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Dec
28
2005

The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe REVIEW

Posted by Mathew at 8:20am.

Posted in Film & DVD Reviews , Sci-Fi & Fantasy, USA & Canada, UK, Ireland, Australia & New Zealand.

Narnia.jpg

I know that this review is quite after the fact, but as I have just recently seen the film and so vehemently disagree with Jim’s earlier review I just have to give my two cents – or pence, rather.

The opening scenes of The Chronicles of Narnia deal with the realities of the world that the child protagonists, Peter, Edmund, Susan and Lucy, live in. Bombs fall from the sky during a blitz on London in World War II, and with the immediate and terrifying results of a war apparent all around them, their mother sends them off to the countryside as part of the evacuation programme for school aged children.

It’s around about this point I began a rumination.

The Chronicles of Narnia are a uniquely British institution. Unlike, for example, the Lord of the Rings, made by a compatriot of C.S. Lewis, J.R.R Tolkien (duh! – everyone reading) which is set entirely within a foreign lands, the lands of Narnia are entirely framed in the realities of wartime Britain and work, at points, as allegory for them. Don’t worry, I’m not forgetting the most blatant allegory, pedantry fans. This makes the film, an American production, a bit of a risky proposition. In fact, I was initially amazed that they’d kept it so true to the book. But you just actually couldn’t translate this – Americanize it. ‘What would the children be escaping from?’ is only the first of a lot of questions you’d have to ask. Indeed, Aslan, Narnia’s great Christ figure (told you I wouldn’t forget), is a lion and you can’t get much more British than a lion. After all there are England’s Three Lions and Scotland’s Lion Rampant.  Wales has a giant leek or something - a Dragon, heh - but that’s not important. The lion, despite naturally hanging out on the savannah rather than the moors, is a symbol of the ultimate in British pride and courage. Yes, Aslan feels as British as a nice cup of tea.

I guess this, to the many negative reviews I’ve read, is a problem. A great deal of the inherent resonance in The Chronicles of Narnia is lost if you’re either

a) not British
b) under about 20

Because the sad fact is that I’m probably one of the last generations that will have a true understanding of the results of World War II in Britain – most people my age have had grandparents live through it, either as reluctant warriors, evacuees or just people with the bad luck to be there - and have heard the stories first hand.

Because of this, from the offset, The Chronicles of Narnia doesn’t particularly feel like a film aimed at kids, despite the youth of the protagonists. Indeed, along these lines, something that you see throughout this film is just quite how dark the world of Narnia is – parts would be genuinely scary for a child, and heck, I find Tilda Swinton freakin’ terrifying anyway.

So, if we can return to the plot, having escaped from the terrors of London trapped in a cycle of nightly destruction, they, after a great deal of sibling scuffling, escape from the horror of a stuffy old country home into the world of Narnia, through the titular wardrobe. And there, their adventure really begins.

I could cut to the chase, here, and not bother with any more plot synopsis, I really could. Because the changes made to the original book is minimal. This is absolutely, insanely true to the book… To my 24 year old, haven’t read the books since I was a kid, mind.

Ahem.

Perhaps it’s this that led me to enjoy this film a great deal. It remains true to the books to the point of not censoring or editing itself for the screen, and creates all the wonder and fantasy of the books in suitably grand detail, enough that you can be carried along throughout the film, almost like the child you were when you read the books for the first time.

Each of the children are superb in their roles, with particular praise to be doled out to Georgie Henley, playing Lucy Pevensie, who acts utterly naturally for a little girl interacting with things that either aren’t really there or are completely bonkers, and she looks adorable with a tea cup and saucer in her little hands. The media will be glad to know that I am so on watch that a faun that wants to be friends with a wee girl sets my alarm bells ringing, giving James McAvoy’s role as Mr. Tumnus an ever so slightly unwanted edge in an otherwise sterling piece of work from the Glaswegian actor. The highest praise is kept for Tilda Swinton, who, as the White Witch, easily plays from glacier freeze royalty to a polar bear led Boadicea with her traditional skill – as I’ve said earlier, her scary androgynous looks help her out a bit, but there is more to the role than that.

