much of a distraction or damper is it when a film deviates from its original source material.  Like in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone when there were characters left out, there were scenes left out.  How does that affect your experience watching the movie?

M                     Well for me, I read Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone a lot.  I don’t even know how many times I have read it, but, when I saw the movie (pause) well the first time I saw the movie I noticed what they left out.  And the things they left out of the first movie were not too bad.  Like, they left out the prober things that were not absolutely inherent to the story.

C                     Leaving in only the essential elements.

M                     The essentials. Obviously for films especially for ones that are based off of novels, you are gonna have a problem if you put every single thing from the novel in the film.  It’s gonna be four hours long.

C                     Unless nowadays they do what they do today, splitting up movies into multiples parts.

M                     Yes, which they did for the final Harry Potter film.

C                     Mm-hmm.  Do you support that? Do you support that idea?

M                     I think that if you make, if you have a series, and you make every single one part one and part two, people are gonna be annoyed.  They will really be upset.  But the final movie being part one and part two like how they did I think was a very good idea because of how they needed to wrap up everything, and they did that in the final movie.

C                     Mm-hmm.  Okay, okay. Uuuuum. (pause)  In your personal opinion, were there any specific aspects of the plot of the book that you felt successfully translated into the movie adaptation?  Was there any scene that you were looking at and you said to yourself “Wow!  They got this down pat! This is exactly how I envisioned it!”

M                     What’s really funny is the one scene that I imagined exactly was a little tiny scene in that movie where I was like “Huh!  That was exactly how I imagined it!” when I was reading it was a scene where Hagrid actually accidently told Harry about Nicolas Flamel.

C                     Oh yes!  I remember that scene.

M                     That scene went on in my head the same way.  Like, when Hagrid was like “I… I shouldn’t have said that.” Yeah and when he says stuff like that.  And then the other scene was, uh, the, well, they left out one of my favorite parts, but I wasn’t too upset with it.

C                     Which was it?

M                     Uh, that was the uh, with the potion room at the end of the book.  It was one of the challenges.  But it’s not important; it’s not relevant to the question.

C                     I see, I understand.  Thank you. Moving on, were there any parts of the original story that you felt would have enhanced the movie if it was left in?  Oh wait, did you already answer that one.

M                     Oh yeah, I kinda answered this question in the last question.  I liked the potion room challenge when Harry and the gang were going after the stone because they actually had to use their wit, and I think a thinking scene would have been (pause) a nice change up to all of the action-oriented challenges.

C                     Alright then, let’s just go on.  What were the most impressionable moments for you in the book that you felt, you know, left an impact on you?  And uh, what about in the movie?  Are the two moments one in the same?

M                     (pause)  I think that the biggest impression for me was actually the very beginning of the book.  Well, sort of the beginning, when he is talking to the snake.  Because when I first read the book I didn’t really know, uuum (pause).  What was I going to say?  I didn’t know he was going to be a wizard, like at all.  I knew a little bit by reading the inside of the book, but when I first read it I had no idea.  I was reading it and I was like “What?  What the?  He is talking to a snake. What?”  (laughs).  So, it was kind of,  I didn’t usually read those kind of books.  It was kinda when I was getting into Science Fiction.  It was from Harry Potter.

C                     Kinda ironic since, you know, science has as little to do with Harry Potter as possible.

M                     I know, but it’s still Science Fiction.  It’s Fantasy rather.

C                     What about in the movie?  What they any, like, scenes or anything that stuck out--

M                     Well the most shocking scene, it was like, it was more inspiring and less shocking, and I remembered it for a long time.  It was the scene when Professor Quirrell took off his, uh, took off his turban, and first turned around, and there was another face on there and I was kinda freaked out by that.  So that was a shocking scene.  I think the most inspiring part of that movie I guess was that emanated with me, um, is (pause)  I can’t really tell that one.

C                     That’s alright.  We can skip it.

M                     Yeah, that probably for the best.  I know the shocking part. (laughs)

C                     Okay, okay, okay.  Let’s move on.  There are only three more questions.  What features of the book and… wait hold on, let me start over. (pause)  What features of books and written literature do you value most?  Like this is going beyond Harry Potter.  Like when you read a book, what… what is most important to you?

