The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010) Part 4: General Nuisancery

We get a montage of life onboard the Dawn Treader as it sails eastward set to audio of one of Eustace’s diary entries. Those entries are a great source of humor in the book with the delusional way Eustace presents himself as a perpetual victim and everyone else as a villain. The movie actually makes them even funnier. “Dear diary,” Eustace writes, “there’s been an extraordinary turn of events. I’ve been abducted by my cousins and set adrift in uncharted waters in some ridiculous looking boat.” As Eustace writes that part, he’s seated in his hammock in the morning and Reepicheep’s tail dangles from the hammock above, annoying him. “What’s worse is I share quarters with an obnoxious mouse thing. And I thought bunking with my cousin was bad enough! So far, every person I’ve met in this strange place suffers from the most florid delusions, chasing green mists and looking for lost lords. I can only assume that this is the result of poor diet or they’re all just barking mad.” By now, the scene has changed to daytime and everyone is on deck. Caspian and Drinian are looking at a parchment[1]I’d say a map but they’re supposed to be in uncharted waters., Lucy is mending her clothes, and Edmund is cleaning Bern’s sword. “Cousin Edmund is no exception,” writes Eustace. “He spends every spare second rubbing that tin sword of his like it’s some magic lantern. Poor fool clearly needs a hobby.” Reepicheep however tells Edmund the sword is going to be magnificent and jokingly asks if it comes in a smaller size. “Peeving marmot!” mutters Eustace who is huddled in a corner among some supplies, journaling. “He’s even more deluded than my cousin! In England, we had mousetraps and all that sort of thing.” A seagull lands near Eustace. “Speaking of food, you don’t know where I could get any, do you?” It’s revealed that a couple of sailors are staring at him. “Uh, why are you talking to that bird?” one of them, the minotaur, asks. “Why, I just naturally assumed he could-” The sailors guffaw and one of them, the human, describes Eustace as “mad as a loon” for talking to birds. This isn’t hilarious or anything, but I do appreciate that this movie establishes that not all animals talk in the world of Narnia. Between the Pevensies riding talking horses and automatically assuming a random bear they met could talk, I was wondering how they got meat.

Below deck, a hungry Eustace, after making sure no one is looking, pockets an orange. But he didn’t look hard enough. “Are you aware stealing rations is a capital offense at sea?” demands a voice. It belongs to Reepicheep. After seeing the size of who is confronting him, Eustace clearly intends to ignore him, but Reepicheep won’t be dismissed. “Men have been keelhauled for less!” he insists. “For what?” asks Eustace. “For treason and sneakiness and general nuisancery,” sputters Reepicheep. Do you see what I mean when I describe him as sounding like Bertie Wooster? By the way, in the book, Reepicheep catches Eustace stealing water after the ship has lost most of its water in a terrible storm.[2]There will be a terrible storm later in the movie, but it won’t have nearly as serious consequences as the book’s storm had. Since there hasn’t been any mention of food being short in the movie, Eustace stealing one orange doesn’t really seem that bad. I guess the situation is similar enough in that the crew has no way of knowing when or if the Dawn Treader will reach land and they need to save as much of their rations as possible. But talking about keelhauling and treason still feels like an overreaction on Reepicheep’s part. “Look, just hand over the orange and we’ll let the matter pass,” he says. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” says Eustace and starts to walk away. “Allow me to clarify,” says Reepicheep, blocking his path or rather begins to say as he’s about to block his path when Eustace grabs him by the tail. “Look,” he says, “I’ve had quite enough of you-” OK, I know I called Eustace one of the best written and best adapted characters in this series as well as the most well-acted, but nothing is perfect, and I do feel like they’re sanitizing him in this scene. In the equivalent moment in the book, Eustace sneaks up on Reepicheep and tries to swing him around by his tail for fun. Just grabbing the tail in anger, while inappropriate, doesn’t seem that mean by comparison.