Speaking of her role as a war queen, this film did fairly well in reminding me not only how scary the world of Narnia is, but how warlike. Perhaps it’s, yes, riding in on that horse named ‘Big CGI battles like in Lord of the Rings’ but it is gleefully chaotic, even though one of the centaurs looks a wee bit too much like The Rock for my liking.

Ah. You want me to talk about the religious aspects of the story. I’ll leave it to the words of C.S. Lewis –

“it is not, as some people think, an allegory. That is, I don’t say, “Let us represent Christ as Aslan” I say “Suppose there was a world like Narnia, and supposing like ours, it needed redemption, let us imagine what sort of Incarnation and Passion and Resurrection Christ would have there.”

Lewis has written hundreds of pages of correspondence in which he states this over and over again. I don’t know what else I can say about how it features in the film other than to say it features exactly as he describes it, and it’s up to us, the viewer, to take what we will from it.

And, in turn, that’s what films ask us to do in general. I can only really give you my experience of this film, but as a British person of the exact kind of age to know the background of the story, and to have appreciated the books as a child, I actually enjoyed it a great deal. Any point where you would complain it was overlong, it sagged, etcetera, etcereta, you could throw at the book itself.

This film makes me think of the snow falling softly on Narnia, hot cups of tea by a roaring fire, shared with a slightly over friendly faun. This film makes me think of a roaring Aslan, reborn, courageous in battle. This film makes me think of sneaking to the wardrobe in the hope there’s a world in there. This film makes me want to pick the book up again, and not only to read it myself, but to one day share it with children.

What more can it do?

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Reader Comments

  1. Jasper 12/28/2005 @ 12:20pm

    Well, I am British and having just seen it the other day, my most immediate impression was how cheap and shoddily-made it was considering how hyped it had been in the run up. Sorry, it just didnt do it for me at all. Regardless of the quality of its literary origins (and I do have my own nostalgic recollections of reading CS Lewis before my age hit double figures) this was simply bad filmmaking.

  2. Jim Tudor 12/28/2005 @ 7:35pm

    I appreciate the alternate point of view, especially since so many people I know ended up loving the film. I’m really glad that everyone who liked it liked it so much. But I still stand by my review, not being British nor having any particularly fond memories of the book. (My preference in youth-wisked-to-a-magical-world tales has always been “The Wizard of Oz”.) Being British shouldn’t be a pre-requisite in really “getting” this film. Obviously its not, since as I said, lots of American folks I know love it. (Although they’re not the type of people I necessarily look to for their taste in cinema, but I’m sure Disney is happy to take their ticket money all the same.) I’m honestly glad you liked the film, Mathew, as you’re review joins the other film-savvy reviews which are surprisingly quite many in number. But as I said, I found it sadly lacking. You may notice it’s not on my Bottom 10 list - it’s not that bad - but on the whole, I agree with Jasper on this front.

  3. Diana 12/28/2005 @ 7:40pm

    Very much appreciated your comment about Narnia’s rootes in wartime Britain—indeed, that was the thing that troubled me about the animated feature “Valiant”, also about the blitzkrieg; you have to know something about the history to see the film as more than just lightweight. That genuine threat of invasion of the Homeland has simply ever been experienced for America. For Narnia, I’m very glad Adamson decided to add those opening scenes that weren’t in the book.

  4. Kurt 12/29/2005 @ 7:59pm

    Just got back from seeing NARNIA at the Local AMC (to a full house screening, with amazingly no ‘annoying film patrons’!).

    I found it to be mind-numblingly pedestrian. The war-time Britain material comprises of about 6 minutes of screentime and is dropped. In fact, the film is undoubtedly made for children, but leaves little for the adults to chew on. Every plot point (and I haven’t read the book so all the material was new to me) was telegraphed so obviously (again, I’m not forgetting this is a kids movie) But what perhaps annoyed me most is that that the move wants to act all mean and scary-like, but then pulls the punches. Why have a line like ‘Clean your Sword and rise’ (I’m quoting from memory, so forgive me if I’m wrong.) when there is never so much as a drop of blood ever shown. Perhaps there have just been too many epic films made recently and the producers of Narnia wanted to keep it short, but the character arcs are so rushed they lose all impact. There just isn’t enough time spent on anything to allow it to ‘breathe’. Sending the children in to combat is just ridiculous (yes, I know, talking animals...suspension of disbelief), What did the children actually do, other than act as inspiration to the rest of the narnia folk...isn’t Aslan enough? These were the things that floated through my mind.