M                     What’s most important to me is… two things actually.  One of which is kinda selfish, but, it’s still… (laugh)

C                     (laugh) Its okay!

M                     One of the things is the length.  If the book is too long I am not going to read it.  I am not going to have time to read it even if the book is excellent.  I might read it if people keep telling me to read it, but otherwise I am probably not going to.  But Harry Potter is the exception to that, because the last one was so long, but I was already hooked.  Yeah.  And the other is, umm, a relatable character.  A relatable main character or antagonist.  One of the two.  You need somebody that is relatable who is important to… in the uh story.  So, okay like Harry Potter was relatable to me because he was almost the same age as me.  He was like two years older than me or something.  I forgot.  He was eleven when he started, but I was like seven or eight so… four years.

C                     Okay, and what about when you watch a movie.

M                     Watching a movie is different because you physically see how the characters work.  So I have two more good aspects in a movie I am going to watch.  It is definitely character development.  That is the absolute most important element.  If the character is developed through either the whole movie or a series of movie, then I thoroughly enjoy it.  Or, well and rather, and definitely the cinematography.  I-I-I am a sucker for that.  So even if there is spectacular acting and spectacular plot and spectacular character development, if the cinematography is terrible I am not going to enjoy it that much.  It’s going to be like:  “Okay!  Its an interesting story but they should have… I could have read this in a book”.

C                     No I understand.  Completely.

M                     And the last one I am going to say is the acting.

C                     Yes.  I completely agree with you.

M                     If the acting is bad, the movie is bad. Straight up.

C                     The characters are really only as believable as the people who portray them.

M                     Yes. Exactly.

C                     Okay.  Uhhhh, alright.  In your personal opinion, if literature is supposedly considered by the general public to be the superior format, then why is it significantly less common to see movies receive literary adaptations, as opposed to the other way around?

M                     Well I think that it is not that it is less common.  It is just that more movies are based off of novels, so there is no reason to have a literary adaptation.

C                     Yes, but um, (pause).  I am trying to figure out how to reword this. (pause)  It seems to be the general belief… or at least whenever I speak to people, you know everyone always says “Well the book was better.  The book was better.”  And if that’s true, then how come we don’t see, um, I am just trying to think off of the top of my head (pause) Back to the Future: The Book or King Kong: The Book.

M                     Well they do exist.  They are just not very good though (laugh).

C                     Okay! Well, why do you feel that is?

M                     Um, well, let’s say we go the novel to film aspect.  The reason why people think that the book is always better than the novels is because they have their own imagination ideas about it.  Now, if you have your own imaginative ideas about it, then, the uh, and if the film does not back that up, then the people are going to automatically think that their imagination is superior to somebody else’s.  So the director’s imagination is what made the movie, but it was not the director’s imagination that made the book.  And it’s not that their imagination is better, that is just how we work.  Our thoughts are better than the ones that are told to us, or rather shown to us in this case… generally.

C                     So, you believe that it is better to show not tell then?

M                     I think it is better to watch the movie then read the book.  Almost always.

C                     Even though you stated before that you find books to be better than movies?

M                     I think that.  Not that they are better than movies per say.  I think that your imagination can run more wild while reading a book, which is, uh, while it takes longer, which is annoying for a lot of people to read a book, it is a more um worthwhile experience than watching a movie.

C                     Alright. Then um why would you say that it is better to watch a movie first before reading?  Because, in theory, wouldn’t it limit what you can imagine to only what the film showed you?

M                     It depends if you want your imagination what governs your idea of a good story.  If you watch the movie, and you like the story, you are going to like the movie.  And then if you read the book, it is going to be what you saw in the movie plus whatever you imagine on your own that was not included in the movie.  It’s going to be an additional kind of, ah, part of the story that you didn’t even see before.  Like for example, if I read Harry Potter after I saw the movie, um, I would go “Oh wait, look at this!  There a whole extra challenge towards the end of the book.  It’s really interesting, and now I can imagine that challenge with the characters that were already developed by like, I am sure a whole bunch of people who helped doing this character development in the movie.

