Chronicles of Narnia!

[pyan]

Yes and no....
It's reasonably well acted, and follows the plot fairly well...but the director couldn't resist putting in extra bits not in the book, and as they were aiming for a family audience, there's no blood and the violence is really toned down, even in the big battle..

[spaceseed]

Meh - it is one of those films that is not good enough to be a classic, but not bad enough to make fun of, either. Whatever is an amateur internet film critic to do?!?

[The Ace]

As the books include talking animals, giants, dragons and sundry other monsters and the films had to try to include this while being made for children, I don't envy the film's makers. I feel they did an extremely difficult job as well as could be expected.

[Iqeret]

Just out of curiosity, has anyone else here seen the old animated version? I loved it when I was small, though I realize now that it's not exactly amazing film work. ^_^

[Teresa Edgerton]

Yes, I've seen the animated version. We used to have it on tape, and my children watched it fairly often. The animation was fairly crude, but it definitely had its moments.

[The Procrastinator]

Like many here I have a sentimental attachment to the little-guys-in-bad-suits and bad-acting BBC series. Tom Baker was an excellent Puddleglum and Warwick Davis was a champion Reepicheep.

Generally speaking I thought the movie version was good on the whole, with moments of excellence, although it did have a bit much of the LOTR thing going on. I loved the beavers, and I thought they did an excellent job of Lucy and Tumnus. I much preferred the film Lucy - the BBC TV Lucy made me grind my teeth. The fusspot anatomist in me wasn't quite pleased with the film Aslan, though I shouldn't complain really, I spose he was an improvement over Robo-Aslan from the tv series.

Have not seen the animated version, did not even realise there was one.

I too wonder if they will film The Last Battle. Good on them for making the movie, btw, as it has revived interest in the books, which I love, despite their weaknesses. If you're not aware of Christian thing you don't notice it, they're still damn good stories.

[Ruin]

Horrific film, and the book wasn't much better.
In terms of the Narnia books, the earlier ones (Nania chronology) such as "The horse and his boy" were the better novels, without interference from the "real world". However, his style seems quite amaturish, but it was nothing compared to the films.
The film was dummed down and child-oriented to a point where it was no longer interesting. It concentrated on creating loveable characters and removing the scary from the setting. The child actors were terrible (almost to the point of Daniel Radcliff in the first Harry Potter movie), the best, surprisingly, being the youngest.

The battle, the best scene due to the simple reason it had as little dialogue from the children as possible, was reduced to the scenes which children enjoy to dance around and recreate after the movie, loosing the epic sense which adults enjoy so much more, and was well portrayed in the book (similar to the battle in King Arthur in this respect). The scene of Aslan's sacrifice was butchered, turned from the horrifying, dark scene of he novel into a Jesus Christ for Sunday schooler's moment, brightened up and made heroic for the benifit of the younger audience.

[Teresa Edgerton]

Originally Posted by Ruin

The scene of Aslan's sacrifice was butchered, turned from the horrifying, dark scene of he novel into a Jesus Christ for Sunday schooler's moment, brightened up and made heroic for the benifit of the younger audience.

It's interesting how different people react to the same thing. I cringed all through that scene both times I saw the movie. It struck me as far more horrifying seeing the way they mocked him and brutalized him before the sacrifice than it did reading about it in the book.

And I thought the young actors were very good, particularly the girl who played Lucy.

Moreover, I liked the way the children were portrayed as well-behaved children of Lewis's day, rather than turning them into mouthy modern children.

[Ruin]

I always found that it was because you couldn't tell exactly what was going on in the book which made it all the more horrifying. The glimpses and snippets given, allowing your imagination to run amok, was one of his finer writing successes through the series in my eyes.

Lucy was a good actor, and I immediately loved the character for hit, however the others, Peter foremost, seemed as lost in the idea of acting in character as they would have been finding a new world in a cupboard.

Keeping the children as they should have been for the era is not difficult, simply making your way through Eton and similar schools and you will find enough youths who act and speak in that way. Though I must admit I may be being a little cynical.

[yngvi]

I can't imagine that films will be made of all the Narnia books. 'Prince Caspian' is out soon here (in the UK) and Edmund and Lucy are back in Narnia for the third book (The Voyage of the Dawn Treader). This also has strong christian themes so could easily be made. 'A Horse and His Boy' and 'The Silver Chair' are more stand alone tales, with the former not featuring any visitors from our world, so a bit less likely to be made perhaps. By the time they think about 'The Last Battle' all the child actors will be grown up and, with it being so overtly christian and possibly scary for little kids, I think this is unlikely to be made.

After 'Dawn Treader' I think they might do 'The Magician's Nephew' then finito.