How the Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban Movie Accidentally Spoiled Some Future Storylines

While Academy Award winner Alfonso Cuarón wasn't exactly sold at first on the idea of helming the third Harry Potter film, The Prisoner of Azkaban, it proved to be a major success and a favorite for many Potterheads. And it wasn't only fans who loved the director's approach to the installment—series creator J.K. Rowling also praised his choices. During an interview featured on the film's DVD, the acclaimed author explained how intuitive Cuarón was.

"Alfonso had very good intuition about what would and wouldn't work," Rowling said. "He's put things in the film that, without knowing it, foreshadow things that are going to happen in the final two books. So, I really got goosebumps when I saw a couple of those things and I thought people are going to look back on the film and think those were put in deliberately as clues."

Rowling did not specifically say which moments she was referring to, but there are a few possibilities. Among many ideas that Potter blog Beyond Hogwarts speculates, one that seems the most likely is in regards to the scene between Harry and Professor Lupin on the bridge. This part is not in the books, but it allows Lupin to open up in detail about Lily and James Potter—Harry's parents, and Lupin's close friends. One line in particular, in which he tells the Boy Wizard, "You're more like them than you know, Harry. In time you'll come to see just how much," seems to foreshadow Harry's move to sacrifice himself in the final book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

There's no debate that Prisoner of Azkaban is one of the best movies of the entire Harry Potter series—Rotten Tomatoes even ranks it as the the second-best in the run (just after Deathly Hallows Part II, the eighth and final installment). It's nice to know Cuarón's work affected Rowling as much as it did moviegoers.