James Casting and New Scene (WAS HUGE problem with the casting)

[Cindy C.]

Saitana wrote:

> My problem with James is..he's too old.  James was in his late 
twenties
> early thirties when he died...

I had an idea.  Is there anything in canon that says that a person in 
the Mirror of Erised doesn't age with real time?  So maybe Lily and 
James died when they were in their 20s, so they are in their late 30s 
when Harry is standing before the mirror.  

Also, maybe the reason we don't see Ron's reflection in the mirror is 
an aging problem.  He would have to be 17 to be head boy/Quiddich 
captain, etc., and they couldn't do that credibly for the film.

Anyway, the theory about people in the mirror aging doesn't work for 
why James is so old in the photo album pictures, though.  People in 
pictures definitely don't age with real time, because Harry is still 
a baby in the family photo at the end of the film.  Unless only dead 
people continue to age but live people do not, which doesn't make a 
whole lot of sense.

I think the "new scene" could be the Voldemort confrontation.  I only 
saw the film once, but I thought the dialogue was quite different and 
much improved.  In the book, Voldemort chats Harry up a bit and then 
says basically "So how about you give me the stone?"  In the movie, 
he provides Harry with a plausible reason to surrender the stone:  
having his parents back.  I think I recall that the scene Jo wrote 
contained dialogue.  Maybe Jo wrote this new ending, and that is 
the "new scene".

Cindy (looking for a way to bail out poor Chris Columbus)