Actor Daniel Radcliffe was received by fans with a warm welcome as he attended the world premiere of the fifth Harry Potter film in Tokyo and in response he too greeted the crowd in Japanese, saying “Nihon no minasan, Konnichiwa” (hello, people of Japan).
Japanese competition winners were among the first to see The Order of the Phoenix movie. The UK premiere in London is set for July 3 whereas it will open in cinemas on 11 July.
Radcliffe with film’s producer David Heyman was the only one from the film’s main stars to make the journey to Tokyo’s Toho Cinemas Roppongi Hills multiplex.
This was Radcliffe’s first visit to Japan in four and a half years since the release of Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. He said to the crowd :
It’s wonderful to come over here and to say hello. I hope people will be impressed by the new characters, new performances, and the big battle.
The Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix is the fifth movie of Harry Potter series and a bit different from earlier ones as Harry experiences his first kiss, with schoolmate Cho Chang, played by actress Katie Leung.
He admitted that kissing experience for him is an altogether different in comparison to stripping off on stage, as he did in the West End play Equus and said:
Once you’ve been on stage naked in front of 1,000 people you really feel you can do almost anything without inhibition. Kissing Katie was a very, very comfortable experience, especially when compared to being naked on stage and blinding horses.
Radcliffe, 17, has played school-aged wizard Harry Potter in each of the first five films based on the best-selling Harry Potter book series. He will also appear in the final two films of that series as well.
The latest of the Potter film sequels is being released just weeks before the long-awaited seventh and the final book is published, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.
The last two sequels namely ‘Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince’ and ‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows’ are scheduled for a release in 2008 and 2010 respectively.
