Ink Blotting - The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and The Wardrobe

Posted on Thursday, January 19, 2006 at 12:00 AM

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

One particularly vehement reviewer states that one of the biggest faults of the movie is the Disney logo at the start. Negative reviews don't get much better than that for jaw dropping amazement. It is not hard to envision the resentment that reviewer had towards the movie from the getgo and to find anything positive at all. The majority of the other reviews of this 65 million dollar first weekend opening movie are predominantly positive.

Reviewers have a hard time not comparing Narnia to The Lord of the Rings. Given the time the books were written in and the relationship between C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien (even their names are similar) it is not hard to see how this is so. Both are works of fantasy and involve relative innocents being thrust into the role of savior. Neither take place on "earth" as we know it and both involve the dispatching of evil for the side of good. Narnia has Aslan the lion and Lord of the Rings has Gandalf the grey/white.

In this reviewer's opinion, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is the better movie.

The movie begins with the Pembersly children suffering through a particularly heavy German bombardment on their city during the second World War. Afraid to lose them their mother sends the two boys and two girls to their Uncle's estate in rural England. It is at this stage that several reviewers compare this movie to the Harry Potter series. And while somewhat fair (both are British with long train rides and involve mystery and magic away from home in a castle filled with wondrous things) are comparisons that simply cloud this particularly wonderful movie by serving it up as refried Harry Potter enters the world of J.R.R. Tolkien.

One of the ways in which Narnia works so well is the way in which the camera captures the wondrous world of Narnia through the eyes and angles of the children. There are fauns, centaurs, talking beavers and magic galore and because this world exists a mere wardrobe from ours there is a sense that these mysteries are but an adult winter fur coat away.

The pacing of Narnia is slow at times, especially while the children debate the validity of little Lucy's experience in Narnia during hide and go seek. And then moves along at an advanced rate before the great battle between good and evil. Some reviewers have used these pacing issues to revile the movie as lacking and there is credence to their viewpoint as Susan's constant doubts and nagging wears and grates on the viewer. Nevertheless the decision to believe Lucy and attempt the wardrobe is the critical point of the movie, for first Edmund and then Susan and Peter, as it initiates their own need to fight for the side of good in a war against evil that they cannot fight at home against the Germans.

To C.S. Lewis it was the story and the characters in the story that were important. To J.R.R. Tolkien it was the creation of a complete world. C.S. Lewis' world was a backdrop for the stories he wished to tell and in the case of The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe there isn't a finer movie out there.

4 stars out of 4.

Kyle Gould is a University of Calgary Graduate in English devoutly trying to make the 25,000 dollar piece of parchment not just a glorified ink blot. Currently it would serve better as a Rorschach test. Feel free to throw some ink his way at wkkgould@hotmail.com.