Salon interviews the screenwriter for the upcoming Harry Potter movie and I breathe a sigh of relief.  It looks like the rumors of the film being “Americanized” might not be true.

“The first thing I said to Warner Bros. was that I love the characters — and that is the whole movie. Obviously you need a plot, but the charm of the movie should be these kids, and you have to be as faithful as possible. The picture has to be British, and it has to be true to the kids. I’m speaking from my own experience, but I find that children 7 and under respond less to special effects than to characters and to what’s happening to characters. And Warner Bros. seems to be wholeheartedly embracing this approach — that if you don’t care about the kids in ‘Harry Potter,’ you’re not going to care about the movie, no matter how remarkable the dragon or the flying broomsticks.”

(via Ghost in the Machine).