The House of Black
Genre: Fantasy/Action/Drama
Director: Chan-wook Park
Writer: Sammy-Jo Ellis
Based on the characters in the Wizarding World created by JK Rowling
Cast: Benjamin Evan Ainsworth, Louis Partridge, Emma Mackey, Nell Hudson, Olivia Williams, Emma Appleton, Paul Kaye, Charles Dance, Cal MacAninch, Laurie Davidson, Kit Connor, Emily Carey, Niamh Cusack, Alun Armstrong
Plot: 1976
The Autumn fog swallows Grimmauld place, and behind the shrunken hedges, number 12 awaits. Cloaked in enchantments and its windows dark. We hear the scowl of Walburga Black (Olivia Williams). Her eyes, not on the street but on the family tapestry, where one of the threads has recently been brought to life. Narcissa Malfoy (formally Black) glows golden. Walburga smooths the silk with trembling finders as she whispers to herself, “One daughter loyal. Just one.”
Sirius Black (Louis Partridge) steps inside Grimmauld Place an hour later, freshly arrived from King’s Cross station. His school robes still on, half-buttoned, the Gryffindor scarf around his neck hangs, and insult to the Black household. Kreacher (Andy Serkis), the house elf greets him with a nod. As Sirius walks upstairs he is met by one of the paintings, Phineas Nigellus Black (Charles Dance), he sneers at the sight of Sirius. As he walks past Walburga she says nothing, just turning away, as if his presence is merely wallpaper.
Dinner is served in silence. Orion Black (Cal MacAninch) reads the Prophet without ever looking up. Regulus Black (Benjamin Evan Ainsworth) sits like a marble bust, his spine straight. Bellatrix Lestrange (Emma Mackey) enters the room, a visitor now, but makes herself at home, lounging across two chairs, eating grapes like a queen at court. Rodolphus Lestrange (Laurie Davidson) just stands by the fire, arms crossed. Then comes a chime, the door creaks again and in walks Narcissa Malfoy (Nell Hudson), she is composed, calm, but almost fearful behind her eyes. “You’re late,” Walburga says. “Lucius keeps me busy,” Narcissa replies coolly. “He sends his regards.” Her voice is silk pulled tight.
After dinner the family go their separate ways within the house. Bellatrix eyes off Narcissa.
As the evening continues a woman apparates into the front corridor of the house, wearing muggle garments. Kreacher is standing in front and snarls at the woman, Andromeda Tonks (Emma Appleton) (formally Black). Sirius, drawn by the disturbance, finds her first. They lock eyes. Neither smiles. Behind them, Walburga’s scream splits the air. Bellatrix appears in an instant, wand raised and drunk. Narcissa follows, less angered than afraid. The confrontation plays out in the parlor, surrounded by portraits that hiss and mutter. “You walk in here dressed like a Mudblood’s concubine,” Bellatrix snarls. “And you expect a welcome?” Andromeda doesn’t flinch. “I came for them,” she says, nodding toward Sirius and Regulus. “Not you.” Bellatrix is furious, irrational. Narcissa is begging them to lower their wands, to not do this “in front of the boys.” Sirius watches in silence. Regulus does too, hidden on the staircase, his eyes wide. He sees not three sisters but three futures. Three exits. None of them like the last, and none of them right. They eventually settle but Bellatrix remains furious, laughing as she walks away.
Later, Sirius and Andromeda walk the upper halls, lit only by the flicker of dying sconces. “They say I’m dead,” she says. “They struck my name from the wall like it was a stain. But I still bleed. I still dream about this house. Do you?” Sirius nods. “Every night.” She presses his hand, she pleads with him not to let them take Regulus. Sirius nods.
Elsewhere, Narcissa sits beside Regulus in his room, brushing dust from the hem of his curtain. “I used to pretend this house was a fortress,” she says. “Turns out it was a prison.” Regulus doesn’t speak. He’s trying to understand it all—Bellatrix’s fury, Andromeda’s exile, Sirius’ absence. Narcissa leans in. “You don’t have to choose today. Just promise me you’ll wait. Listen and think.”
