Two more weeks!!!
It’s almost here!!
The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe hits theatres on December 9th. Now I’m a huge fan of the books, and I’m a huge fantasy movie person. I was sad when Lord of the Rings finished because I knew there’s only one other book that could be done, and right now that one’s in limbo. When I heard that Walden media’s optioned ALL SEVEN of the Narnia books, that excited me.
What excited me more is seeing it all come together. For starters, you have C.S. Lewis’ stepson, Douglas Gresham, involved with the movie, which means you know it will be very true to the story (polar bears pulling the witch’s sledge aside… Apparently New Zealand wouldn’t let them import reindeer for that because of some weird american reindeer disease). You also have WETA Workshop, the team that headed effects, creature creation, and armor for Lord of the Rings, in charge of effects, armor, and creature creation. You know that’ll be good, but then throw in the added bonus that on the effects, they have two other special effects powerhouses collaborating with WETA, Industrial Light & Magic, the original effects minds behind Star Wars, and Sony Pictures Imageworks, which was known for Spider-Man fame. Getting three of the biggest Special effects workshops in the world working on this movie is absolutely incredible.
By incredible, I mean this… I saw a screen test they did with a completely CG lion in one of the featurettes about the movie, and I could not tell this lion wasn’t real. A COMEPLTELY CG Lion that you cannot tell it’s CG. That’s the kind of effects we’re talking about here.
Then there’s stars to the movie. The children are all virtual unknowns (which is fine by my account, I’d feel cheated if they’d been using well known child stars), and the girl playing Lucy is exactly as I would’ve pictured her (not like the pudgy little girl they had in the BBC version). The voice of Aslan is Liam Neeson (I’d always pictures James Earl Jones myself, but from what I’ve heard Neeson does an excellent job). Tilda Swinton looks perfect as the White Witch, and seeing some of the characters in the trailers, the Beavers and the wolf, they sound perfect for their characters. Jim Broadbent looks exactly as I would’ve pictured professor Kirke.
And let’s not forget the director, Andrew Adamson. As director, he’s only worked on two previous movies, Shrek & Shrek 2. He’s been visual effects supervisor in other films, but Shrek is where Adamson’s fame lies. To some it might seem strange having a director of animated features doing a live action movie, but I think it’s precisely what Narnia needs. For starters, it’s well known that Adams, a New Zealander, grew up on these books. If there’s a director who I think can be faithful to the story, he’s it. I think Adamson is to Narnia what Peter Jackson was to Lord of the Rings. Also, with an animated feature, you have to have the vision to essentially create the entire world of that movie from scratch using computers. While not all of Narnia is CG (Thank God… I must admit I get tired of the all-CG location movies a la George Lucas), it still requires that same degree of vision to do it justice. From what I’ve seen, Adamson’s done this book justice.
I think this movie has the ability to be just as big, if not bigger, than Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter. I know I’ll probably see it in theatres a few times, the first of which will be midnight opening at Bridgeport Village. 2 weeks, 3 days, 13 hours….
~Andrew =)