Got your robes in a bunch because you have to wait a few more months for the next Harry Potter film? Maybe the international trailer will tide you over.

The Wall Street Journal reports that Warner Bros. decision to postpone the release of the next installment of the Harry Potter movie series has earned it a mountain of anger, including death threats. From the story:

Jean Fink, a 51-year-old Los Angeles artist who also works as an administrative assistant, was so distraught after a night of fitful sleep that she dashed off a scathing message to the man who’d betrayed her. “I can’t breath amymore [sic] because you just ripped out my heart,” she wrote in an Aug. 15 email….

An online petition expressing fans’ disgust with the decision garnered more than 45,000 signatures. The studio says it even received death threats. “I hope you choke on your own saliva,” snarled one fan in an email.

I totally felt the same way when Bio-Dome got bumped!

Warners just handed Summit their first Event Picture.

Coming to the CW, er, I mean, theaters this fall.

Rather than face down the “will probably do better than any of us are willing to admit” Day the Earth Stood Still remake on December 12, the company’s Twilight will now do battle with the “will probably do worse than Disney expects…well, a lot worse now” talking dog romp Bolt in the vacated Harry Potter slot.

The pre-Thanksgiving weekend release, the Rain Man suite of fall dates, takes this from a less than $100 million grossing curiosity to a $100 million plus contender.

But the real win here is all the news and blog posts (this included) now that will fan the Harry Potter comparisons that the series has already been courting. Even if, in reality, there’s no comparison at all.

The final book in the Twilight series sold 1.3 million copies in the first 24 hours. The final book in the Harry Potter series sold 8.3 million copies in its first 24.

But anybody who hasn’t heard of the series will now hear it in the same breath as Harry Potter and feel, maybe, like they need to give it the same attention.

And that is how you market a movie.

Hollywood Reporter points out what was likely a key factor in the decision to postpone Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince for half a year.

For a publicly traded company like Warners parent Time Warner, earnings growth is vital. So moving Potter to next summer improves prospects of a decent revenue comparison with Batman-swelled ‘08.

This isn’t just about box office. If Warners releases Potter this fiscal year, it has to market it this fiscal year, which is a whole lotta dinero out of this year’s budget.

Analysts including Pali Capital’s Rich Greenfield noted that the film’s original November slotting would have weighted the fourth quarter with heavy marketing costs, while “Dark Knight” already ensures a healthy revenue haul for the studio in 2008.

So, if The Dark Knight hadn’t have been so darn successful, they might have had to release Harry Potter this year to make up the difference so, in a way, this is all Batman’s fault.

Anxiously awaiting the next Harry Potter film? Be patient.

Warner Bros. announced yesterday that Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, scheduled for a November release, will now open July 17, 2009.

Alan Horn, President and Chief Operating Officer, had this to say:

Our reasons for shifting ‘Half-Blood Prince’ to summer are twofold: we know the summer season is an ideal window for a family tent pole release, as proven by the success of our last Harry Potter film, which is the second-highest grossing film in the franchise, behind only the first installment.  Additionally, like every other studio, we are still feeling the repercussions of the writers’ strike, which impacted the readiness of scripts for other films—changing the competitive landscape for 2009 and offering new windows of opportunity that we wanted to take advantage of.  We agreed the best strategy was to move ‘Half-Blood Prince’ to July, where it perfectly fills the gap for a major tent pole release for mid-summer.

So, because Warner backed off of a Justice League film (for now), Harry fans have to wait.

She's looking for the frog ...

A number of teaser trailers have hit the net today. Enjoy!

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Disney’s The Princess and the Frog

Saw V

Punisher: War Zone

Emo ... the new black

USA Today pulled images from the Harry Potter teaser trailer that’s expected to be online today and attached to The Mummy this Friday. Above is the aptly named Hero Fiennes-Tiffin as young Tom Riddle. And yes, he is related to Lord Voldemort himself, Ralph Fiennes. Ah, sweet nepotism!

Below, find Michael Gambon’s Dumbledore locked in a heated battle.

After The Prisoner of Azkaban, I commented to a friend that if Warner Bros. were able to film all seven Harry Potter novels using the same cast but rotating directors, it would rank — in my opinion — as the most impressive achievement in cinematic adaptation.

Well, it’s happening. Still photos from the pending Half-Blood Prince are surfacing (the movie opens in the U.S. on Nov. 21). And while the carousel of creative storytellers seems to have stopped on David Yates, who helmed Order of the Phoenix and is directing Prince and both Deathly Hallows, I’m still blown away that in this age of escalating salaries, production costs, author interferences, artistic divides and audience apathy, this franchise has positively flourished. Because it hasn’t been the voice of one filmmaker and rather several interpretations of author J.K. Rowling’s world, I’d put the Potter series ahead of Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings behemoth (and truthfully, it ain’t even close).