But Bellatrix won’t wait. She corners Regulus in the drawing room later that night, all smoke and persuasion. “They’re wrong about you, you know,” she coos. “You’re not like Sirius. You understand what this family means. What we could be again. I’ve told the Dark Lord about you. He’s interested.” Regulus doesn’t respond. But he doesn’t walk away either. And always, above it all, Phineas Nigellus watches. His portrait shifts across frames, drifting from one wall to another. He mocks Sirius—calls him a “defector with delusions of grandeur.” He praises Regulus—“the last son worth the name.” He rebukes the sisters like a bitter uncle at a cursed wedding. But when Andromeda calls him out—“You stood for nothing but your own comfort”—his smile slips, if only for a moment.
As the days pass, Sirius grows more restless. The sisters are gone again—Andromeda into hiding, Bellatrix to Knockturn Alley, Narcissa to the Malfoy estate. The house returns to silence. One morning, Regulus walks past Sirius without a word. He’s different, he’s paler, closed off. And Sirius knows.
Sirius packs that night.
His escape is loud. Walburga tries to hex him as he descends the staircase, but Kreacher blocks the spell with an old, twitching hand. Phineas curses him from three different frames. Orion says nothing and Regulus doesn’t come down. The door closes behind Sirius like a vault.
Regulus stands alone in the upper hall, staring at the empty space where the family tapestry used to carry Andromeda’s name. Behind him, Narcissa’s new golden thread gleams faintly. And from the shadows, Phineas whispers: “Two daughters gone. One son fled. And the last one standing? We’ll see what you’re worth.”
Cut to black.
Snow now piles on the iron gate of 12 Grimmauld Place. Christmas passes without celebration. No lights. No warmth. Only silence. Inside, Walburga mourns her son as if he were dead—though her grief is twisted and theatrical, more for the disgrace to her bloodline than for the boy himself. “He made his choice,” she says to the empty hallway. “Let him rot in red.”
But Sirius is alive—and freer than he’s ever been.
Sirius now lives with the Potters, tucked into a warm spare room that smells faintly of potions and old parchment. Euphemia (Niamh Cusack) makes tea and insists he eat second helpings. Fleamont (Alun Armstrong) nods approvingly over the paper. James (Kit Connor) is always nearby—jokes at the ready, midnight cocoa in hand. Lily Evans (Emily Carey) visits often, dropping by after prefect meetings, leaving behind borrowed books and notes written in red ink. Their home is cluttered and kind, filled with love spoken aloud. Still, Sirius can’t settle. He paces at night, stares at owls passing overhead, writes letters to Regulus that are never answered. He dreams of Bellatrix’s laughter and wakes with his wand clenched in a fist.
Meanwhile, Regulus walks deeper into shadows. Bellatrix meets him often now, usually in places without names—fog-drenched alleyways, crumbling ancestral manors, cold fields where owls circle. Rodolphus is always nearby, a ghost with teeth. Bellatrix flatters Regulus, spins prophecy from ideology. She speaks of purity, of legacy, of fire that will cleanse the world. “You could be the youngest in the circle,” she whispers. “The Dark Lord remembers names like ours.” Regulus listens. He does not smile. But once more he does not walk away.
Regulus now walks alone through a narrow wizarding alley just off Knockturn. The fog is thick, and his steps echo. He’s come from a meeting—Bellatrix had summoned him but didn’t stay long. Said “the others” were watching. Told him to walk home alone, to “show resolve.” That night, the streets below Knockturn Alley are damp with fog, the kind that muffles steps and swallows lantern light. Regulus walks alone, his wand tucked beneath his sleeve, heart still pounding from Bellatrix’s words. She told him this path required strength. That people would test it. He doesn’t make it a block. The first spell bursts against the wall behind him, white-hot and deliberate. A second slams into the cobblestones near his feet, knocking him off balance. Regulus spins, barely shielding himself as two masked figures emerge from the fog—neither cloaked like Death Eaters, nor robed like Aurors. These men are something else. The kind that strike first and speak with ash. “We know what you are,” one hisses. “Bloodline coward. Tell her she’s next.” Regulus tries to speak, to defend, but one curses his legs out from under him. He hits the pavement, hard, wind gone from his lungs. One man presses a knee into his back, yanking his arm, while the other readies a killing blow—wand raised. It never lands. The attacker is flung backwards, a jagged slash across his chest. Blood hits the stones in a wet arc. A second man tries to run, but his spine snaps mid-step, dropped like a marionette with cut strings. Bellatrix appears from the smoke like a revenant—wild-eyed, laughing. Her wand still hums with residual magic, vibrating with death. “Pitiful,” she says, kicking one of the bodies aside. “They thought they could touch you?” Regulus doesn’t move. He’s still on the ground, breath shallow, trying to understand what just happened. Bellatrix kneels beside him, wipes dirt from his cloak. Her touch is gentle, almost maternal. “You see now?” she whispers. “They fear what you’ll become. That’s power. That’s the mark of something important.” She cups his cheek briefly, like a proud mother, like a general before a war. Then she’s gone. Apparated into the fog.
