The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

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Can we reasonably expect every movie to be a masterpiece? No.

Can we reasonably harbor such hope every time walk into a theater? Yes.

The public will likely react to Andrew Adamson’s The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe in much the same way they reacted to C. S. Lewis’ short novel. Some will be deeply moved, some will enjoy it but remain fairly indifferent, and some will hate it. But the film is no more likely to be universally hailed as “great cinema” than the book has been universally praised as “great literature.” Take that as you will.

Producer Douglas Gresham is perhaps unfortunately correct in claiming that the success of the movie will hinge on the appeal of the story, not on the craft of the film’s director—for the strength of this movie is the story, which is effectively enough told, if in a journeyman-like fashion.

Adamson is also perhaps unfortunately correct in claiming that “whatever you found in the book, you will find in the film.” I certainly doubt that many viewers will find more in the film than they found in the book.

Is that such a bad thing? I guess not. In fact, according to Walden Media President Michael Flaherty, if audiences even prefer the book to the movie, “We consider that a success.” Why? Because, as long as the movie is a good one, at least the comparison will have been made; and that means another book has been read.

So while I’m personally disappointed that Adamson took the opportunity to make a merely good film rather than a truly groundbreaking one, most audiences are likely to be perfectly satisfied with The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. But is the movie good enough to be breakout success, generating enough buzz to draw an audience not already familiar with Narnia—in the way that The Lord of the Rings did? I doubt it. There’s just not enough about it that’s really unique.

In fact, the parts of the movie I found most uninspiring were those that will come as no surprise to those who read the book: a meal with the Beavers, Edmund in the Witch’s palace, the disaster at the Stone Table and the battle between Peter’s army and the Witch’s host. And that was the problem with those scenes: they weren’t at all surpising.

But there are still a handful of nice surprises in the film: James McAvoy’s performance as Tumnus, Skandar Keynes as Edmund, beautiful scenery and CGI (surprising, that is, if you haven’t been paying attention to the trailers) and a couple of new action sequences (pleasant, that is, if you care for scenes that feel scripted for gaming tie-ins).

The parts of the movie I enjoyed most, however, were those in which Adamson seemed most at liberty because of the sparseness of Lewis’ narrative. In particular, the opening London Blitz sequence and the Pevensie children’s subsequent exile to a country manor established the setting and characters very effectively.

And through the characters, the major themes of Lewis’ book come through loud and clear, particularly those of responsibility and sacrifice; in fact, they come through too loud for some. Polly Toynbee, writing an editorial on the film for The Guardian, says: “Of all the elements of Christianity, the most repugnant is the notion of the Christ who took our sins upon himself and sacrificed his body in agony to save our souls. Did we ask him to? Poor child Edmund, to blame for everything, must bear the full weight of a guilt only Christians know how to inflict.”

It’s funny how the theme of sacrifice is so appealing to some and so “repugnant” to others. Is the starving refugee who saves the last bowl of rice for her child wrong to do so? Is it better for the child to die than to live with the guilt of watching mom starve?

In a 2001 interview, author Philip Pullman said that if Christians want to find love in Narnia, they’ll have to invent it because it simply isn’t there. If the only significance of sacrifice is guilt, I suppose that’s the case—but that’s a brand of guilt that Christianity didn’t manufacture, because what motivates sacrifice is love. And that seems incredibly obvious to me; certainly, Lewis the narrator took great pains to explain what motivated Aslan’s sacrifice in his book. But if it isn’t so obvious to filmgoers with no prior exposure to Narnia, I doubt that this film will clear things up. If one already understands how loving sacrifice works, one can find it here. If one doesn’t, though, there’s a good chance one might only find guilt on the screen because, to be honest, Liam Neeson’s CGI Aslan is pretty inscrutable. With Lewis’ narration gone, it’s pretty hard to figure out why Aslan does what he does.

And that’s too bad. Like Jim Broadbent’s professor Kirke, Adamson himself has been trying to get to Narnia through the wardrobe for a very long time. He didn’t seem to find much but bloodless scenery and a good story when he got there. Audiences might be lucky enough to find a bit more, if they're willing to try.

Images Copyright 2005 Disney Enterprises, Inc. and Walden Media, LLC. All rights reserved.

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