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![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) cleolinda | |
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I'm going to put all of the Narnia stuff behind a cut, but if you're on the fence and want something to push you over the edge into seeing the movie, this is it. >> I had seen the pictures of the White Witch's battle outfit for months. The one with the polar bear chariot that's photoshopped to look blue and snowy in the poster art, you know--I've used it in my icons. But I'd seen it in its proper context and I still hadn't realized what I was looking at until I happened to read something on Narniaweb--I thought it was prairie grass or something ( see interview snippet here). And no one I have talked to has realized what it was, either, until it was pointed out--once you know, it's obvious, but it--it's just not something you would expect.So the battle at the end arrives, and I want my sister to fully appreciate what she's seeing, so I lean over and whisper, "You know what she's wearing, right?" "No, what?" "SHE'S WEARING ASLAN'S MANE.""HOLY SHIT." The White Witch is freakin' hardcore, y'all. >> And then she pwns Edmund in battle. >> And then she brings out the two swords and pwns Peter. You get the feeling that she could have totally finished him off if she weren't having so much fun fucking with him. >> I have got to scan in the Michael Hague illustration of how Aslan finishes the Witch off, because--costume and setting aside--it is very like what actually happens. And is awesome. >> Aslan is very obviously Liam Neeson; they didn't fiddle with his voice or lower it or anything. Fortunately, it didn't really stick out after the first couple of lines. >> Speaking of which, the Aslan and beavers effects are awesome. Also, I just realized that I wasn't thinking of the wolves as effects as all. >> They skip the part where Aslan and Susan and Lucy romp around after the Stone Table, and thank God, because I can see that falling completely flat on film. It would stop the movie dead right when the battle's just gotten started, and the effects would inevitably look like first Harry Potter movie quidditch crap. >> Lucy is the cutest little girl ever. Like, weapons-grade cute. >> My sister is now in love with Mr. Tumnus. I'm afraid she's going to have to fight Lucy for him, though, assuming that the vice squad doesn't come down on him for hitting on a toddler first. >> My sister says she will settle for Peter. >> I kind of want to hug Edmund. They got such a great kid to play him--he's a surly little bastard but he misses his dad and they spend 85% of the movie making him feel like shit for what he did, and shit's like, "HEY! Don't involve me in this!" I'm not even going to spoil the Witch's line in the dungeon when she tells Tumnus what Edmund did, because it's that awesome. >> The part in the Witch's sledge is awesome, because you can see her petting and feeding and flattering Edmund with all this sugary calculation and then she just forgets and goes "NO YOU CAN'T HAVE ANYMORE!" It's not even so much that she's faking being nice as that she's faking being human. >> P.S. Watch for the lion that Edmund drew a mustache on at the coronation. I can't figure out if the lion doesn't know he's got a mustache and glasses drawn on, or he can't get them off, or he's just so proud that the king drew on him that he doesn't care. >> That, and I swear to God Susan actually says "Oh, REALLY?" at one point. I think it's around when they first get to Narnia, but I'm not sure. Seriously, someone watch for that and tell me what the context is, because I was too busying choking on my own laughter. I want a Susan O RLY? icon that somehow makes sense so bad I can taste it. I had miscellaneous issues with the movie--the music was too loud, with too much Our Lady of Soundtrack Woodling; some of the lines and/or acting needed to be a little more natural (the scene where Susan and Lucy splash around in the creek comes to mind, and then the part just after where Susan announces that She Needs to Get Some Practice); I loved that they got Michael Madsen for Maugrim, but he needed to shut the hell up and just bite Peter, for God's sake, because that "You just don't have what it TAKES" shit got old fast; Peter needed to STFU after about the eighteenth "When are you going to learn?" bit; the major points of the movie were hammered home a bit hard ("Why don't you start ACTING like a family?"), but it is a children's movie, so I keep reminding myself to cut it a little slack. All in all, two thumbs up, didn't rape my childhood, Susan's got it goin' on, fine holiday fun. I think the Lovely Emily and I may go see it tomorrow night (her first time, my second) when she gets in from out of town, whee! ETA: "Ok so here's the hard part, which is better Narnia or Goblet?"    Tags: movies, narnia
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Current Music: More Martika. Shut. Up.
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Comments
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You know, it's hard to say, because on one hand, Goblet has a group of child actors who have now worked out many of the kinks in their acting, and the whole cast has a very lived-in, comfortable chemistry now. I think the Narnia kids are better now than the Potter kids were in the first movie, but then, the older Pevensie kids are in their late teens. And I think Adamson is a better director, in terms of getting decent performances, than Columbus was. I think Cuaron pulled better performances from all the kids, and Newell pulled a fantastic performance from Radcliffe in this last one--both of those directors focused on more "natural" acting. So Adamson and the Narnia kids are kind of in the middle range.
Goblet's also an "older" movie, in terms of the target audience, so it's a lot more harrowing (a good thing). On the other hand, they're trying to cram this huge book into less than three hours, and while they make some great adaptation calls, towards the end, the who/what/where/how starts to fall apart, like when Dumbledore's like, "They're going to find they're missing a prisoner." NO KIDDING, MAN. Narnia's the opposite--they've *expanded* a relatively brief book, so all the plot points you need to understand what's going on are there.
I've seen Goblet three times now and Narnia only once, so it's hard to judge--I'd have to see Narnia at least once more, because I can only think of it in terms of "Oh, I really loved that one moment" or "I wish they hadn't done that right there," rather than the movie as a whole right now.
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Someone quoted a letter Lewis wrote to some Maryland schoolchildren (I think it's in the comments in one of the two previous entries) where he basically says, Aslan isn't *specifically* Jesus. Aslan was his attempt to say, what if a fairy tale/fantasy world had a character that functioned as a savior? And as Aslan is a lion, not a man, "he is very different." He also mentions Bacchus and "rivers running with wine" when Tumnus first meets Lucy, so really, anyone who says, by God, LWW is a Christian allegory and Aslan IS Jesus is forcing an outside POV on the book that isn't there.
Tilda Swinton, in one of those interviews I linked to, said something really interesting--that she thought the story wasn't Christian per se because Christian stories tend to be about faith, about submitting to and finding comfort in a higher power, and LWW--the movie version, certainly--is rather about these children going out into the world (or this world, anyway) and learning to take care of themselves and triumph, which is more of a classic fairy-tale trope. I mean, the movie battle, in particular? Is fought on the assumption that Aslan is dead and will not be there to help them. It's not fought on the faith that someone will swoop in and save them, although that it happens is totally a bonus. It's fought because Peter and Edmund feel a responsibility to the Narnians, and they assume leadership roles and do things they didn't think they could (Peter, in particular).
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