Director David Yates Talks Harry and Voldemort’s Final Battle in New Clip

To celebrate its 21st anniversary, Rotten Tomatoes is releasing 21 of movies’ most memorable moments. The site has already looked at moments from The Sixth Sense, The Avengers, Elf, and more, plus other collections of 21 moments.

Today, which is 21 years to the day after the epic Battle of Hogwarts, Rotten Tomatoes has gifted us with this new video of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows director David Yates talking about the incredible fight between Harry and Voldemort in the film’s second part.

In the video, Yates discussed the decision to break the final book into two movies, a decision that has had mixed reactions in the fandom.

I felt you could create two interesting films, with ‘Hallows’ part one an independent, much more intimate movie when Harry, Ron, and Hermione are [in] the real world for the very first time having to learn some really hard life lessons, and the second part was more of the blockbuster, entertaining conclusion to the whole series, which felt much more appropriate.

Yates also talked about the showdown between Harry and Voldemort.

The sequence is about a boy facing down this nemesis, this demon that has haunted him throughout his childhood. This is the figure that had killed his parents. I was keen to explore this unique relationship between Voldemort and Harry.

He discussed his decision to have the pair Apparate around Hogwarts before landing in the courtyard for the final battle, a different location for the showdown than in the books. Yates said the courtyard gave it the feel of a “Western.” He also discussed what it was like to end this series that fans had been with for years.

That was probably the biggest challenge – knowing that expectations were sky-high and that people wanted to have a properly satisfying emotional resolution to this series of stories – and I think we did it.

Do you agree with Yates? What do you think about this new, behind-the-scenes information? Let us know in the comments!