C                     Let me see if I understand what you are saying.  You’re saying that because films tend to leave a lot of stuff out from the original literary text, you are saying that it is better to read… I am sorry… to watch the movie than read the book first, because the book has all of this extra content.

M                     Yeah.  It’s like getting an extended edition.  Let’s say you get a DVD or a movie?  It’s like getting the director’s cut of the movie in relation, but just in a book.

C                     Okay, okay.  So that way you can say that it avoids the disappointment that one might feel when watching a movie and saying the book was better.  That way you can enjoy both the movie and the book, you know without having to… sell yourself short.

M                     And then you could say that the book was better but the movie was great, but the book was better instead of saying that the movie did not live up to the book.  It’s kind of a positive reinforcement thing.

C                     Okay that makes, uh, a lot of sense and that is an interesting way to look at it.  Final question.  Is there anything else that you would like to say about The Sorcerer’s Stone or about your views on literature or cinema?

M                     Well my views on literature and cinema are a little strange.  A lot of fellow film-makers don’t agree with me with cinema because of the fact that I thoroughly enjoy things that are impossible, which a lot of filmmakers look down upon.

C                     Impossible how so?

M                     Like Hogwarts.  Well, impossible as in our society doesn’t exist. (laughs)

C                     Okay. (pause) So… umm…

M                     So, as a film-maker I probably wouldn’t want to make a film about something based on a true story, even though I enjoy those films.  The ones that I really really want to see currently don’t exist in this society.  That is why I love science fiction, I love fantasy, I love anything that is… the word that I like to use is “impossible”. 

C                     Okay, that makes sense.  Anything you wanna say about maybe the books or about literature?

M                     Harry Potter?  Um, I enjoy Harry Potter as he got older and when he was a kid he was kinda annoying, especially in the movie, which was why I enjoyed the book a little better.  But eventually it was why I grew to like the movies better as the went along.  In the amount of time  it took me to read the book, I could have watched the movie… twenty times over.  (laughs).

C                     Well one could make the argument that that makes books a little more of an investment in time.  Just in terms of enjoyment.

M                     Yes, definitely.  So say you have to have a balance between time, and the type of media you are trying to take in and digest.

C                     Alright, well, if that’s all you have to say--

M                     That’s it.

C                     Well then Anthony, I want to thank you for your time.  This has been very informative. And you have been such a great help.  If you have any questions or if you just have any additional thoughts, but sure to let me know.  You know how to contact me.

M                     Yep.

C         Alright then.  In that case, we are finished.  Have a good night.

Case Study Interview Transcript #2

C                     Hi, I am Christopher Caruso and I am here with…

A                     Allyson Matthaey

C                     And today I am going to be talking with Allyson about her experiences with Harry Potter both in its literary and cinematic format.  The focus of this interview is to find a solid answer to whether or not the stereotype is true that the written format of storytelling is superior to the visual and audio cinematic format of storytelling, and if the way that we read and process the information in books vs. the way we read and process information presented to us in movies has any contributing factor to this notion.  This will be achieved by analyzing the story of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone in both its original novel format and its movie format.  Do you understand?

A                     Yes.

C                     Alright then, let’s begin! (laughs)  Could you give a little background information about the first time that you ever came into contact with the Harry Potter series in any format?  How did you first learn about the existence of Harry Potter?

A                     Uh… I first learned about Harry Potter through my sister who got the book from my aunt as a present.  After she finished reading it, I got the hand-me-down, and I got to read it and fell in love with it.

C                     So you would say that you were a fan of the series right off the bat?  It didn’t take you time to get hooked to the series at all?

A                     It… Just the time it took reading that book was enough to get me hooked to the series.

C                     Okay, that’s cool.  Now, when it comes to reading literature, what would you say is your “reading style”?  Now to clarify, uh, are you more of a visual reader, creating heavily vivid and immersive images in your mind based on the author’s descriptions, or do details and descriptions not matter as much to you, and you instead create your own images in your head of what certain settings and certain characters look like?

