Helen Martin’s Blog

I went to see Narnia. Thought it was really very good. Beautiful to look at. I liked how it began by providing context for why the Pevensees were in the old country home to begin with.

The children had fresh faces and seemed to fit their characters (except I think Kenny said Lucy is supposed to be blond.) And to my relief, the animals were very believable, especially the beavers. (I had feared the talking creatures would look like they were in a dog food commercial. Phew.) Jadis was perfectly cast, and given amazing wardrobe and make up. And the mythical creatures were very impressively and convincingly presented - good and evil alike.

The Chronicles of Narnia are so wonderful and it would have been difficult for any movie based on them to meet my expectations, and nearly impossible to reach my high hopes. But I can be so critical. If some of the great parts of the movie are true to what I already admired in the stories, the movie might not get all the credit it is due. And anything that didn’t measure up will be more noticeable to me by its very nature.

I will limit the negative comments to what actually disappointed me.

First, Aslan’s roar was never worthy of him.

(I didn’t know until tonight that Ken agreed - he is very careful not to spoil anything about movies I haven’t seen.) One roar in particular is supposed to scare you bigtime - at least put you in your place, which can and often should be scary - but it didn’t. I thought, “Well, the earth shaking roar must be coming later. They just want to build up to it.” Nope.

Also, I wish Aslan would have been more majestic. He didn’t take my breath away and I had so hoped he would. Since the books almost come out and tell us that Aslan is the world of Narnia’s manifestation of Christ, the potential for awe is pretty high.

I think more screen time and simply staying true to the book’s original dialogue would have done it. Not too tough to do, either, since it’s already written down.

Don’t know why it was ever a controversy that Christians see Christ in Aslan. Anyone who knows all the stories and has even a cursory familiarity with the gospels (um, particularly the last few chapters of each) can’t help but see it and know it was clearly intentional, no matter how many times we are admonished that Narnia wasn’t intended as an allegory.

Let’s see: Substitutionary death of the innocent for the guilty, resulting in the demolition of the power of evil and the reversal of death itself, culminating in resurrection and ultimate victory… If dear Jack wasn’t allegorizing, can we at least agree that he wasn’t plagiarizing?

Lastly, I wanted the eldest Pevensee to be less reluctant. Of course he faces the battle bravely, and I suppose we are to look upon that process as character development. But I wish we could have seen the hero in Peter - his kingliness - as being brought to life in him through his coming into contact with Aslan and then discovered by him as circumstances demanded. Not as something he fought, but something he found.

When the Lord of the Rings trilogy became the movie trilogy, they went and reluct-ified Aragorn, too. In the books Aragorn never says he doesn’t wish or seek to be king. He KNOWS it’s his destiny and his right, and he NEVER fights it. I have no doubt that any hemming and hawing that was written into the script could have been left on the cutting room floor - and never re-spliced, not even for the director’s cut - and Aragorn still would have been one of the dreamiest, most fascinating and heroic figures ever to grace the screen. Even more so.

Despite these relatively small beefs of mine, Narnia was great and deserving of its box office cha-ching. I do so hope more of the Chronicles get made into movies by the same people and cast.

Also, I love the [Focus On The Family Radio Theater] [1] presentations of all seven in the series. Absolutely great. And as for that roar? Hold your breath or lose it.

[1]: http://www.radiotheatre.org/