The Chronicles of Narnia

[truehobbit]

Has anyone seen Chronicles of Narnia already?

I saw it this afternoon, and I liked it quite well!

The trailers I'd seen on TV in past week or two had appeared quite silly to me, so I wasn't expecting much, and was pleasantly surprised.
I'm not the greatest fan of the book - I've only read The Lion, the Witch and the Warderobe, when I was around twenty/twenty-five, and although I thought some parts of it were brilliant I got bored in the middle, and don't remember all that much. (That doesn't mean it was too childish for me, though, I read a lot of "children's books" for the first time then and loved them.)

So, without hearkening back to the book too much, I thought it was beautifully, and, even though it's Disney, lovingly and carefully done.

I'd like to hear other people's opinions!


I'd also like to discuss some other aspects, but am not sure whether they fit in here or anywhere else (either the literature or Tolkien forum would be good, I think, but as I don't know the book so well, I'll start here - let me know if you think this belongs elsewhere! ).

(Warning for fans: negative criticism ahead! )

When I read the book, I never thought there was any Christian message involved, I missed that completely, and only learnt about it on TORC somewhere.

Seeing the movie now, I recognised some parallels of the story to elements of the Gospels.
However, I still fail to see a Christian message in there.
In fact, I fail to see any message. I still think, like I did when I read the book, that the story, in spite of several brilliant elements, is often incoherent and at times shallow.
I can very well see Tolkien go at Lewis's story.

What exactly would you say is the message? Is there some deeper meaning behind the four kids on the thrones? Or is the message only in the part that's about the self-sacrifice of the King?
(And I suppose the book has a better intro to that than the movie? Because in the movie for me it was basically "d'uh", when Aslan explained the inscription on the Stone Table.)

Did someone else dislike the fact that "evil" is female and icy?
(Loved Tilda Swinton, though, and the way her character was shown - her ice-cold evil was h0tt!11 )

An amusing, but rather nice feature, I think, is making the faun a nice person - although a bit disturbing at first in my traditional European mythology conditioning. I mean, a little girl accepting the invitation of a faun? Might as well have followed the big bad wolf!
Do you think there's a conscious overturning of traditional concepts there?
Although the wolves were still the bad guys.

Hmmh, enough questions for one evening, I guess - hope this is not just completely confusing!

[vison]

My children both read and enjoyed the whole series. I tried reading The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe because my youngest son insisted, but I found it just as truehobbit said: shallow and incoherent.

I thought it childish and have no desire to see the movie.

There is some controversy, with some commentors claiming it is "Christian propaganda" and others hotly denying it.

I saw no religion in the bits I read, none at all.

I can't imagine what the fuss is about. Why shouldn't a movie be Christian propaganda if people want to make a movie like that? If it's good, fine and dandy, if it's not, then that's fine and dandy too.
No one is forcing me to go and see it.

[Whistler]

I'll be there tomorrow night. I have my tickets already, as the line is expected to be enormous. Sadly, the film is coming at a time when I will have little opportunity to discuss it as I’d like: Lewis has always been one of my passions.

Sorry to disagree about the Christian content! To me it could hardly be more obvious, or more powerful. And, oh! To hear the story called “childish” simply stuns and horrifies me. It is complex, sublime and sophisticated. Harry Potter is not fit (in my always humble opinion!) to rest on the same shelf as Narnia. Almost nothing is.

Yes, I’ve read the insulting and condescending complaints about “Christian propaganda.” Are we to understand, then, that books and movies mocking Christianity (which are too numerous to count) do not amount to “anti-Christian propaganda?”

Idiot critics! They’ve swallowed the Turkish Delight, and they’ve sold their souls to the witch.

[vison]

Well, there is no accounting for taste, is there, Whistler? C. S. Lewis is very far from being a hero of mine, yet I have read about him with some interest.

I hope you enjoy the movie.

[Whistler]

Well, vision, we have yet to agree on anything, so why start now?

If you don't like Lewis, blame Tolkien. If Tolkien hadn't lured Lewis into Christianity, he would never have written a word that anybody still reads.

[Jnyusa]

I didn't read Lewis as a child but my children read him and so I read him as an adult along with my children.