Regulus rises slowly, legs shaking. The alley is quiet again. Too quiet. The blood is already drying. There are scorch marks along the brick, a smear of ash where a man used to be. Regulus retrieves his wand and walks away, head down, steps slow. He doesn’t report the attack. He tells no one. But that night, he lies awake in bed, the red light of Bellatrix’s spell flashing behind his eyes like lightning behind curtains. And for the first time, he begins to wonder what exactly he’s being asked to become.
Narcissa watches from the Malfoy estate, far enough to stay clean, close enough to stay informed. She visits her mother on occasion, bringing expensive wine and excuses. Lucius works late. She is alone, yet complicit. She reads the Prophet with a deadened gaze. When she learns that Regulus has been marked for recruitment, she apparates to Grimmauld Place and finds him in the attic.
But this time, she doesn't speak. She grabs his arm, and with a crack of magic, they vanish. The safehouse she brings him to is an old manor in Wiltshire, cloaked in disuse and dust. No portraits and no watching eyes. Regulus tears his arm free. “What is this?” he asks. “A prison?” “No,” she replies. “A pause.” He moves to leave. She blocks the door. He raises his wand. So does she. The first spell shatters a lamp between them. Dust rains from the ceiling. They circle each other in silence, the air thick with years of unsaid things. Narcissa tries to disarm him. He deflects, then casts a knockback curse that sends her into a couch. She groans, winded, but doesn’t retaliate. She looks up at him from the floor—her eyes wet but steady. “You think power gives you control. It doesn’t. It just changes the shape of your fear.” Regulus lowers his wand. Helps her up. “I can’t be Sirius,” he says. “You don’t have to be,” she replies. “Just don’t become Bellatrix either.” They return to Grimmauld Place together. But Narcissa knows the war has already chosen him.
Elsewhere, Andromeda lives in hiding. A small cottage in Yorkshire. A baby’s cry echoes from the next room—young Nymphadora, pink-cheeked and curious. Sirius visits once, arriving unannounced with muddy boots and tired eyes. Andromeda welcomes him in. Over tea, they speak of family. Of war. Of Regulus. “He’s clever,” Sirius says. “He’s not blind.” “Neither was I,” she replies. “Until it was too late.”
Back in London, the Ministry tightens its grip. Muggle disappearances are rising. Whispers of a secret war trickle through alleys. Phineas Nigellus, still drifting between frames at Grimmauld and Hogwarts, becomes restless. He lectures Regulus on legacy, mocks Sirius for his moralism. “You think your new little Order will save the world?” he says from a crackling frame. “It’ll save nothing. At least the Dark Lord understands power.” But even Phineas has moments of unease now—lingering silences in his frame, as if watching his descendants walk the edge of a cliff he never dared climb.
Bellatrix takes Regulus to a meeting. It’s not a full gathering—not yet—but enough. Mulciber is there. Wilkes. They test him. They speak in riddles. Bellatrix watches, proud and hungry. Regulus passes. He is calm. Controlled. Dead-eyed. When they brand him, he doesn’t scream. The Dark Mark is black and gleaming.
That night, Regulus doesn’t go home. He walks the Thames for hours, the sleeve of his robe damp with blood. A silver coin clutched in his palm—one Sirius gave him when they were boys. He stares at it a long time before casting it into the water.
Meanwhile, Sirius returns to Grimmauld Place in secret. He enters through a hidden passage and moves like a thief. The house is unchanged—stale air, angry portraits, the smell of rot beneath polish. He climbs to the attic. Regulus isn’t there. In the drawing room, Phineas stirs. “Back to burn another name off the wall?” he sneers. “Or just to gloat?”