    Oh yea, why make Peter the leader if he is just going to surrender the High Ground in favour of a dramatic charge? But the movie had long lost me with the sloppy production design of the fairy tale prince and princess look with was like classic Disney crossed with cheap Renaissance Festival.

    My expectations going into this film were low, but it failed to meet even that.

    Forgive the late night ranting, If I was 12 (admittedly the movies target audience) this movie would probably have been great. But I think the movie is more or less worthless for adult viewers.

  5. anon 12/31/2005 @ 3:29am

    hehe, i liked the SNL rap video better

  6. Kim C 01/02/2006 @ 8:14pm

    I had read all the harsh reviews as I sat down with my family to watch Narnia and to my surprise I liked it a lot. It really felt like old time matinees I used to watch as a child.

    I can’t really put my finger on what made me like it but I know that it would surely have been a completely different film if they had made it more “realistic” with character development, story rewriting etc. I think the simplicity of the story appealed to me.

    When I first heard of the movie the connection to WETA made me cautious. But when I saw the finished result it was not anything close to Lord of the rings and that was a good thing. I was afraid I would compare it to THE fantasy trilogy of a lifetime but instead it appealed to my inner child.

    It was a simple movie that I enjoyed just as I enjoyed The wizard of oz as a kid going to the matinee.

  7. biscuit 01/10/2006 @ 4:09am

    i liked the movie it talking about god. thats the only movie i liked except passion if christ.i need 2 no where can i get all books because if the books are the same as the book then i will enjoy the book as much as i loved the movie.

  8. biscuit 01/10/2006 @ 4:10am

    i liked the movie it talking about god. thats the only movie i liked except passion if christ.i need 2 no where can i get all books because if the books are the same as the book then i will enjoy the book as much as i loved the movie.

  9. mathew 01/10/2006 @ 3:02pm

    There is a wonderful review of Narnia by Andrew Rilestone <a>here</a>. It’s very long, but wondefully pedantic.

  10. Atkins 02/07/2006 @ 5:54pm

    Just watched the Chronicles of Narnia movie. Critics? Well… hmm… How can I say it. I have the impression Disney is making the same movies for the last few years.

    N.B. I am not discussing the animation movies here. Those are Really the same. Every frame. The style, the ideas… taking a deep breath… and they keep on rerere(re)leasing their old successes (Cinderella especially, I think)… There were some good ones I admit… BUT that was when they were working with Pixar and I think Pixar was the only reason!

    So, they are doing movies for the family. And they think that means movies that make everyone happy. Rule N°4 from the Reality: “It is impossible to make everyone happy, so keep your forces for something meaningful”. Result of non respecting Rule N°4: “You make everyone angry (and that is absolutely possible).”

    Now, about Narnia’s Chronicles, a new term came to my mind: flatfilm (in Bulgaria we have a very good word for this: “boza”, but it’s difficult to translate). That means you can watch it (i.e. watchable), but you’re kind of sliding on it, without feeling anything. The scenes were toooo long, there wasn’t a scenario, they really used the book, Tilda Swinton (White witch) was more witch than white, more of a barbarian than a queen, and the whole flavoured with… what? special effects (quite good in fact)!, called “the magic of Narnia” by Disney. You know I’ll stop here. Criticising is like hitting: there must be something to hit on.

    P.S. Try to visit Disney’s site, it’s hideous (i.e. “so extremely ugly as to be terrifying"), especially the graphics and the sound.

  11. Patrick J. McCarthy 05/21/2006 @ 5:59pm

    Only something so right would result in such a didactic(?) effect on those who experienced it. The last time people witnessed this message, it walked on the earth out of love for humanity.

    To this day, people are either for or against acceptance of this fact, with those against trying to make everyone else settle for indifference instead of utter(ed) reality. That end-game includes attacking or dismissing the periphery for fear of the center itself--pure cowardace! ("Here, kitty,” indeed!!) Case in point: Edmund’s betrayal glorifies rather than detracts from Aslan’s commitment to Narnia. Apply that to our lives to find Lewis’ message that no cast, director, producer or distributor could dilute. I LOVED THIS FILM and that “certain something indescrible” about it is TRUTH. Not many films from any source touch on that these days.
    -----

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