I like the series. It's entertaining. It doesn't have the deep roots that Tolkien has, and I think it might suffer by comparison among Tolkien lovers for that reason. Lewis created characters whereas Tolkien created Peoples. You just can't approach the two with the same expectation.

The Christian allegory was obvious to me, too, from the first read. I see nothing wrong with that, and nothing wrong with putting it in the movie, but like most merchants the producers are probably trying hard not to shrink their market share by aiming too obviously at any one religion. But the myth of the god who dies is universal, and that element certainly could not be removed from the story without destroying it completely.

Narnia is more of a children's tale than LotR is. Those who are adults and love the stories love them because they read them as children. That's my guess anyway. Those of us who read them for the first time as adults, coming to Lewis by way of Tolkien, will be less taken. (As with all generalizations, there are exceptions.)

I haven't seen the movie yet but I'm really looking forward to it because I think Lewis lends himself far more than Tolkien does to the fantasy treatment Hollywod is able to do so well.

Jn

[vison]

You may be right, Jny. Maybe Whistler read the books as a child?

There are many books I read as a child that I still love and still read. Some of THEM are pretty childish, to be sure, yet are beloved old friends, and loyalty compels me to take them up and read them now and again. My little boys have read the Little House books with me and my husband. My husband had never read them, and he was very taken with them, and quite liked reading them to the kids and having the kids read them to him.

LOTR is the only "fantasy" type book I've read as an adult that I liked. I read absolute masses of science fiction as a child and teenager, but it's hard to find what I regard as good science fiction nowadays. There, I sound like a codger.

My soon-to-be-eleven year old has the Narnia books now, my youngest son gave them to him, but he's not overly fond of reading, and has a fair amount of assigned reading that has to be got through first.

While I'm not a big fan of Lewis, I like to think of the evenings those two men spent together, it would have been fun to be a fly on the wall, listening.

[cemthinae]

I read both Lewis & Tolkien as a "child". (I use quotations because I often feel I still am a child.) It depends on the day, as to which I would say I like more. I love both of the world's they have created.

I'm not sure yet what I will think of the movie, because the religious aspects of Narnia are what kept me coming back to the books. Hollywood has a tendency to suck the good (not just religion) out of things.

I harbour hope for this movie though & am excited to see younger generations interested in Narnia.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

I think it would be insulting and inappropriate to make a movie of The Chronicles of Narnia without incorporating Lewis' explicit Christian message. What would be the point?

[nerdanel]

Narnia touched my life as a young child. In particular, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe moved me so much because it was the first time I had ever identified allegory on my own (in fact, with some amusement, I recall wondering out loud, "Did he MEAN to make Aslan so close to Jesus?")

I love Narnia, and for me the books (esp. the first) are fundamentally Christian. If you excise that only a shell is left behind. I reread the books my senior year of college and found nothing in the least inappropriate or offensive about them - they are delightful. Of course, if you don't want to read a book with such a Christian message, you can choose not to. I have never been proselytized by believers handing out Lewis books.

Essentially, it goes back to the same purist stance for me. Lewis' intent is clear, the text of the work itself is clear, and in this case I think it cannot be changed without being destroyed. Of course, Disney is particularly good at destruction through change of classic works.

Whistler? Agree 100% about HP, even though I enjoy those books. And don't get me started on the people who compare HP and LOTR.

Also, what Jnyusa said about the differences between Tolkien and Lewis.

[truehobbit]

Thanks for the comments, everybody!

Whistler, I knew you love the books (and that others do, too), that's why I put the 'warning' in my first post. I'm sorry if your feelings were hurt by my views, but I was hoping that people would either not read on after the warning or help me see what I was missing.

Sorry to disagree about the Christian content! To me it could hardly be more obvious, or more powerful

Then where and what are they? I asked specifically, because I hoped someone would point them out to me!

Like I said, I recognised the sacrifice of the King part, but that was all I could see. The rest seemed entirely unrelated to Christianity.

That's why I brought the comparison to Tolkien in.
There seems to be no overt religion in LOTR, there are no claims that the book is written to promote Christian ideas, and yet I've never read a book that was so true to them! To my catholic mind, at least, things just kept clicking into place all the time. When I read LOTR for the first time, I finished reading it in February, and I'm afraid I didn't have very orthodox feelings during the following Lent and Easter season: whenever I heard anything about the Passion, all I could think was Frodo, and all the images in my mind were LOTR.

