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.
华纳兄弟公司（Warner Bros.）今天宣布，新的《哈利波特》（Harry Potter）电影正在筹备中。这家电影公司与《哈利波特》作者J.K.罗琳（J.K. Rowling）携手合作，根据哈利波特魔法世界的虚构课本《神奇动物在哪里》（Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them），打造全新的系列电影。电影情节也将围绕这本书的作者纽特•斯凯曼德（Newt Scamander）的冒险经历展开。J.K.罗琳将首次撰写电影剧本。
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.
华纳兄弟公司打算将《哈利波特》系列电影继续拍摄下去，这个决定并不出人意料。光是原先的《哈利波特》电影本身就获得了77亿美元的票房收入，录像带和电视方面的销售额几乎在此基础上翻了一番。此外还有大量的哈利波特特许商品，仍然是影迷争相抢购的对象。
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.
但有些时候，哈利波特电影还是显得有些过时了，这可不是华纳兄弟公司希望看到的情形。因此，公司高管有三个选择：重新启动该系列、拍摄续集或者将哈利波特魔法世界中的部分内容剥离出来，拍摄派生电影。
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.
没有了原著的支撑，华纳兄弟公司要推销这些新电影恐怕不会像以前那么简单。该片背景将设置在纽约，故事发生的年代比哈利波特进入霍格沃茨学校早了70年前，因此哈利和朋友们根本不会出现在新电影中。
The new stories will also net video games, merchandise and enhance Rowling’s website, Pottermore.
这个新故事还将网罗电脑游戏、特许商品，并助推罗琳的网站Pottermore。
Here’s Rowling on the upcoming franchise:
以下是罗琳对即将拍摄的系列电影的看法：
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.
是这样的，当初华纳公司来找我，建议把《神奇动物在哪里》改编成电影。我觉得这个想法很有趣，但是想到要请一位作家去充当《神奇动物》的设定作者纽特•斯凯曼德（Newt Scamander）来执笔这个故事，这对我来说有些难以接受。由于在这个虚构的世界中生活了很久，我对这个故事有很强烈的保护欲，而我知道很多关于纽特的事情。哈利波特的铁杆粉丝应该知道，我非常喜欢这个人物，甚至让他的孙子罗尔夫（Rolf）——这也是我在哈利•波特系列中喜欢的角色之一——娶了卢娜•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.
我考虑着华纳兄弟的建议，脑海中就形成了一个令我无法摆脱的想法。就这样，我最终向华纳兄弟公司推荐起了我自己对这样一部电影的构想。
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.
这部电影的背景将设置在巫师和女巫的魔法世界，我在这个世界里快乐地度过了十七年的时间。《神奇动物在哪里》既不是《哈利波特》系列的前传，也不是续集，而是这个魔法世界的延伸。那些读过哈利波特原著或者看过电影的人，都会熟悉这个隐藏的魔法社会的法律和习俗，但是纽特的故事将在纽约拉开序幕，这是哈利踏上魔法旅程的七十年前。
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