“Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” to be release July 17, 2009

Warner Bros Pictures is pushing “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” from Nov. 21 release date to July 17, 2009

Alan Horn, studio president, said in a press release that the reasons for the switch are twofold.

The first reason: “We know the summer season is an ideal window for a family tent pole release, as proven by the success of our last ‘Harry Potter’ film, which is the second-highest grossing film in the franchise, behind only the first installment.”

And the second cause for worldwide Muggle tears: “Like every other studio, we are still feeling the repercussions of the writers’ strike, which impacted the readiness of scripts for other films — changing the competitive landscape for 2009 and offering new windows of opportunity that we wanted to take advantage of. We agreed the best strategy was to move ‘Half-Blood Prince’ to July, where it perfectly fills the gap for a major tent-pole release for mid-summer.”