But maybe the questions I asked are out of place in a movie thread, because no one has even begun to answer them?
I guess a Lewis-Tolkien comparison thread somewhere might be better, I'll think about it.

As to the movie: of course it's silly to criticise it as "Christian propaganda" - it contains the Christian elements of the book, as it should, but I think that to a non-Christian, for whom there is nothing to recognise (Aslan's "Golgatha" is beautifully done!), it is still a set of comprehensible and largely sensible values that is promoted, so that's not in the least what I'm criticising!

To sum it up, what bugs me is not the Christian content as such, it is that a story that (from what I hear) is supposed to illustrate Christianity contains so little of it that I recognise!

(And, I might add, it also bugs me that what I do recognise sometimes borders on blasphemy for my taste. But then, I don't like lions much, I think they are vile animals. )


Another question I forgot yesterday: the story in The Lion, the Witch and the Warderobe seems pretty complete. What can possibly be the subject of the other books, then, I wonder?
And - they don't plan to make it a movie a year, like with LOTR, or do they?

[WampusCat]

TH, I've been teaching a class on the theological concepts that can be found in the Narnia books, so perhaps I can help.

First, a disclaimer. Lewis was adamant that he wasn't trying to put across Christian themes when he wrote the stories. He said the stories began with images, such as a faun with an umbrella, and grew from there. What was most important to him bubbled up into the tales, but the tales were not written for that reason. That makes sense to me.

Second, a bias. I first read the Narnia books when I was 8 years old, a year before reading Lord of the Rings. The first time through I didn't notice Christian symbolism, but I was totally entranced by the stories. They hit me at a depth that nothing else did (until LOTR). It was not because of the books themselves, which I saw had flaws even then. Later I came to realize that it was because they spoke to something deep inside me. They had a truth about them that transcended their limitations.

Although I am Christian, I have been touched in this same way by other tales in other traditions. The Norse myths come to mind. I was aware of the intensity of my reaction to Narnia, but did not see the Christian parallels until years later. (In fact, I remember thinking in church one Sunday that I'd much rather be in Narnia, where everything made sense!)

OK. Here are some of the Christian themes I see in "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe."

EXTENSIVE SPOILERS BASED ON THE BOOK
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Resurrection: This is obvious because of Aslan's coming back to life. But it is also seen in the resurrection of Narnia itself. The frozen land where creatures are turned to stone thaws and erupts in warmth, movement, joy and dancing when Aslan returns to defeat the witch.

Temptation: The White Witch tempts Edmund with pleasure (Turkish Delight), power ("you will be king") and being special/recognized. These are strikingly parallel to the temptations of Jesus in the wilderness: pleasure/comfort ("turn these stones into bread"), power ("worship me and all these lands will be yours") and being recognized through spectacle ("throw yourself off the pinnacle of the temple so angels will catch you").

Truth: Evil lies and deceives. Edmund lies to wound his sister and to make himself look better. The witch lies to control Edmund. Once entrapped by evil and its lies, it becomes harder and harder to escape.

Repentance: The obvious example is Edmund, who came to understand and regret his own treachery. Another example: Tumnus the faun, who broke down in tears while talking to Lucy because he realized what a terrible thing he had promised the witch he would do (turn Lucy over to her).

Redemption/Sacrifice: Aslan dies in Edmund's place, which echoes the traditional Christian concept of the atonement.

Even the arrival of Father Christmas has Christian parallels. Like him, Christ comes in times when we are frozen with fear and despair, bringing gifts that both equip us for our future struggles (Peter's sword, for example) and comfort us now (hot tea).

Enough! Sorry to run on for so long. But one more opinion:

The book is not Christian propaganda, because it doesn't push Christianity as such. But by cutting away the clutter of dogma and history, it can let both Christians and non-Christians see the faith's essential themes more clearly, whether they believe it or not.

As Aslan said in one of the later books while sending children back to our world, "...there I have another name. ... This was the very reason why you were brought to Narnia, that by knowing me here for a little, you may know me better there."

