Nano Film Review #29 -- The Chronicles of Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader

(Earlier Narnia posts: Read my review of Prince Caspian here. Here's Disney's admittance to releasing Prince Caspian on a bad weekend. And here's the news that Disney was dumping the Narnia franchise, but Fox was picking it up.)


Voyage of the Dawn Treader has some really great acting. Some incredible special effects. Great sets. Brilliant cinematography. Awesome creature design. It's a really good movie.

But, you know what, my review is going to be one of those "it was different than the book" type things. I feel bad even typing it. But it's true.

The kid who plays Eustace is spot on perfect. Edmund and Lucy, the same actors from the first two Walden Media Narnia films, fall into their rolls perfectly. Caspian does better as King Caspian than he did as Prince Caspian. The White Witch, brought back in a larger cameo than in Prince Caspian, is right on.

But they made so many changes. Unnecessary changes. Now, I understand the challenges of taking a story created for one medium and changing it to another medium. Most of my experience comes from comic books. I've taken historical stories and turned them into comic books. I've taken novels and turned them into comics. I've also done some small scale film projects and stage projects doing the same thing. And it is a challenge. Books are not visual, and so lots of action can happen within people's minds and it's really interesting, but on the screen or comic book panel or stage it's not as easy to do. But that's not the problem with Voyage of the Dawn Treader. They actually do a really good job of putting the internal conflicts of the characters on the screen in a visual way.

I understand that Voyage of the Dawn Treader, as a book, is not a long story with a beginning, middle, and end. It's a series of episodes, held together by a vague "quest" for seven lords who left Narnia long ago. There's no big battle at the end, there's no huge climax. So some of the "episodes" get rearranged. Two islands stops are combined into one island, saving a lot of time. The scariest and most dangerous island is moved to the end and turned into a fierce conflict. That all makes sense.

But apparently, rescuing the seven lords of Narnia wasn't enough. So they fall into the Star Trek movie trap: a story isn't big enough unless Earth itself is in trouble. So Narnia itself is in trouble. A vague evil is causing trouble, and it keeps showing up, and will eventually destroy Narnia if it isn't stopped. And the only way to stop it is . . . well, it's in the video below.



Yup, for some reason those seven lords of Narnia have a magic sword to place at on Alsan's table. And now our heroes must find the swords to destroy the evil.

Just curious about the logic here -- if it won't work unless all seven swords are brought to the table, what good could it possibly be to split up? Instead of seven guys working together to get teh job done, you've got seven guys trying to do it alone, and if even one of them fails, they all do . . . and they have no way of knowing if one of the others needed help . . . adding this element didn't help create a stronger story, it took a stable story and gave it a whole bunch of plot holes.

So we end up with a movie that becomes the "book to movie" cliche that they avoided in the first two movies. In The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and Prince Caspian, changes were made to amp up the action and the drama and to make it more epic. But the story remained the same. In this version, action and drama are amped up . . . but sacrificing the original story to do so. Iconic moments from the book are removed -- moments I was excited to see on the big screen brought to life by master visual effects creators. At one point in the movie, I felt like I was watching an '80's fantasy film -- "You must find the magic weapon to destroy the world-engulfing evil!" and I had images of the Glaive flashing in my head . . . normally not a bad thing.

So overall, we get a well made movie with familiar characters . . . but it's just not Voyage of the Dawn Treader. I'll watch it again. My son was excited about this Narnia movie in the same way I got excited about Star Wars movies. Fortunately, he loves the Narnia books as well.

It's not a bad story. It just felt like big budget fan fiction.

Now, were the spiritual elements lost in the midst of this? Surprisingly, no. There's some really good moments with Aslan and about Aslan. The director and writers were trying to be true, I think, to the intent of the book, and Lewis' ideas. For some reason, though, they just didn't have the same goal for the story.

(Let's address the Liam Neesan controversy for a moment. Mr. Neesan said, "Aslan symbolises a Christlike figure, but he also symbolises for me Mohammed, Buddha and all the great spiritual leaders and prophets over the centuries. That’s who Aslan stands for as well as a mentor figure for kids – that’s what he means for me." You can't fault him, though, for misunderstanding the difference between Christ and Mohammed & Buddha. Christ is a personal, living part of God who wants a personal relationship with us -- not just a dead mentor. And this shines through brilliantly in the movie. Aslan reveals to Lucy in the end of the movie (and the book) that the reason Peter, Susan, Edmund, Lucy, Eustace, and (eventually, Jill Pole) is so they might get to know Aslan better in our world. That's one of C.S. Lewis' intents for writing these stories as well -- to show us Jesus and help us know him better here.)

So, I do hope Walden Media gets the chance to do Silver Chair, which they should find less challenging to actually use the story as it is. I want to see more of Eustace, and he can carry that film. And I really want to see The Horse and His Boy made into a film (which would allow Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy to appear). But I fear that this is the last we'll see of Narnia on the silver screen. I had hopes for all seven movies to be made, but as of December 15 (six days after opening) Dawn Treader has only made back $112 million of its $155 million budget. It will make money, I think, but it's not a smash hit.

Final thoughts: it's a good movie, it's fun, it's kid-friendly (more than the other two). But I'm a grumpy old man . . .

~ Ben

NARNIA: Bad News & Good News

Extree! Extree! Read all about it!

Disney dropped their funding of the film adaptation of C.S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader!

That's OLD news . . .

I've always been a bit miffed that they chose to put Prince Caspian on the weekend they did. It went up against Indiana Jones and Iron Man! It was almost as if they strategically placed it on the weekend it was most likely to fail on.

