I've just seen THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE...

[rj_anderson]

And although I was skeptical at first, right now I am just overflowing with so. much. love.

They got it right. I hardly dared to hope it could be done, but they really did get it right. At least, all the parts I personally strongly felt they needed to get right, they did. And the bits they added in that weren't in the book, I mostly didn't mind, or even outright liked (like the fox).

The absolute best bit, though, has not been mentioned by anyone in any of the reviews I've read to date: When Aslan turns from killing the White Witch, and looks at Peter and says, "It is finished."

My eyes nearly popped out of my head. I couldn't keep it in -- I just burst out, "OH MAN THAT'S SO COOL." I'm sure half the theatre must have heard me. I mean, here I'd been afraid that they were going to downplay the Aslan-Christ parallel or somehow mess it up, and instead they went and made it even stronger, by having Aslan speak the very words of the Lord Himself. I had shivers, and tears in my eyes (not like I hadn't been crying ever since Aslan went to the Stone Table, mind you) -- it was beautiful. Perfect.

As for the rest, Tilda Swinton's White Witch was every bit as cold, ruthless, chilling and brilliant as she needed to be -- and the duel between her and Peter was, as I just finished saying to lydaclunas, WICKED COOL. Loved the way she used her wand and the sword together. As for the Pevensies, I've always had a bit of a literary crush on Peter, and I must say this movie did not discourage that at all. Susan was lovely, and I was very interested by the way they emphasized her being "logical" and more focused on practical and earthly realities, as it were, than the others -- maybe I was reading too much into the script, but they almost seemed to be hinting at her eventual loss of belief in Narnia. Which, I have said before and will say again, is a genuine tragedy and not a case of "Good riddance to bad rubbish" in the least, and I'm sure I will cry buckets if and when the movies get to that point.

Also, hee on the movie's revisionist handling of Father Christmas's infamous "battles are ugly when women fight" comment, rubbed in still further by the presence of tough-looking female centaurs in Peter's army. It's not like I was sentimentally attached to that line or anything, so I didn't mind that particular change in the least. In fact I got a bit of a chuckle out of it.

In short, I loved the movie and would gladly see it again, and when my kids are old enough not to be scared witless by some of the nastier-looking creatures, I'm sure I will. And in the meantime, there's Prince Caspian to look forward to -- at this rate, the sooner the better.

Note to self: badly need at least two Narnia icons.

Comments

[persephone-kore.livejournal.com]

The "It is finished" -- I haven't seen people comment on that either, I don't think. And that includes people who liked it and people who are grumpling that they don't think it was true enough to the book or emphasized Aslan's divinity enough. I've been contemplating bringing it up a few places, actually -- it bowled me over, I was completely not expecting it -- but I don't particularly feel like getting into the argument if someone complains that it should have come before he died. (Never mind that his mouth was tied shut, or that in the context of a physical battle it makes somewhat more sense where they put it.)

[fpb.livejournal.com]

What bothers me - did nobody notice this? - is that it reverses the last of Our Lord's last words on the Cross. We know that Aslan is Jesus, the Messiah, the Second Person of the Trinity. And Jesus spoke these words, not as any enemy was being killed, but as He was. There is something here that does not ring true to me, and reminds me that many of the people involved in this will not have been any kind of Christian.

[guttaperk.livejournal.com]

It is arguable that Satan's chances died a kind of death with Jesus' sacrifice.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Yes, but is it not the general feeling that His Death represents the very reverse of aggression and punishment? Also, in the context of Narnia, the fall of the Witch is to do not with His Death but with His Resurrection.

[guttaperk.livejournal.com]

I guess what I am saying is that I do see parallels. I do not claim that the parallels are perfect. I do see your basis quite clearly.

Your criticism does extend, however, to the original book. It is not an artifact of the movie. If we stand against the agression and punishment of the movie, we should also therefore stand against the aggression and punishment of the book.

I stand firmly against aggression and punishment in real life, but find that I cannot so staunchly oppose fictional aggression against (punishment of) fictional characters that likely represent non-anthropomorphic entities.

My personal feeling is that the Rule of Sin over Man did die a kind of death with Jesus' sacrifice and with his resurrection, and thus I do not share your deep misgivings.