[Whistler]

Thanks for that, Wampus. I was going to write something along the same lines, but you've managed it nicely.

Hobby is bothered by the thrones. My thinking is that when the children enter Narnia as "sons of Adam and daughters of Eve," they are essentially stand-ins for those two, destined for lordship over Narnia as Adam and Eve were intended to rule the earth. They are meant to rule in righteousness under the lordship of the “Emperor Beyond the Sea,” who is God the Father. Of course, they don't realize it.

What the witch fears is not that the children will end up in heaven (whatever that may mean, in Narnia) but that they will take over her playground when they learn who and what they really are. So she tempts one of them with candy (Narnia’s forbidden fruit) in what is (to me) less a parallel of Christ's temptation than a picture of the fall of man. When one of the children makes his deal with the "devil," the witch's continued dominion of Narnia is ensured, and the thrones must remain empty.

The meaning of the redemption of the “traitor” by Aslan is pretty obvious to all. Aslan’s reference to the “Deep Magic,” which accounts for his resurrection, seems to be a reference to Old Testament messianic prophecy, which could not have been understood even by those who wrote it. Certainly Satan didn’t get it. Anyway, it is this resurrection that allows for Aslan to finally triumph over the witch, as Christ broke the power of Satan only after His death.

With the witch at last destroyed, the intended order of things can be restored and the children can assume the thrones that were intended for them. The story ends with the children following an elusive white stag (the Holy Spirit, I think) that leads them right back to the wardrobe, and to their original world, where they are meant to make use of the knowledge they have gained in Narnia.

And (of course!) get to know Aslan better, under his other name.

[Pearly Di]

I'm just back from seeing the film and I am absolutely over the moon.

What a gorgeous, GORGEOUS movie. I ADORED it.



Vision, I honestly think you have to read Narnia as a child to be able to fall under the enchantment. They are far more childlike than LOTR, and I can't quite imagine an adult coming to them cold, without that first childhood spell.

I loved the books as a child ... and this is a beautiful, BEAUTIFUL, utterly enchanting and magical movie. Faithful to the book through and through. I could not be more thrilled!

Adamson handles the Christian symbolism extremely well. He just lets the story speak for itself. It's there for eyes to see that can. It shouldn't be a big deal ...if you see it, you see it - if you don't, you don't. Nothing to get worked up about. Just enjoy the magic.

I honestly think this is the best film adaptation of a beloved children's book I've ever seen. It's like Andrew Adamson has put a whole slice of my childhood up there on the screen.

General comments:

Liam Neeson's Aslan is wonderful. I loved his voice. And he calls Lucy 'dear one'.

Tilda Swinton is fantastic as Jadis ... she makes Jadis three-dimensional and INTERESTING.

I had a real soft spot for Susan in this movie, playing Mum to everybody.

Little Georgie Henley as Lucy exudes an innocent radiance which is very, very touching.

I just LUUUUURVE those Talking Beasts!!!!!!

*******


Well. First Middle-earth and now Narnia. I am spoilt.

Under the enchantment,

Pearly Di

[cemthinae]

One of my favourite passages about Aslan really parallels how I have felt about God. From Prince Caspian:

"Aslan, Aslan. Dear Aslan," sobbed Lucy. "At last."

The great beast rolled over on his side so that Lucy fell, half sitting and half lying between his front paws. He bent forward and just touched her nose with his tongue. His warm breath came all round her. She gazed up into the large wise face.

"Welcome, child," he said.

"Aslan," said Lucy, "you're bigger."

"That is because you are older, little one," answered he.

"Not because you are?"

"I am not. But every year you grow, you will find me bigger."

Wow.

[TheTennisBallKid]

Far be it from me to disagree with Di, but I'm going to on this one.
*spoilers, I guess*

I definitely felt that Christian elements were downplayed, and Aslan came across as quite a bit less than a Christ figure...it wasn't his return that brought the end of endless winter, it was the arrival of the children. And his resurrection was brought about by The Deep Magic, which in the film, comes across as akin to The Force; Aslan tells young Peter how "The Deep Magic binds us all together..." in a scene that I found oddly remiscent of Obi-Wan instructing Luke in the ways of the Jedi.


