David Fincher, the director known for dark films like Se7en, Fight Club, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Gone Girl, and zombie-thriller World War Z, was at one point in talks to direct 2001’s Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, he revealed to Variety. “I was asked to come in and talk to them about how I would do Harry Potter,” he told the site, “I remember saying, ‘I just don’t want to do the clean Hollywood version of it.’” He recalled telling Warner Bros executives, “‘I want it to be kind of creepy.’” The pitch didn’t get him the project of course, as the first film adaptation of J.K. Rowling’s novels was shepherded by Home Alone director Chris Columbus. Fincher explained that his signature dark, twisty approach to the story wasn’t the studio was going for. “They were like, ‘We want Thom Browne schooldays by way of Oliver,’” he added, while he was hoping to imagine Potter for the big screen more like the 1987 British black comedy film Withnail and I.
