Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them: New Harry Potter movie premiered in London

Even for JK Rowling’s most dedicated fans, it is a step into the magical unknown. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them premiered in London on Tuesday night and is due to hit cinemas on Friday.

Yet for the first time in the history of Rowling films it will not be a familiar world, or even familiar characters, on screen, the Guardian reports.

Instead of the comforting surroundings of Hogwarts, occupied by literature’s cherished trio of Harry, Ron and Hermione, it will be the first time the wizarding world has been depicted across the Atlantic in prohibition-era New York – and this time without existing books containing the plot.

Speaking on the red carpet in Leicester Square on Tuesday night, Rowling said that by the end of the film – the first of a planned five – it will be clear to audiences where the story will head. Although she wanted to keep the fun in the film, the author and screenwriter said: “I am dealing with some dark themes in there.”

Rowling described her delight when an Academy-Award-winner, Eddie Redmayne, signed on to star as “magizoologist” Newt Scamander. He is “warm and endearing – and a peculiar sort of hero”, she said.