Review: Prince Caspian (Andrew Adamson)

[nebroadwe]

I finally sat down to watch the last of my Christmas DVDs this week -- Andrew Adamson's Prince Caspian, which I must say has left me feeling quite vicariously heroic. It's a worthy attempt at turning the least dramatic of the Narnia books into drama, and I think it largely succeeds. Not being (everybody say it with me!) a text purist, I have no problem with amplifying the storyline to include, say, a night raid on Miraz's castle, or even with amplifying the characterization to make Peter and Caspian quasi-rivals. I do object when the plot logic goes shaky on its own account, as it does in a couple of places right near the end. Caspian and Peter's argument after the failed raid should not have taken place in public -- the obvious consequence of that (a loss of confidence, almost certainly fatal, by the army in its leadership) is never addressed. Nikabrik and companions are too small and too particular a faction to represent the whole. I'd buy it if the two captains had drawn on each other in council, though; it's not an illogical link to Caspian's decision to accept Nikabrik's help. There again, however, the amplification that allows Tilda Swinton back to strut her stuff as the Witch doesn't trouble me, but I am bothered by a kind of looseness in the details. Her arrival, though dramatic, didn't have the kind of I-hear-theremins! quality that would justify Caspian immediately regretting his decision. (It didn't help that the Hag walked through her own circle after drawing it around her victim!) There's also no clear reason for the rescue party to show up so promptly upon its cue, and the action sequence (though, by the testimony of the commentary, much cut down) ran a touch long over against the temptation bits. Subsequently, the decision to have Peter rather than Caspian challenge Miraz really needed the explanation that it got in the otherwise justifiably deleted scene about choosing the marshals. Oh, and a longbow is not a close combat weapon. Period.

That out of the way, I quite enjoyed the work from the cast. It was fun watching Sergio Castellitto's Miraz assume that he was powerful enough to ride roughshod over everyone around him, until suddenly they weren't letting him. I also thought it was interesting to have Damián Alcázar's Sopespian be a straightforward self-interested, power-hungry intriguer to contrast with Pierfrancesco Favino's Glozelle, who's just following orders until he begins to discover that he can't. My inner sixteen-year-old fangirl (who didn't exist when I was actually sixteen, so I'm not sure where she came from) had no objections to Ben Barnes as Caspian (and awwwed and giggled over his gentle flirtation with Anna Popplewell's Susan, whose ironic "Ooh-er!" over their first meeting was one of the funniest moments on the commentary track) but was much more inclined to moon over William Moseley, even when Peter was being an ass. My forty-year-old inner fangirl prefers Skandar Keynes's Edmund for being the world's best right-hand-man -- here was certainly "a graver and quieter man than Peter, and great in council and judgement," as Lewis writes. Georgie Henley's Lucy continued cute. And Warwick Davis as Nikabrik was amazing -- I'll take him, scene for scene, over Peter Dinklage's Trumpkin despite the latter getting all the good lines. Oh, and I also thoroughly enjoyed Eddie Izzard's take on Reepicheep and am all kinds of looking forward to him getting his real star turn in Dawn Treader -- props to the animators who did such a lifelike job on him and all the other creatures. We're leaps and bounds and light years ahead of the puppets of yore.

So, lovely cinematography, fantastic set-dressing (WETA workshop really is the Gwaith-i-Mîrdain slumming in New Zealand), decent acting, exciting action sequences, and a script that mostly holds together is good enough for me. I hope Michael Apted and Company can make at least as much, if not more, out of the picaresque that is The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, my second-favorite of the Chronicles growing up, so that we can continue on and eventually get The Silver Chair and perhaps even The Horse and His Boy in the can. Oh, please ... oh, please ...

Comments

[artemisrae.livejournal.com]

Aww I hope for you too. From what I've heard, Disney's dropped the series and they're shopping around for a new studio...

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

They found one late in January: Fox. (I never thought I'd be cheering for Rupert Murdoch.) They've also announced a December 10, 2010, release date just this past week (along with the arrival of a script doctor). So the signs are hopeful.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

mostly i just sat there ogling Ben Barnes

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

You and a lot of other people. :-) Nothing against the man -- he just didn't set my ogler tingling.

Now that I'm rewatching the old BBC serial versions (ah, Wonderworks!), in which the principals are even less ogle-able, it occurs to me that the other thing Adamson's version put aside was Lewis's social satire. Since his swipes at bad parenting and bad education sometimes seemed a bit twee to me anyway (Queen Prunaprismia? Come on! And the gender typing I just have to read past ...), it's not a loss I feel deeply. I was always there for the magic and the adventure.

[lyrangalia]

I had absolutely no shame sitting there ogling Ben Barnes. Hubby, on the other hand, wished he'd left me home.

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

Oh, dear. One of the advantages to being without a significant other is that nobody is going to call you on your ogling on anything but aesthetic grounds. Barnes-type individuals just don't call up my deepest admiration, but that leaves them for others to appreciate.

[lyrangalia]

My ogling tastes are changing, I think. I used to ogle the blonds and have slowly shifted to the tall dark and pretty now that I've got my own blond.

Of course, he might have just been irritated that every 15 minutes or so, I'd lean over and whisper "Caspian is so hot" to irritate him. :D

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

My ogling tastes are changing, I think. I used to ogle the blonds and have slowly shifted to the tall dark and pretty now that I've got my own blond.

See? He's perfect and yours. He should bask in the knowledge that you appreciated him sufficiently to acquire him.

(FWIW, my tastes in ogleworthy have always run to "approachable" rather than "hot" -- Alphonse Elric (restored) rather than Roy Mustang, frex. One of my friends used to tease me about being on the lookout for a moderately handsome, vaguely geeky guy who played classical piano. I had to admit that she was probably right. :-)

Of course, he might have just been irritated that every 15 minutes or so, I'd lean over and whisper "Caspian is so hot" to irritate him. :D

Oh, well, that's just part of the normal give-and-take of a relationship, isn't it? :-)

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

yeah it's hard to remember these books as a product of their time especially where the girls are concerned.

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

I'm reading Dawn Treader aloud to my goddaughter and waiting for her to call for an explanation of mid-twentieth-century gender roles in the same way she asks what all the ship parts and Anglicisms mean. (I think she's spending most of her time trying to get the layout of the ship straight in her head, though. We refer to the picture at the beginning of the book a lot.)

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

nods.

i have to review a manga that tried to be 'historical' but so totally messed up the gender roles (making them even WORSE) it's going to be hard to do

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

Bleargh. What period (or pseudo-period) of history?

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

the INquisition

so I expected subservient women and sexual sadists since that's true...it's the hero's companion who runs around literally naked the whole time that I can't deal with (and making the hero upset by it doesn't change the fact an otherwise potentially interesting storyline has been ruined by this crap)

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

It so happens that one of my current projects involves cataloging documents produced by and concerning the Inquisition. There's a lot more bureaucratic minutia and a lot less nakedness than thriller writers could wish. Sexual sadists come and go, but the time sheets endure forever.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

I do know the needle to the breast and vagina was used which naturally made it into this but yeah on the whole the sleeze factor is too high.

and the true killer for me though it is the real witch running around with a pelt with paws covering her nipples...

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

"This is what happened to the last familiar who got a little too ... familiar."

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

dies.

that's way better than my nipple ring thru the paw theory

[nebroadwe.livejournal.com]

Ouch.