And I didn't like Neeson. Just didn't work for me. :|


And I thought there was a bit too much emphasis placed on the action; one scene in particular stuck out to me:

It was the arrival of Father Christmas. In the book, the children and beavers are hiding in a cave when they hear sleigh bells approaching and think it's the witch, but it turns out to be Father Christmas.

In the film, they are crossing a frozen river when they see the sleigh approaching at breakneck speed. A high speed chase ensues, and they end up in a cave on the other bank, and the shadowy figure advances slowly...and I'm sure you can figure out the rest.


It felt like the whole film was like that. :|

There were some nice touches, yes...but overall it felt flat...pretty, but flat...and not the book...


Oh, and the music? I liked the main theme, but I also disliked quite a bit of it, and hated some more...mostly the pop songs..

ttbk

[WampusCat]

Wow for cem's quote and Pearl's review.

[Pearly Di]

back to Wampus!

I definitely felt that Christian elements were downplayed, and Aslan came across as quite a bit less than a Christ figure...it wasn't his return that brought the end of endless winter, it was the arrival of the children.

ttbk

Do you know, TTBK, I didn't pick up on that at all.

I didn't feel that Aslan was downplayed though ... the 'Gethsamene' and 'resurrection' parallels are quite obvious to me, but then I guess they would be.

Aslan certainly got up Polly Toynbee's nose. She's a journalist on The Guardian and wrote a very sour-puss article called 'Down with Aslan' on how dreadful the Christian message in Narnia is. Because, obviously, Narnia is very evil. It will corrupt your kids. Because it's so CHRISTIAN. Yeah. Right. Thanks, Polly, don't let the door hit you on your way out.

I have a lovely liberal Catholic friend who really doesn't like Aslan at all, actually ... finds it all a bit blasphemous. Interesting reaction a bit like Tolkien's.

Then I've found all these scary fundamentalist sites that claim Narnia is all about witchcraft and that Lewis was not a 'real' Christian at all and that his books are full of spiritual deception ...

There's nowt so queer as folk.

I think if people go in to this film expecting another LOTR, of course they will be disappointed! PJ's LOTR reaches dizzying heights of sublimity, for all his goofiness, that Narnia can't reach.

But Narnia doesn't have to reach it. That's not what Narnia is about. It's a simpler, lighter world, full of childhood innocence and purity and radiance. That's what I hoped for, and that's what the film delivers. In spades.

And I just got a real kick out of seeing a barely teenaged Peter as the young knight-prince and all that jazz ... this stuff feeds into so much primal childhood fantasy, it's WONDERFUL.

And it has some nicely scary bits too ... Maugrim the Wolf Captain is an evil dude, I didn't notice who voiced him ... oh well, will just have to see it again. Damn.

The script is nicely witty too. My favourite line: Susan to Mr and Mrs Beaver, "But we're not heroes. We're from Finchley!"

[Alatar]

Hoping to bring the kids to this tomorrow. So far my favourite quote is from the supertrailer:

Peter "Well, he said he knows the Faun"

Susan "It's a beaver! It shouldn't be saying anything!!!"

[Pearly Di]

Hope you and the kids enjoy it, Alatar!

Oh, and PJ is still the Lord of the Battle Scenes. No question.

Another question I forgot yesterday: the story in The Lion, the Witch and the Warderobe seems pretty complete. What can possibly be the subject of the other books, then, I wonder?
And - they don't plan to make it a movie a year, like with LOTR, or do they?

'Prince Caspian' is in development for 2008. This is when the Pevensies are pulled back to Narnia by the Deep Magic, only to find 100 years have passed since they were last there ... and Narnia is once again in trouble.

Oh, truehobby, there's so much in these books! 'The Voyage of the Dawntreader' ... in 'The Magician's Nephew' we get to see the creation of Narnia, from the perspective of two Edwardian children ... 'The Horse and his Boy' is set during the period when the Pevensies are Kings and Queens ... 'The Silver Chair' takes place hundreds of years afterwards, when two more 1950s kids (not Pevensies) get called to Narnia ... 'The Last Battle' is just amazing (and how Hollywood will handle this one blows my mind, frankly.)