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The Golden Compass -film review
Dec. 9th, 2007 10:06 pmThe Golden Compass - directed by Chris Weitz ( a new director), starring Daniel Craig, Ian Mckellan (as the voice of the Polar Bear), Nicole Kidman, Derek Jacobi, Christopher Lee, Eva Green amongst others - is based on first of a triology of Young Adult novels written by Philip K. Pullman. Prior to becoming a movie, it was a radio play and a live action 6 hour play put on by the Royal Theater in London. The novels are entitled (in the US) The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, and The Amber Spyglass and comprise "His Dark Materials". They came out, with little fanfare in the US sometime around 2001, possibly before. Were best sellers and unlike Harry Potter, won critical awards and acclaim. What's interesting about the novels - is up until now, no one ever raised a ruckus on their content, at least not that I'm aware of. Suprised me when I read them - since the content is far more controversial than Harry Potter or The Da Vinci Code and incredibly critical of "organized Christianity" specifically the Catholic Church, the Anglican Church, and most "fundamentalist" sects interpretation of Revelations. (It critiques the whole battle between the angels in heaven, pointing out that maybe Lucifier wasn't such a bad guy and Gabriel is a monster - the fight is about free will. By the way, this is by no means the first book to critique Christianity's literal interpretation of Revelations. Terry Prachett and Neil Gaiman do it in "Good Omens".)
The movie in comparison to the books is actually quite tame, in fact I'm not even sure you can figure it out from what you see on the screen. So why the religious sects have chosen now to get all hot and bothered over it, I don't know. Desire for free publicity? Ghod, is everyone a publicity whore?
The novels aren't easy reading and fairly complex. They are also quite dark, far darker in some respects than the Harry Potter novels. Unlike most *popular* fantasy novels for children, these books center on the trials and tribulations of an adolescent girl. It is her coming of age story, not "his". And the adolescent girl is tough, tomboyish, prickily, courageous, and at times quarrlesome. I fell in love with the books because of the girl, who is called Lyra.
The film, which was cowritten by Pullman and Weitz, closely follows the book upon which it is based. To such an extent, I felt as if the pages had sprung to life. There are only a few discrepancies - which I didn't catch since I read the books over five years ago. I remember them much better than the Potter books, but not well enough to notice slight differences.
Now the books are densely plotted and detailed, more so than most Young Adult fiction - these come closer in style to Tolkien than Lewis, if that helps. Most of my friends barely made it through the last one. And to be honest, it took me a while to get into them. The reason is that Pullman introduces a couple of tricky metaphors - daemons (the human soul lives outside their body in the form of an animal entitled a daemon. The animals can touch you and you can touch them. Whatever the animal feels the human feels and vice versa.), the aliethometer or golden compass, and finally "dust" - the material that sprouts from a human form when it dies and is in the areas between worlds.
All of these concepts are explained in the film, but I'm not sure most viewers would be able to understand them if they hadn't read the books. Much like Harry Potter - the film more or less assumes you've read the books if you are watching it. But unlike Potter - it's not as popular. (Pullman got a bit preachy in his books, and as a result lost his reader; JKR did a better job of hiding her message amongst layers of metaphor in Potter. Not that Pullman didn't try and to be fair, Pullman's message was a tad harder and bit more complicated to express than JKR's.) I only compare the two because they literally started around the same time and were both on the Children's best seller lists.
The flaw in the film may be that much like the first two Potter films (which I also found a bit busy at times) - it attempts to cram too much into two hours of screen time. It wants to put the whole book on the screen - well the whole book except for the final chapter (which I had no problems with) and as a result loses a bit in character development - although, most of the characters (Asrial/Coulter and The Witch) don't really get developed that much until the later books. The book was over 300 pages long.It is not as "simple" as Lewis' The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - which has less characters and only two or three tasks. Lyra's journey is similar to the heroine of The Snow Queen, which may partly explain why I loved it. We all have our favorite story tropes. Some love the whole hero's journey aka Luke Skywalker/Hercules myth. Me? I love the Snow Queen - about the girl who faces her fears and prejudices to journey into the cold desolate north to rescue her male friend from the icy clutches of the Snow Queen, who metaphorically may be her adult self. Here - Lyra rescues her friend Roger from the icy clutches of Mrs. Coulter and the GOB. There's a twist in this tale that is not in The Snow Queen, which I won't spoil you on, but other than that the stories are similar - including polar bears, gypsies (here egyptians), witches and a cowboy.
Will you like it? Ah. Hard to tell. I'm not sure anyone who hasn't read the books can follow it or for that matter appreciate it. (This is how it may differ from Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and Narnia - all of which could be appreciated if you had never read the books.) The guy in front of me found it silly (then again he didn't appear to be the sort who'd like this sort of thing - far more of Transformers type of guy.) This is not a boy's story so much as a girl's. The conflicts are not resolved with "fighting" - they are resolved with wit and cunning. The little girl never really fights anyone. And the main villian doesn't fight people either - she manipulates. Which makes it a bit low on the blood and guts and violence that people seem to get off on in these things. IT does have it's scarey bits - but they aren't "physical violence" so much as emotional and mental. That's not to say it does not have moments of violence - it does. Just, more subdued. There's a rocking fight between two polar bears and a huge battle at the end.
Is it for kids? Not sure. It's complicated. Not sure if most kids below the age of 10 could follow it. But I'm not around kids that much, so I may be wrong about that. There were kids in the theater. The small children were bored. Not enough action. Too much talk to hold their attention. I think it may be too old for them. But then I thought the book was too old for the market it was directed at. For some reason people think books concerning children should be for children, I'm not entirely sure that is true. Not saying kids shouldn't read it (I read Lord of the Rings and Dune in the sixth and seventh grades) but they may not fully understand it.