I would note, however, that the dismissal of people as NotReallyHuman in order to unflinchinly perpetrate aggression against them is a common human failing with disastrous consequences. That does give me pause.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Well, no. The Harrowing of Hell is a definite part of Tradition, and it was Our Lord Himself who saw Satan falling as lightning from Heaven and spoke of the everlasting fire prepared for the Devil and his angels. I am the last person in the world (if you had followed some of my online rows!) to want a Christianity purged of Hell and Divine anger. I just think that particular expression, at that particular time, is out of place. It is as if to say: This is all that I, as Savìour, have come to do. But it is not. By rising from the dead, Our Saviour not only defeated Hell and Death, but above all opened wide the gates of Heaven. That, if anything, should be what "It is finished" should be used for, if it is removed from its natural place in the story.

You know what it reminds me of? There was that pretty dreadful song, "We are the world", at the time of the great movement to help the victims of famine in 1985. The song, I think everyone will agree, stank on ice, although giants like Stevie Wonder, Bruce Springsteen, Bob Dylan and Ray Charles lent it a class it did not deserve. One line said: "As God has taught us, by turning stone to bread..." The thing is, this is nonsense. It is not God, but the Devil tempting Him, who promised to turn stone to bread. God multiplied bread and fishes in the two feeding miracles, but did not turn stone to bread; indeed, he used the two as a sign of opposing and incompatible things. ("Which of you, if your son ask him for bread, would give him a stone?")

What I am saying is that here you have the mental fingerprint, so to speak, of someone who has no familiarity at all with Holy Writ, quotes from hazy memories because he feels that it is required in that particular situation, and gets it wrong. As for the rest of the film, they had the sense to stick fairly closely to Lewis' original, and (in spite of some deadening in the sacrifice scene, which again shows insensitivity to the properly Christian content of the story) they just proved how well C.S.Lewis wrote it in the first place. Well done to them for doing it, but it is, on their part, no more than professionalism. It is Lewis whom we should praise.

[guttaperk.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure what you are disagreeing with, since I'm not aware that I alluded to stripping the world of Divine anger. I rather alluded to the fact that dehumanisation of anthropomorphic figures is a universal prelude to atrocity, and is perhaps one of the most dangerous mental steps that we can take, whether as a group or in individual action.

"It is as if to say: This is all that I, as Savìour, have come to do."
If those were the words used, I would certainly condemn them. But they were not, and I do not share that interpretation of the actual dialogue. I suspect that that difference in our interpretations is key.

The line you quote from "We are the World" prevented me from liking the song. I understand your misgivings with regard to the movie, but again do not quite share them. You sound fairly firm in your conviction that the changed stemmed from ignorance- what is the basis of that conviction?

I think that my major problem with your thesis is that I think that your argument is well-founded, but fundamentally subjective, personal, and interpretative. As such, I have problems in taking it to be more widely definitive, and I am certainly reluctant to speculate as to the mindset of the film-makers on that basis.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

Yes, I do not say anything more than that. I was sharing a doubt I had, not intending to hammer anyone over the head with facts. Nor did I intend to imply that you wanted to strip the faith of Divine anger - if anything, I was trying to say that I was not! I agree with you about dehumanizing others, too, and I find that bit in Lewis a bit too close to the overt racism of his Catholic friend Tolkien (and, incidentally, I love Tolkien too, though I find some aspects of his views disquieting). It is not a matter of agreeing or disagreeing, in general, so much as of trying to clarify a feeling I had.

However, as for "We are the world", I do disagree. With or without the incriminated line, nothing will change my view that it is a dreadful piece of sentimentality and disguised egotism. Compared to "Do they know it's Christmas?", it comes across, to me, as wholly self-regarding and deprived of any genuine emotion; the great line, "Well tonight thank God it's them instead of you!" has more to say to me than the whole of "We are the world". If you disagree, that is your privilege, but this is my view.

[guttaperk.livejournal.com]

Huh?

What do you think I am saying about the song?

[fpb.livejournal.com]

YOu said: The line you quote from "We are the World" prevented me from liking the song. To me, this implied "if it had not been there, I might have liked it." I, on the other hand, would have disliked it with or without that line. If I misunderstood what you said, I apologize.

[guttaperk.livejournal.com]

You misunderstood what I said.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

And I apologize.

[rj-anderson.livejournal.com]

If you're going to continue this discussion do you mind taking it somewhere else, as it hasn't really got anything to do with the post any more and seems to be just between the two of you? Thanks.

[fpb.livejournal.com]

It was finished a couple of hours ago.

[rj-anderson.livejournal.com]

Christ spoke those words as He had completed the work of redemption, thus defeating Satan in what Satan no doubt believed was his hour of greatest triumph. As such, having Aslan speak that phrase after killing the White Witch seems perfectly legitimate to me. And, as others have pointed out, he couldn't have said it at the Stone Table, because his mouth was tied with cords, and anyway it wasn't finished, not in the Narnian sense, until he was actually killed.