A                     I-I would definitely say, uh, I am a very visual reader, and I go a lot on based on what the author writes and portrays.  And then I interpret it in my own creative mind.

C                     Uh, okay!  Do you believe that the illustrations that are in The Sorcerer’s Stone play a significant role in how enjoy or visualize the settings or the characters?  You know, like the cover of the book or like the little illustrations at the beginning of each chapter.

A                     (pause)  I, uh, I do not think that it takes away from the chapters or the uh, uh, (pauses) premises.  I think it could definitely ad to it, especially if someone who doesn’t have such a creative mind and they need that slight push.  It gives a little bit of that extra “oomph”.  It… It helps if you don’t have that initial spark, and it lures you into reading it further.

C                     Alright, that’s an interesting way to look at it.  Do you think that viewing the movie first would affect how a person visualizes the book instead of reading the original novel first?

A                     (pause)  I definitely feel that yes if you watch the movie first it will impact the way that you read the book.

C                     Yes, well the reason that I say this is because I personally did not read the first Harry Potter book until after I saw the first three Harry Potter movies, so… when I read the book, I felt like I could only see… you know, Daniel Radcliff’s face.  I could only see the movie’s representation of Hogwarts.  So, that’s just my personal take on it.  That’s why I was asking you.  Uh, while a book is limited to its text, movies are able to convey their tone through uh music, camera angles, lighting, facial expressions, special effects… how big of an impact would you say those have to enjoying The Sorcerer’s Stone?

A                     Uh, I feel that it has a major impact with experiencing and watching the movie The Sorcerer’s Stone.  And it adds a whole other dimension besides just watching it.

C                     Okay so to put like a little extra spin on that, would you say that if someone were to watch the Sorcerer’s Stone movie first and then read the book, would you say people would feel underwhelmed by reading the book because it doesn’t have those interactive visual and audio aspects?

A                     I-I would not say “underwhelmed”.  I would actually say that after watching the movie adaptation and then reading it, that it would add more to the book because you have that extra audio or you have the visual already there were it can just enhance the reading experience of the novel.

C                     So let me see if I am getting what you are saying.  You are saying that actually watching the movie first would probably be better because it gives, uhhhhh….. I guess it kind of gives the reader a little bit extra to visualize?

A                     (long pause)  If someone (pause)  I don’t want to say it’s a better option because if someone who is more into, or like, someone who isn’t into reading, and they watch the movie first, and that entices them to read the book, I am more for it.  But if someone likes to have their own interpretation of the characters or of how things are described, I would suggest you read the book first, and then watch the movie if willing.

C                     Alright, um, and is there a reason that you believe it is better to, uh, read the book first and then watch the movie?  Or its just your own personal, you know, flavor?

A                     (laughs)  Besides the personal preference, I feel that if you go into reading a novel without any influence of a movie, then you have the ability to imagine whatever is being depicted via text.  If say a scene in Harry Potter, if when, when you get to Hogwarts and you just imagine what’s going on, the imagination is endless.  You could imagine anything in the world, and it could be in The Great Hall, but once you watch the movie first, that is all that you think of.  You are influenced and your… you sort of have a narrower mind with what you can experience after watching the movie.  You already have the seed planted and not so much have an open field with no, like, with no raw material.

C                     Okay, so let me see if uh I am understanding what you are saying.  You are saying uh basically that it would be better to read the book first because then it allows your imagination to view, say, The Great Hall as vividly and as, you know, imaginatively and as stupendously as you want, while if you watch the movie first it pretty much limits, you know, how you see it.  (Alyyson nods)  Okay!  That actually makes a lot of sense!  That is an interesting take on it.  Uhhh, how much of a distraction or damper is it to you when a film deviates from the original source material?  Like if it adds characters or omits certain characters or whole scenes entirely.

A                     (pause)  Uh, I think that it is, uh, a pretty big distraction in my eyes.  It… personally if the director or producer or whatever skips a certain part or character out of the… the film when it is a major part of the book, then that could change the possible, uh, outlook of the scene.  Um, I personally hate it, and I have a bigger (long pause) understanding of the book compared to the movie.  With the last book, and with the final fight…

C                     The final fight between Harry Potter and Voldemort.