I enjoyed the film more than Narnia. It's beautiful. And well cast. A bit too busy perhaps, but I loved seeing my favorite bits from the book come to life. I'm hoping it does well enough for the next two films to be made.
Overall rating? B
PS: Did have some interesting previews. Most memorable? A computer animated version of Horton Hears A Who (which looked surprisingly good - I think they finally figured out a way to adapt Dr. Seuss for the screen.) And Inkheart about a father and daughter who have the ability to bring items in books to life whenever they read them aloud, which of course causes them problems when they bring a villian from the novel Inkheart to life and can't figure out how to get him back into the book before he destroys the world.
[No time to edit. Off to bed. Must get up at 6 am.]
The movie in comparison to the books is actually quite tame, in fact I'm not even sure you can figure it out from what you see on the screen. So why the religious sects have chosen now to get all hot and bothered over it, I don't know. Desire for free publicity? Ghod, is everyone a publicity whore?
The novels aren't easy reading and fairly complex. They are also quite dark, far darker in some respects than the Harry Potter novels. Unlike most *popular* fantasy novels for children, these books center on the trials and tribulations of an adolescent girl. It is her coming of age story, not "his". And the adolescent girl is tough, tomboyish, prickily, courageous, and at times quarrlesome. I fell in love with the books because of the girl, who is called Lyra.
The film, which was cowritten by Pullman and Weitz, closely follows the book upon which it is based. To such an extent, I felt as if the pages had sprung to life. There are only a few discrepancies - which I didn't catch since I read the books over five years ago. I remember them much better than the Potter books, but not well enough to notice slight differences.
Now the books are densely plotted and detailed, more so than most Young Adult fiction - these come closer in style to Tolkien than Lewis, if that helps. Most of my friends barely made it through the last one. And to be honest, it took me a while to get into them. The reason is that Pullman introduces a couple of tricky metaphors - daemons (the human soul lives outside their body in the form of an animal entitled a daemon. The animals can touch you and you can touch them. Whatever the animal feels the human feels and vice versa.), the aliethometer or golden compass, and finally "dust" - the material that sprouts from a human form when it dies and is in the areas between worlds.
All of these concepts are explained in the film, but I'm not sure most viewers would be able to understand them if they hadn't read the books. Much like Harry Potter - the film more or less assumes you've read the books if you are watching it. But unlike Potter - it's not as popular. (Pullman got a bit preachy in his books, and as a result lost his reader; JKR did a better job of hiding her message amongst layers of metaphor in Potter. Not that Pullman didn't try and to be fair, Pullman's message was a tad harder and bit more complicated to express than JKR's.) I only compare the two because they literally started around the same time and were both on the Children's best seller lists.
The flaw in the film may be that much like the first two Potter films (which I also found a bit busy at times) - it attempts to cram too much into two hours of screen time. It wants to put the whole book on the screen - well the whole book except for the final chapter (which I had no problems with) and as a result loses a bit in character development - although, most of the characters (Asrial/Coulter and The Witch) don't really get developed that much until the later books. The book was over 300 pages long.It is not as "simple" as Lewis' The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - which has less characters and only two or three tasks. Lyra's journey is similar to the heroine of The Snow Queen, which may partly explain why I loved it. We all have our favorite story tropes. Some love the whole hero's journey aka Luke Skywalker/Hercules myth. Me? I love the Snow Queen - about the girl who faces her fears and prejudices to journey into the cold desolate north to rescue her male friend from the icy clutches of the Snow Queen, who metaphorically may be her adult self. Here - Lyra rescues her friend Roger from the icy clutches of Mrs. Coulter and the GOB. There's a twist in this tale that is not in The Snow Queen, which I won't spoil you on, but other than that the stories are similar - including polar bears, gypsies (here egyptians), witches and a cowboy.
Will you like it? Ah. Hard to tell. I'm not sure anyone who hasn't read the books can follow it or for that matter appreciate it. (This is how it may differ from Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, and Narnia - all of which could be appreciated if you had never read the books.) The guy in front of me found it silly (then again he didn't appear to be the sort who'd like this sort of thing - far more of Transformers type of guy.) This is not a boy's story so much as a girl's. The conflicts are not resolved with "fighting" - they are resolved with wit and cunning. The little girl never really fights anyone. And the main villian doesn't fight people either - she manipulates. Which makes it a bit low on the blood and guts and violence that people seem to get off on in these things. IT does have it's scarey bits - but they aren't "physical violence" so much as emotional and mental. That's not to say it does not have moments of violence - it does. Just, more subdued. There's a rocking fight between two polar bears and a huge battle at the end.
Is it for kids? Not sure. It's complicated. Not sure if most kids below the age of 10 could follow it. But I'm not around kids that much, so I may be wrong about that. There were kids in the theater. The small children were bored. Not enough action. Too much talk to hold their attention. I think it may be too old for them. But then I thought the book was too old for the market it was directed at. For some reason people think books concerning children should be for children, I'm not entirely sure that is true. Not saying kids shouldn't read it (I read Lord of the Rings and Dune in the sixth and seventh grades) but they may not fully understand it.
I enjoyed the film more than Narnia. It's beautiful. And well cast. A bit too busy perhaps, but I loved seeing my favorite bits from the book come to life. I'm hoping it does well enough for the next two films to be made.
Overall rating? B
PS: Did have some interesting previews. Most memorable? A computer animated version of Horton Hears A Who (which looked surprisingly good - I think they finally figured out a way to adapt Dr. Seuss for the screen.) And Inkheart about a father and daughter who have the ability to bring items in books to life whenever they read them aloud, which of course causes them problems when they bring a villian from the novel Inkheart to life and can't figure out how to get him back into the book before he destroys the world.
[No time to edit. Off to bed. Must get up at 6 am.]