Here's the NEW news:

Fox has entered into an agreement to help fund C.S. Lewis's Chronicles of Narnia: Voyage of the Dawn Treader!

I was so disappointed when I first heard Disney was pulling out, because it possibly meant no more Narnia movies. (Merry Christmas!) And personally, I've been hoping that they'd actually do all of them. I just read Horse and His Boy to my kids, and think it would make a wonderful film, especially since it features Lucy, Edmund, and Susan!

Looks like they're planning on a smaller budget. That really doesn't matter. Dawn Treader is a quest film, with no epic battles. It's a fanciful journey through many different fantastic places, with fun creatures and, of course . . .

REEPICHEEP!!!

Narnia movie fans rejoice. We get at least one more!

~ Ben

Nano Film Review Recommendations: Alternatives to Delgo

So you want a fantasy movie that actually IS what Delgo wanted to be?

Here's some recommendations:

The Last Unicorn
I just discovered this film. It's beautiful. The story is interesting and satisfying, if a bit weird.

The Dark Crystal
Similar to Delgo, in that a LOT hinges on the world it creates. It's a valid criticism to say that The Dark Crystal is more style than substance, and some would say that it's a concept in search of a real story. The difference is that this creates a living world, while Delgo's world is dry and disconnected. I love this film. It's a masterpiece of puppeteering that we won't see again because of today's reliance on CGI.

Labyrinth
With Labyrinth, Henson wanted more story to go along with the world, and story-wise it works better than Dark Crystal. World-wise, not as much. Still, it's a bizzare and unique world, and once more pushed puppeteering film effects in to directions we will never be able to see the culmination of.

My Neighbor Totoro
Wow, wanna talk interesting creature and world creation? This movie is crawling with them (literally!).

The Hobbit
I've always loved this movie, since I first watched it on the black and white TV in the basement as a kid on some Saturday afternoon to when we rented it on VHS a little later to when I rewatched it as an adult on DVD. To me, Bilbo Baggins will always sound like Orson Bean.

And don't forget The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (all three versions, including the BBC version and the '70's animated version), Prince Caspian, Pan's Labyrinth (not for kids), The Lord Of The Rings trilogy (The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return of the King), along with the two other versions that were made (both interesting in their own right).

What say you?

~ Ben

Disney Admits Mistake in Prince Caspian Release

Really? You think?

Disney is admitting that maybe releasing Prince Caspian the week after Iron Man and the week before Indiana Jones might not have been a good idea.

I think Iron Man surprised everyone, I guess. Indy, with name recognition and the hype machine, was going to do as well as it did, though. And releasing Caspian less than a week before Indy was NOT a good idea.

~ Ben

Nano Film Review #12 -- Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Lost Skull

Hm.

Yes.

So I went to the midnight show. For Narnia, I felt old. I did not go to the MIDNIGHT show, I went to the NOON show. Weak!

This time I powered through. I'd never seen Indy on the big screen. This was my chance.

My thoughts on the film? It was good. It was a good Indiana Jones movie. Lots of action. Funny one liners. A few references to George Lucas movies (American Graffiti and Star Wars both come to mind -- watch for a classic Harrison Ford line). Absurd getaways. Classic cliffhanger serial style. Fun. It was by the numbers. If I were to rate all the Indiana Jones movies (like a good geek does), this would come third.

Shia Lebeouf wasn't bad. His character actually had some genuine emotional moments, and while he wasn't a buffoon he was impulsive and caused problems. That worked for me. It was fun to see Karen Allen return as Indy's old flame from the first movie, and it seemed like she had more to do in this one. Marcus Brody gets in a good shot at stopping the bad guys without even really being in the film. And Harrison Ford, well, I've never not liked him in a movie.

But overall, the movie felt flat. And I can't place my finger on why. I don't think it was the climax (for those haters of the climax, remember that a 500 year old knight showed up at the end of the third movie). It might have been the exposition that was horribly spelled out at the end (really, that was the best you could do to explain things to the audience that they'd mostly figured out already?). It just felt like they were going through the motions.

So . . . overall, a fun movie. But little more than that.

Ah, but . . . the denouement got me worried for a moment. It was a nice moment, and then something happened that you just about cringe for, but in true Indiana Jones fashion, at the last second Indy swoops in and saves the day. Or moment. Or whatever.

~ Ben

SPOILER (although if you know anything about the movie, you already know about this):

Indiana Jones and Han Solo are now part of the same universe. My theory about the movie linking the two was correct.

Kingdom of the lost Skull features aliens who look like the aliens in Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

Close Encounters of the Third Kind was followed by a "sort of" sequel in E.T. (To me, E.T. was the sequel to Close Encounters, if not literally than "spiritually".)

E.T.-like creatures were in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace.

And Han Solo is in the Star Wars universe.

A stretch? Heck yeah! But a little fun, if lame.

Nano Film Review #11 -- Prince Caspian

I'm just going to cut to the chase:

The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian was amazing.

It was more intense than the first film, and younger children may be disturbed by that. Violence has series consequences in this movie. So do mistakes. And our four heroes make some serious mistakes.

But the movie itself is beautiful. And the themes and messages in the movie, well, they're there if you're looking for them.

I was a little worried about this movie, though. The first one was, to me, really well done. All the things I like about the first movie were in this one, only better. (I am hoping for an extended edition, though.)

So, Speed Racer is going to be kicked to the curb by Narnia. Too bad, I liked Speed Racer. It'll be interesting to see how Iron Man holds up this weekend. People are predicting Narnia to knock it out of the top slot. Next weekend sees the new Indiana Jones movie. How will the Narnians fare against the man with the whip?

~ Ben