Undeathly Hallows ? (was Re: The Boy in the Striped Pajamas/Pyjamas)

[Carol]

Carol earlier:
> > <snip>
> >I forgot to mention that David Heyman, the producer for the HP
films, is also the producer for "Striped Pyjamas." Here's more,
attached to an update on the scripts for DH (they considered omitting
the Deathly Hallows from "Deathly Hallows" before deciding that it
*had* to be two films!!):
> > <snip>
> 
Alison responded: 
> When I read this article, I wondered what they were going to call
the movie if they had intended dropping the Deathly Hallows from the 
> plot ???

Carol:
My reaction exactly.

Alison: 
> However, David Heyman then goes on to say that in splitting the
films in two they are going to do so by focussing on separate themes
for each movie. I guess the two obvious themes are Horcruxes versus
Hallows, although given how the Horcrux hunt went on for so long with
little immediate result (otherwise referred to by many as the great
camping trip) and 3 horcruxes were destroyed very near the end of the
book, I'm not sure how this could be done. <snip>

> Any thoughts on what other themes might be used to split the movies
into two ? <snip>

Carol responds:
Before I can answer that question, I need to know how Heyman defines
"theme." As a former English teacher with a PhD in literature and
consequently a lit/crit perspective that may not match Heyman's
perspective as a film producer, I would say that Hallows and Horcruxes
are not themes but motifs (recurring elements in a work of art that
may or may not have thematic significance). Motifs like wands,
broomsticks, spells, Dark creatures, the DADA jinx, potions, Quidditch
games, and a host of other objects, incidents, phrases, and devices
recur throughout the series, but none of them really qualifies as a
theme. (It would be interesting to explore the thematic significance
of some of those motifs on the main list, preferably without bringing
in Freudian implications, but obviously that discussion is out of
place here.)

A theme, OTOH, is a concept, often a controlling idea around which the
writer structures the work or an insight that he or she is consciously
trying to convey. (In a film, unlike a literary work, getting the
theme across is a collaborative effort.) Some critics (and, for all I
know, movie producers) consider certain conflicts or universal
experiences to be themes. (Anyone remember man vs. man, man vs. woman,
man vs. nature, man vs. himself and the rest of that list that your
high school English teacher called "themes"?) I've also heard
"jealousy" or "revenge" or "love and death" referred to as themes.
That use of the term may be closer to Heyman's definition of theme
than mine, which is an idea that can be stated as a complete sentence,
for example, "Life is meaningless" or "Love conquers all." (Bad
examples, but you get the idea.)

If I were looking for a theme in the first half of DH, it would
probably be related to Harry's attempt to perform a seemingly
impossible task assigned him by a dead mentor in whom he's rapidly
losing faith. How I'd express that in one sentence, I don't know. The
second half is easier since it's the resolution of the entire series
and (to me) is clearly something like, "Despite loss and suffering,
good will triumph in the end." IIRC, Heyman mentions that the break
between the two films doesn't come where he would have expected it to,
probably in terms of page count or a dramatic incident like the doe
Patronus. If he's seeing the same themes that I do, the natural break
would be somewhere around "The Wandmaker" or "Shell Cottage," with
about 450 pages crowded into the first half and only about 200 given
full development in the second half. The first film would end soon
after Dobby's burial and the second would begin with the planned break
in to Gringotts and would be nearly non-stop action, broken by Snape's
memories and a bit of tense waiting for LV but not much else.

Obviously, though, I'm not David Heyman (or Steve Kloves or David
Yates), and they may see the whole concept of theme differently, or at
least see the dominant messages or insights of the two halves of the
last book differently, than I do. 

Carol, wishing she had time to read a lot of Heyman interviews to get
a sense of how he uses the term "theme"