A                     Yes.  So much was changed and altered.

C                     Yes I will admit that the film version made it just a little more dramatic, taking the whole all over Hogwarts while in the original novel it was kept just in The Great Hall.  You thought that was distracting?

A                     Mm-hmm.  And also the way that Voldemort died.  That’s a huge scene!  Especially if you are a diehard fan.  It urks me.  Greatly.

C                     Okay, I can understand how that would annoy certain Harry Potter purists or fangirls or fanboys.  Next question, uh, in your personal opinion, uh, were there any specific aspects in the plot of the book, of the first book, that you felt successfully translated into the movie adaptation.  Like were you watching this and saying “This is exactly how I feel that this should look!  This works so well!”

A                     Uh… off of the top of my head I would say… the sorting and The Great Hall at the beginning of the movie.  They did a wonderful job just from showing like the floating candles, the feast, and then showing how each of the kids get sorted and the speech that Dumbledore gives.  It was just done wonderfully.  I see no issues, like, at all.

C                     Okay.  Where there any parts of the original story that were left out or altered in the original movie adaptation that you felt would have enhanced the experience of the movie if it was left as it was?  And this is strictly for the first book.

A                     (long pause)

C                     Take your time.

A                     (laughs)  (Pause)  Uuumm, off of the top of my head I do not recal anything that I wish that they would have put in the film that they omitted.  Like there are probably little things that of course any fan of the Harry Potter book series would nit-pick and say “Oh, they should have put that in.”  But, I feel like they got all of the major points.  Definitely for the first film.

C                     Yes. Uuum… What were some of the most impressionable moments for you in the first book that you felt left, uh, a major impact on you.  And uh, what about in the film as well?  Are the two moments the same or are they completely different?

A                     Mmmmm…..  (long pause)

C                     Take all of the time that you need.

A                     (laughs) (long pause) I… I would have to say the scenes with Dumbledore.

C                     How so?  In which one? The book or the movie?

A                     They both were well-done in the films, so I would have to say both. (laughs)

C                     Okay.  And how did they leave, huh, leave such an impact on you?  In their respective formats.

A                     Well, I will go with the the film first.  Besides just the plot, which was already supplied via book, the actor, the actor for Dumbledore.

C                     The original one?

A                     Yes, the original actor for Albus Dumbledore was… the epitome of what I saw him as.  So, bringing the character to life alone made every scene that he was in, from looking at him in The Great Hall, with a twinkle in his eye.  Just, everything that was translated made a lasting impression between the way the actor was and the way that the script was written for the actor translated from the book, and any scenes involving him to the movie.  It was believable to the point that it fit perfectly.

C                     Okay.  And what about in the book?  Just the way that you pictured him in your head?

A                     Definitely.I… I had… ummm  (pause)  The way that the character Dumbledore was portrayed in… in the novel, it was like a grandfather.  Something that Harry had never had, and the way that J.K. Rowling brought that notion to life in our heads…. Words just don’t describe it.

C                     Alright!  Next question (laughs).  What features of books and written literature do you value most?  Now this goes beyond Harry Potter.  This is just literature in general.  Uh, what features of books and written literature do you value most above anything else?  What is most important to you when you read?

A                     Besides the character development and a good plot, I would have to say a detailed description overall.  No matter what is being written about.  If it has a good description, I will like it.  That’s one of my stipulations.  If it’s very dry or, um, dry or very like straight to the point kind of book, then I won’t want to read it.  If there is description and depth to the scene or the character, then I will definitely be interested and want to read more.

C                     Alright. (ahem)  On the flip side, what about movie?  What are some of the most important features or aspects when watching a movie?  What is most important to you when you watch a film?

A                     (long pause)  That, with film, I would have to say that a good plot is the biggest thing.  Because if it has nowhere to go, if it is just running around in circles or has a lot of fallacies, then that will shut me off, and I won’t wanna watch it.

C                     So you are saying that special effects and maybe the actor’s abilities aren’t as important as long as the movie is able to convey a decent and immersive story.

