November 21 is slowly inching closer, and Potter Mania is starting to heat up. Just in time for the Fourth of July, we've got a whole slew of new Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince pics to enjoy. There are seven tasty shots over at USA Today, including the one above, plus another two over at Moviefone.

You're not going to see many drug and sex paralells in these pics, but there is the obligatory trio discussing some important fact (in this case, the potions book), the wonderful Dumbledore, Draco looking much tougher and ticked off, and well, hit the jump to see my favorite one of all.

I didn't get beyond the fifth Harry Potter novel, so I'm not familiar with what goes on in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. I never would have thought, however, that it features an adorable version of Voldemort (which reminded our own Kim Voynar of the young Anakin of The Phantom Menace), nor would I have ever imagined, in my wildest years, that it is anything like Trainspotting. Yet that's what Daniel "Harry Potter" Radcliffe told Empire regarding the upcoming movie adaptation. He specifically likened Half-Blood Prince to the heroin-heavy movie, admitting that it is indeed strange to mention those two films in the same sentence. He also stated that in his movie, "there's a fair amount of sexual energy and drug parallels."

Now, of course, that doesn't mean there's actual sex and drugs featured in the movie. And this wouldn't be the first time the Harry Potter films included suggestive imagery or content. One of the early installments (I think it was the original, Sorcerer's Stone) features a scene in which Harry experiments with his wand under the covers late at night. Like with a similar scene from Spider-Man, in which Peter Parker wakes up in his own sticky web, it's pretty obvious what real-world experience the scene is meant to parallel. So, I'm not surprised that as the Harry Potter movies get darker and the cast grows up that we'll be seeing other kinds of innuendo. And knowing the franchise so far, even if the suggestive imagery or content is easily deciphered, there's sure to be good messages tied in. It's not like Warner Bros. would permit improper subliminal encouragements.

This morning I got an email from Snitchseeker.com, a Harry Potter fansite, pointing me to some pics they have up of young Hero Fiennes-Tiffin (nephew of Ralph Fiennes, who plays the evil Voldemort in the Harry Potter franchise). Fiennes-Tiffin is playing Young Tom Riddle (aka the Future Dark Lord, Voldemort) in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. Nice call on the part of the casting director to have a relative of Fiennes play the younger character.

You can see all the pics over on Snitchseeker; they're apparently from another film the young actor is in, Bigga than Ben. Fiennes-Tiffin looks oh-so-sweet-and-innocent -- he hardly looks like the sort who'd grow up to wreak havoc on the wizarding world, tossing around Imperius curses at his enemies and plotting to rid the world of good guys like Albus Dumbledore and Harry Potter. But then again, it's always the innocent looking ones who sneak up on you and turn out to be evil dark lords trying to take over the world, isn't it?

Few adaptations have been pored over and scrutinized for adherence to cannon as intensely as the Harry Potter films. Every omission and deviation gets pounced upon immediately. Speculation ran rampant that each of the later, longer volumes would be split into two films to accommodate J.K. Rowling's sprawling storylines, until it was finally announced that the last book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows, actually will be. In a few weeks, I'll take a look at the prospects for David Yates' Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, due this November. This week, I want to look back at the sole Potter installment to date where the film not only did right by the book, but expanded it, improved it, brought it to life. And that would be Alfonso Cuarón's Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.

I'm usually lavish in my praise for the film; I'm fond of saying that I like it better than Cuaron's purportedly more "serious" works like Children of Men and Y Tu Mamá También. What I don't often get a chance to mention is that I'm much less enamored of the novel on which it's based. Don't get me wrong -- Rowling's Azkaban is still Harry Potter, and as such it's fast, and funny, and filled with all sorts of wonderful, world-building detail. But when I read it, shortly after tearing through The Sorcerer's Stone and The Chamber of Secrets, I couldn't help but be a bit disappointed. It seemed a little contrived, I thought, and overdramatic; a little cheesy. The climax involved a lot of ALL-CAPS YELLING to signify big emotion, the whole thing feeling like it was about to turn into a wizard soap opera. And I remember rolling my eyes at the time-travel, which felt like a cheat despite being gracelessly telegraphed a dozen times.

When I was a kid, I watched all the awards shows ... except the Tonys. Even when I was involved in theater as a teenager I wasn't a follower of Broadway. And I lived an hour away from Manhattan. But today's youths may be more interested in tuning in to the 2008 Tony Awards, because everyone's favorite boy wizard is among the presenters. Daniel Radcliffe will likely be there solely to promote his Broadway debut this fall, in Equus, but that shouldn't deter fans of the Harry Potter films, the latest of which, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, also opens in the fall. Despite the significance of Radcliffe's role in Equus (remember those sexy photos?), Radcliffe will presumably be dressed fully and sharply.

Other presenters include Laura Linney, Alec Baldwin, Marisa Tomei and Radcliffe's costar in both the Equus and the Harry Potter films, Richard Griffiths. This year's Tonys are also of interest to movie fans for its nominees, which include movies-turned-musicals Cry-Baby (4 nominations), Xanadu (4 nominations), The Little Mermaid (2 nominations) and Young Frankenstein (3 nominations), as well as the comic adaption of The 39 Steps (6 nominations), based on the John Buchan book that Alfred Hitchcock and others turned into hit films (with a fourth version reportedly in the works).