Sirius says nothing. But as he passes the tapestry, his hand brushes it. The burn where Andromeda once was. The gleaming new thread of Narcissa. The untouched thread of Regulus. He stares at it a long time. He leaves a letter for Regulus in his old trunk. A simple note. “You don’t have to die for them. I’ll come back for you.” Then he's gone again. Before he can mobve anymore, a footstep echoes from the corridor. The room darkens—not from light, but from presence. Bellatrix stands in the doorway, her silhouette electric with fury. “Back so soon, cousin?” she purrs. Sirius raises his wand. She strikes first. The spell misses his chest by inches, scorching the drapes. He fires back, and within seconds, the hallway is a warpath—paintings shrieking, curses ricocheting. Sirius is quicker, wilder, but she’s been sharpening her rage for years. Kreacher tries to intervene and is thrown aside, crumpling near the stairwell. The duel breaks into the upper corridor—banisters splinter, wallpaper curls with flame. Sirius stumbles through the old servant’s passage and barely escapes into the night. Bellatrix’s laughter follows him, echoing like a curse. The camera lingers on Kreacher, who gets up slowly, walks toward where Sirius put the note, he finds it and hides it in a drawer.
Regulus watches the frost collect on the inside of his bedroom window, the world beyond it quiet and brittle. His mother calls him the family's pride. Bellatrix sends word of new raids and praises Voldemort’s genius. But Regulus has stopped responding. Something inside him has turned. He no longer speaks much. He no longer sleeps.
Kreacher notices first. He follows his master with cautious eyes, always a few steps behind. One night, Regulus calls him close and whispers of a cave by the sea, a hidden place Voldemort brought Kreacher to once before—how he’d forced Kreacher to drink a potion and left him for dead. But Kreacher returned. And that, Regulus realizes now, was a mistake Voldemort didn’t expect. A window.
Together, they begin planning. Regulus orders Kreacher to take him back to the cave. He tells him that they will switch the real locket with a decoy. But only one of them will return. “You must obey me,” he says, looking Kreacher in the eyes. “You must come home and destroy it. That’s your order.”
At the same time, Sirius hears nothing. He’s begun to pull away from everything that reminds him of Grimmauld Place. James jokes that he’s lucky to be rid of them, but Sirius doesn’t laugh. He carries guilt beneath his swagger, and something in his gut tells him Regulus is drifting somewhere he can’t reach.
One final morning, Regulus dresses carefully. His robes are dark and formal. He eats nothing. He writes no letter. No grand farewell. The tapestry will remain untouched. He leaves only with Kreacher by his side, and a fake locket hidden in his cloak. No one sees them go. The cave is just as Kreacher remembered—cold, slick, hidden by ancient magic. They cross the black lake in silence, the boat summoned by blood. At the basin, Regulus drinks the potion himself. It burns like acid, rakes down his throat. He gasps and claws, but drinks it all. When the final drop vanishes, the water behind them stirs. Pale hands emerge—then faces. Inferi, rising from the depths. Kreacher screams. Regulus stands, barely able to move, and casts fire, his spells lashing across the cave like lashes. The Inferi keep coming. One snags his arm. He burns it back. Another claws at his chest. He stumbles, coughing blood. He lifts the real locket, drops in the fake. Then he presses the true Horcrux into Kreacher’s palm. “Take it. Go.” Kreacher won’t move. Regulus whispers, “You must obey me.” And with the last of his strength, he forces Kreacher to Disapparate. Alone, Regulus turns toward the swarming dead. And he does not scream.
Kreacher arrives at Grimmauld Place alone, collapsing near the hearth with the locket clutched to his chest. He hides it in a cupboard beneath the sink, behind piles of rotting heirlooms. He keeps the promise. He tells no one. Not Walburga, who assumes her son died nobly. Not Phineas Nigellus. Not Sirius.
Walburga enters a fugue of grief and glory. She mourns a son she never truly knew, praising his loyalty while polishing his empty chair. She never asks questions. Orion dies not long after, silently, without ceremony. Bellatrix does not return. Narcissa writes a single note, folded and left unanswered.
Sirius receives the news days later—Regulus is dead. No body recovered. Presumed lost in service to the Dark Lord. He says nothing. He crumples the parchment, and walks out of the Potters’ house into the snow. James doesn’t follow. Sirius stays gone for hours.
Kreacher watches silently as the house empties. He begins to tend the hidden locket like an altar—dusting around it, muttering to it, guarding it. He tells himself that he will destroy it, but he doesn’t. He can’t. He isn’t strong enough. And Regulus never taught him how.
The final shot lingers on the cupboard in the kitchen—quiet, unremarkable, sealed with age. Inside, the locket pulses faintly, like a heart trapped under glass. Regulus Arcturus Black lies dead beneath a nameless cave. No one will know what he did. Not yet.
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