I never thought I would say this as I have been waiting to watch Narnia since June, but here goes, Narnia is a tat too slow moving…almost crossing the boundaries to the Kingdom of Boredom … Yes, I remember looking at my watch 3 times during the first hour. This is another 2.5 hour movie which is a Value-For-Money type of film. Lately, directors are fond of long winded shows (perhaps thinking LOTR’s success is measured by the length of film used) without realizing that paying too much to details is the major downfall of a great epic. Or maybe the price of film has dropped due to digital filming. Well, maybe New Zealand directors are long winded (Both Narnia’s director Andrew Adamson (also directed Shrek and Shrek2) and LOTR’s Peter Jackson are New Zealanders). King Kong is another 3 hour movie! More value for your money to go to the theater! However, I must give fair compliments to Richard Taylor and his US Weta Workshop Team for his special effects work in creating 60 different species of Narnia inhabitants. The CGI effects are almost flawless as he breathes live into all the characters he produced. Perhaps film makers nowadays are willing to spend a bomb on making detailed film sets and real-life props and costumes with the realization that these film locations and items can be used as a tourist attraction after the movie release.
The casts are good too especially the child actor Georgie Henley as little Lucy Pevensie who is full of emotions in her face and Tilda Swinton (of Constantine fame) as the witch queen, Jadis. The creatures/animals (especial the lion) are also good in showing their emotions too….
The storyline is good too. I have never read the Narnia book series but as the title reveals, the story tells you about The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe. In layman’s terms, The Good, The Bad and The Link. As it meant for children viewing (and as per the normal Disney deal), it’s full of good elements such as moral, friendship, family, love, respect, doing the right thing, good triumphs over evil, truth over lies, all the good stuffs. There are body counts (thus it is rated PG for battle scenes) but don’t expect gory blood splashing. Even the dead can come back to live (to encourage doing good and heroic deeds)…. Well, Narnia is indeed a large scale, Christmas movie to spread some magical spirit and cheer to warm our hearts.
The action of this movie starts after 1 hour of boring introduction. After that, the characters of Narnia make fun viewing. Try and see if you can spot King Kong in the set. Yes, King Kong made a cameo appearance in the movie. So more value for money ha ha…
Notice that I mentioned King Kong a lot in my reviews lately. I can’t help it as I am expecting a lot with all the hype about the remake of a 1933 classic. Let’s hope Peter, after spending USD207 million, would carefully paced the much anticipated film and not make the same mistake as Narnia (USD200 million) and Harry Potter(USD150 million).
Kelly Rivers
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