A                     Well the actors and the actresses, and sometimes if it is involved the special effects too, those definitely play a part in a film.  I wouldn’t say that they don’t hold a part in it.  I would say that, as a whole, it would make it, uh, cohesive.  But, before even the actors and actresses get there and start performing, you need a good plot.  You need a good screenplay.  And then the actors and actresses take what is provided and translates it from text to action.  And once that’s done, then you bring in the special effects if needed.

C                     Okay.

A                     It is a process.

C                     It is almost like a pyramid you could say.  It all needs to work together to work, but there are certain aspects that are more important than others and are just... okay that makes sense.  (laughs)  Um, just in your personal opinion, uh, it seems to be the general stereotype that whenever people watch a film they always say “Ahh, the book was better”.  Are you aware of this stereotype?  Or are you guilty of saying this as well?

A                     I am both aware and guilty.  Only I say (laughs) I say “you don’t know until you read the book first”.  Then you can compare it.

C                     Okay.  Alright, alright.  Well, if this is the case, then in your personal opinion, uh, if that is true, then why is it that it is significantly less common to see movies receive literary adaptations as opposed to the other way around?  Like, why don’t we see… say…. Back to the Future: The Novel or uh… you know… uh… I am trying to think of another example, or like Ghostbusters: The Novel.  You know what I’m saying?  Like how come we don’t see, uh, literary adaptations if literature is truly “better”?

A                     Umm…. (long pause)  I don’t (pause)  I actually don’t think I have an answer for that.  I-I could take a guess and say that if the film were to come out first, and it was so highly, uh, received by the audience that they turned it into a book, it would be more of a fan-need.  It would be more for uh, for the specific fanbase or the-the need for more money.  Like it’s very rare I-I feel that… it’s rare for that to happen because the-the movies if they are turned into a book, like, it loses something, I would say.

C                     What would you say that it loses?  Because this actually has happened in the past.  Like, there actually was there was actually a novelization of the movie Back to the Future for example, and you know obviously there are numerous books on Star Wars, and what would you feel they would be lacking if movies continued to be translated into novel form?

A                     Ummm  (pause)  The fact ahh… going back to my original thing of when you watch a movie and you… you have that world in your head, and then if you translate that into a book form, and the writers don’t continue that, that is where you start with the fallacies and you lose something.  Because if it is not continued in the way that the fans in the audience want, then that’s where they lose the… the fanbase that you could possibly get more fans with.  Because you are starting with cycle of “well if you read that first they will get you into the movie if you haven’t seen it already”.

C                     Well I guess you could compare literature and cinema to apples and oranges.  Like say if you have the Star Wars the movie, and then have the novel, people will probably say “oh well the movies are better” and if you have say Harry Potter or The Lord of the Rings, you will probably say, you know, that the original version was better.  I tend to notice that people always seem to stand by the original format in which the original story is conveyed as the superior.  Do do do you think there is a reason for that phenomenon?

A                     I-I could take a gander and guess that if that if most people stick by what comes first, so like with Harry Potter the books came first, and then years later they said “Let’s make this into a movie”,.  And the same thing goes with Star Wars, even Twilight.  It starts off with one media way and then, um, the fanbase is already there.  The structure starts off right there, and people get set in their ways where they originally go with what first comes out.  But that’s what I think causes the people to say “this one is better than that one” because whichever came out first is simply what they knew first.

C                     Okay that makes sense.  And now we are down to our final question! Yay! (laughs)  Just to wrap up, is there anything more you would like to say about Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone or about your views on literature on your views on cinema?  Is there anything that you just want to get out there?  You are just dying to say it!

A                     (laughs)  I-I always encourage people to read the book first because it is a whole another world besides the movie and there is so much more that you can get from it.  So if anything, I would say to anyone read the book no matter what.  Even if you watch the movie first, if you get interested, read the book.  Don’t just go based off of just the movie because the movie always leaves something out.  Almost always.  Just read the book.

C                     Alright then is that all that you have to say?

A                     Yep.

C                     Well then Allyson I want to thank you so much for participating in this interview.  If you have any questions, comments, or concerns you know how to contact me.  You know how to contact the professor.  But with that, this interview is over.  Thank you and goodnight.