The Tony Awards will be held at Radio City Music Hall, and broadcast live on CBS, June 15.

New Image removed at request of studio; we've replaced it with another image from the film

Above is a new photo from this fall's Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince; there's another one after the jump. There's rarely anything substantive to say about photos from upcoming movies, but with Harry Potter, the look of each film has been pretty distinctive, and often instrumental to the series' success. No one's yet topped Alfonso Cuarón and Michael Seresin's work on Prisoner of Azkaban, but I have high hopes for Half-Blood Prince, which was one of my favorite Harry Potter novels. Part of the reason I like it so much is that J.K. Rowling had the guts to plunge its characters into absolute, nearly hopeless despair, particularly toward the end. The movie could be powerful if it finds the courage to embrace that darkness.

David Yates, who turned in an impressively serious, almost businesslike Potter installment with Order of the Phoenix, returns for Half-Blood Prince. The grainy gloom of the photo above suggests to me that he might have the right idea. Unless I miss my guess as to what part of the film it's taken from, it depicts one of the most pivotal moments in the entire series. The movie needs to get it right.

You can click through for the second photo, or click here for an image released back in March.

• Joseph Pevney (1911-2008) - Director, Actor - Directed James Cagney as Lon Chaney in Man of a Thousand Faces, Boris Karloff in The Strange Door, Debbie Reynolds in Tammy and the Bachelor, Frank Sinatra in Meet Danny Wilson, Joan Crawford in Female on the Beach, Martin and Lewis in 3 Ring Circus, which he also co-wrote, and Rock Hudson in Back to God's Country, Shakedown, Air Cadet, 1951's Iron Man and Twilight for the Gods. Beginning in the '60s, he mostly directed for television, including a number of episodes of Star Trek. Prior to directing, he acted in films noir of the '40s, including Robert Rossen's Body and Soul and Jules Dassin's Thieves' Highway. He died May 24 in Palm Desert, California. (The Desert Sun)

• Sydney Pollack (1934-2008) - Oscar-winning Director, Producer, Actor - Won two Academy Awards for directing and producing Out of Africa and was nominated for directing and producing Tootsie and for directing They Shoot Horses, Don't They and for producing Michael Clayton. For more on his career and death, read Eric's full post.
• Del Ankers (1916-2008) - Cinematographer, Photographer - Shot the early Jim Henson shorts Wilson's Meats Meeting Film #1 and Wilson's Meats Meeting Film #2 and appears as himself in the former. He also shot Henson's actual Wilson's Meats commercials. He died May 15 in Great Falls, Virginia. (Washington Post)

Some sad news from London over the weekend: Rob Knox, an 18-year-old actor who has a small role in this fall's Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, was stabbed to death during a brawl outside a bar late Friday night. According to London's Telegraph, Knox was defending his younger brother from the attacker, who had two knives and stabbed three other people besides Knox.

The attacker, a 21-year-old man, has been arrested on suspicion of murder. His other three victims, all young men around the same age, had injuries that were not life-threatening, according to BBC News.

Knox (pictured here with his mother) plays Marcus Belby in Half-Blood Prince, which finished principal photography a week ago. Marcus is a minor character in the book, a seventh-year Ravenclaw student who tries unsuccessfully to join the "Slug Club," the potions professor's group of favorite students. The Times says Knox, who will make his big-screen debut in Half-Blood Prince, had signed to potentially play the role in the seventh film, too.

Harry Potter distributor Warner Bros. issued a statement of sympathy for Knox's family. Various British news sources have noted that Knox was the 14th teenager murdered in London so far this year, and that 11 of those deaths were stabbings.

It's been a busy week for Emma Watson. Not only did she turn 18 (a landmark which caused no small amount of cheering among the guys I know -- you pervs!), and not only did she inherit her Harry Potter fortune, but now she's landed her first real non-Potter role. According to The Hollywood Reporter, she is going to star in Napoleon and Betsy, a historical romance written and directed by Benjamin Ross. It is set to begin shooting in the fall to work around the scheduled 2009 start of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

Watson will play Betsy, a young and headstrong noblewoman who is trapped on the island of St. Helena. There, she meets and falls in love with the exiled Napoleon. It's based loosely on a true story -- the real Betsy was all of thirteen, and wrote a book recalling how Napoleon enjoyed playing childish games with her and her siblings. Not quite Harlequin material. I can't help but think that a movie about a playful Napoleon might be more interesting than a bodice ripper. (Possibly, bodices will not be ripped.) The role originally belonged to Scarlett Johannson, who gave it up when the film headed in a younger direction. She is still set to produce the film.

As Napoleon was 46-years-old when exiled to St. Helena, they must really be aiming for the "creepy" level. Perhaps Hollywood will re-imagine him as a handsome twenty-something. I'm envisioning James McAvoy, at least for Watson's sake.