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| Sometimes I ponder what goes through a director/script writers mind. It seems the world of movie directors, film writers and the like have become obsessed with creating marvelous action sequences, special effects and emotional scenario's to take the audience by surprise and leave them breathless. Indeed the competition grows with the advancing technology that evolves faster than one can blink their eyes.
Unfortuntately, in our great desire to create these mind-boggling animations, something has been lost. As our desire for new effects, cool features and what not grows, it appears that the ability to tell a good story has greatly waned. Yes, that is very much and understatement.
For those script writers today who do wish to tell a good story, they usually resort to one of two different methods. The first is being that they find a story that was already written awhile ago and try to re-create it on screeen. The second being they take a classic film or perhaps a more recent one that has already received great honors and they try to add to it.
I can easily understand both circumstances. I mean if I were the sort of person who lacked imagination, creativity and good story-telling abilities, yet possessed highly artistic, computer animation skills and I happened to be in the movie business, I myself would do the same thing. Yet what I don't understand is how directors can be so clueless to so many things.
Now a book will always be better than the movie. This is a given and everyone knows it. When a good story is translated from a book to a movie, something will be lost. For those of us who grow up with the story, we go into the theatre and we know already that what we are about to see will not be exactly as we had imagined it. In fact great portions of it will be deleted and perhaps a few things that we long to see will either not be included or else its distorted to one degree or another. Even so, we expect that anyone with any kind of common sense, would take a book and thoroughly understand it before beginning to work on a film. I would hope that, though they cannot possibly put everything from the book into the movie, they would at least do their very best to include as much as they can and accurately depict the portion they are able to include.
This was my desire in going to see Narnia. I knew that there were bound to be certain things that could not be included. I knew that it wasn't going to be the Narnia I grew up loving, yet I hoped to find something familiar, something that I could walk away satisfied that the director did everything in his power to be true to the story that was told so many years ago and to honor the world that hundreds of thousands of people have become captivated with.
The movie started fairly well. I was pleasantly surprised at first, perhaps the climax of my good mood pivoted on the scene with Lucy and Tumnus. In fact, that was the scene that had played in my mind for many years and watching it on screen, depicted so faithfully was heart-warming. I though for once that a director had succeeded in bringing Narnia to life, exactly as it was meant to be.
To my disappointment, that was where my satisfaction with the movie ended. Everything that occured afterwords was a huge let down. Perhaps my greatest anger towards the movie was how they played the personalities of the kids. Peter, especially. Peter was not the indecisive wussy, girly-man he was portrayed as in the movie. He was an older brother who was brought into a mystical world that captivated him and his three siblings. He encountered challenges and provided encouragment and comfort when they were needed. Yes he had his doubts, yes he had his fears, but he also had a sense of purpose, destiny, adventure and duty that was never shown in the movie.
Also, there was only one point in the book where the kids mentioned going home. This was brought up by Susan, the older sister, very practical and acting in the mother role. After this, the kids get lost in the world of Narnia, just like Lewis' faithful readers. They never even think of home and would never have returned their had they not accidentally stumbled into it at the end of the book.
My question to the director is "What reasoning do you use to justify so terribly blundering a perfect story?" Unlike the Lord of the Rings, Narnia is written in simple language, it is short and not many details are included. If there is one book that would be easy to translate to film, it would be Narnia. The short amount of writing makes it significantly easier to capture the spirit of, unlike Middle Earth that is laiden with heavy detail and even commentary from external sources.
Wouldn't it make sense that if you are taking up a story that so many people already love and cherish that you make it as complete and accurate as you can? Surely such a move would only increase the ratings of a movie, as any true Narnian would be appalled at the terrible representation of their history on screen. The setting was gorgeous, but the script was terrible. What angers me the most is that Narnia could have been done well on screen. I know this because the first part of the movie was done well. They have the materials to make it, they even have the time to recreate at least, most of what is in the book. Yet one thing directors lack is the ability to tell good stories, even stories that they didn't write!
I was going to go rant about sequels and my opinions on that, but this is already fairly long so I will spare you that as well. I could go on about my grudges against the movie of Narnia and directors and those who don't faithfully represent the things in which they endorse. However I will just leave it as it is, as I fear being redundant if I continue any further.
In any case, this is just my opinion, feel free to leave me a comment and tell me your views on the matter.
~John~
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| So today is Easter Sunday.
It is also the day that I had a deep, insightful revelation. That is, I've come to discover that I have absolutely no clothes that can be considered "dressing up". No suit coats, no really nice shirts...a few dressy casual type things, which is what I wore today. I cannot say that I regret this fact, as I've never been one to particularly endorse clading the body in extravagant garments...however, the matter has caused me to contemplate a few things.
I wondered why it wasn't until now that I thought about this. Didn't I have the same crisis last year? Thinking back, I remember that last Easter Sunday, my "Sunday outfit" was perhaps the greatest outfit ever selected by anyone to wear to church, ever!
It consisted of really old, blue shorts and an inverted star wars shirt with the sleeves ripped off! I did go to church last year, in case you were wondering. I also wore the specified outfit above to the church. And no, I did not feel strange selecting that outfit either. The reason for this was because I was in the Easter Drama and had a costume to throw over that, even though, said costume wasn't much to boast of either.
The point is that somehow I've managed to negate the fundamental requirements of dressing accordingly, and not be deemed "strange" for doing so. This makes my day much brighter. Yes...someday I may upgrade my wardrobe, but one of two things will have to happen before that time. Perhaps both.
Either A) I find myself with an extra resevoir of money that I don't need for anything else.
or B) I happen to get married and need something to wear for my wedding.
Since I don't foresee either of these possiblities happening soon, I shall bask in the freedom of dressing however I feel like and taunt those who are subject to the confines of tight suit coats and oxygen-depleting ties.
I love my life!
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| Okay, right now I am in one of those blah moods. If you've ever been there, maybe you can sympathize with that. It takes quite a lot to get into a blah mood and it isn't particularly easy to describe.
Anyway, I am really tired right now cuz I stayed up all night two
nights ago working on a paper that was worth 20% of my
grade...grrr...Its like I have amazing ideas when I'm not writing, then
I sit down to write and they all run away from me. Then I have to go
get a baseball bat from the corner of my mind and beat my ideas into
submission before finally locking them down on paper. After thats done
though, the words are ususally too bloody to be of any use to me, and
thus I have to go hunt down some more ideas...the cycle continues,
explaining why I stayed up all night.
I have another paper due today...
My eyes hurt...
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