But Reepicheep is certainly appalled by it. “Unhand the tail,” he says in a chilling voice, drawing his sword. “The great Aslan himself gave me this tail. No one, I repeat, no one touches the tail! Period exclamation mark!” I’ve read some fans online object that to sound more British, Reepicheep should have said “full stop exclamation mark” instead of “period exclamation mark.”[3]At least he didn’t say “exclamation point.” I just think it’s a dumb phrase either way and I’m annoyed that the character of Reepicheep said either version. And who thought “no one touches the tail” sounded better than “a tail is the honor and glory of a mouse?” Anyway, Eustace is intimidated enough to let go of the tail. “Now I will have the orange,” says Reepicheep, “then I will have satisfaction.” He uses his tail to hand Eustace a butcher’s knife so they can duel. “Please! Please! I’m a pacifist!” Eustace protests. He was a pacifist in the book too or his parents are pacificists anyway, so credit goes to the filmmakers for including that. Reepicheep won’t be dissuaded so Eustace runs up on deck. Foolishly, he doesn’t drop the knife, not realizing that Reepicheep would be too honorable to fight him unarmed. Reepicheep swings on a rope in front of Eustace. “Trying to run away? We’re on a boat, you know,” he taunts him. “Please,” says Eustace, “can’t we just discuss this?” Reepicheep cuts a hole in Eustace’s shirt. “That was for stealing,” he says then he spears the orange Eustace was hiding. “That was for lying.” Then he strikes Eustace across the face. “And that was for good measure!” The knife in Eustace’s hand trembles but it’s because he’s now angrier than he is scared. He swipes unsuccessfully at the mouse who jumps out of the way. “That’s the spirit!” he says. “We have ourselves a duel!” He tosses the orange to Drinian whose expression is hilariously resigned.

The rest of the crew are happy to see a little boy get beat up by a mouse. I guess they’re really desperate for entertainment. Again, for the most part, I love the writing for Eustace’s character in the movie, but it hasn’t shown him being enough a nuisance for the whole crew’s delight at his humiliation to feel justified. While we’ve heard him complain obnoxiously when he was first brought on board, lately he seems to have been keeping to himself, writing in diary and not bothering anybody.

In the book, when Eustace refuses to give him satisfaction, an angry Reepicheep instead uses his sword as a switch to lay down some corporal punishment. The movie instead has him see potential in Eustace that no one else sees and take this moment to playfully teach him how to swordfight. Since it’s rather cliche to have two characters start out hating each other and then develop a deep bond, I see the appeal of this change to Reepicheep’s character though I feel like him initially hating Eustace made more sense given his personality. From what I’ve heard from the people who love this movie, the relationship between these two characters is one of their favorite things about it and I can understand that. Eustace and Reepicheep are the only characters whom I feel the screenwriters really enjoyed writing and the only ones from the book whom they found a source of inspiration. With Caspian, Edmund and Lucy, there’s a palpable sense that the book gave them no ideas and I can feel them forcing arcs for the characters.[4]This is probably because Eustace was the only character with a major arc in the book. I don’t mean that as a criticism by the way. I don’t believe every book needs to be about character … Continue reading That being said…this scene doesn’t work for me. Partly that’s because of what I wrote above and partly it’s because I don’t like the way Reepicheep is written here. His instructions range from silly (“Stop flapping your wings like a drunken pelican!”) to vague and cliche. (“Be nimble! It’s a dance, boy, a dance!”) In another book by C. S. Lewis, Till We Have Faces, a character teaches the protagonist how to use a sword. I don’t how much research Lewis did but he really creates the impression that what the mentor character says is what an actual instructor would have said in a historical culture where swords were used.

“That shield is too heavy,” he said. “Here’s the one for you. Slip it on, thus. And understand from the outset; your shield is a weapon, not a wall. You’re fighting with it every bit as much as your sword. Watch me, now. You see the way I twist my shield — make it flicker like a butterfly. There’d be arrows and spears and sword points flying off it in every direction if we were in a hot engagement. Now: here’s your sword. No, not like that. You want to grip it firm, but light. It’s not a wild animal that’s trying to run away from you. That’s better. Now, your left foot forward. And don’t look at my face, look at my sword. It isn’t my face is going to fight you. And now, I’ll show you a few guards.”

Why couldn’t Reepicheep have been written like that in this scene?

The duel ends with Reepicheep pretending to topple overboard, sneaking up behind Eustace when he peers over the railing, tapping him on the shoulder with his tail and knocking him down when he turns. “And that is that!” Eustace knocks over a basket and someone crawls out of it. It’s the young girl whose mother was devoured by the Mist. “Gael? What are you doing here?” asks her father. I kind of despise the name Gael by the way. For the first two movies, the writers did a good job of inventing names that sound Narnian. Here they just took the name Gail and changed a letter. Same with her mother’s name, Helaine. At least the father’s name, Rhince, is from the book. (He’s the Dawn Treader’s first mate there.) When reports on the filming of the movie first mentioned this character, fans of the book were baffled as to her identity and some in the community took to calling her the MLG or the Mysterious Little Girl, so with the court’s permission, that’s what I’m going to call her. For a moment, it looks like MLG is in big trouble. Then her father, moved by her vulnerability, puts a protective arm around her.

All are silent as a stern looking Drinian approaches. “Looks like we have an extra crew member,” he says. Then he just hands her the orange and walks away. “Welcome aboard,” says Lucy with a smile. “Your Majesty,” says an awed MLG, curtseying. “Call me Lucy,” says the queen and leads her away. So… stealing one orange is a capital offense on the Dawn Treader but stowing away and giving them a whole extra mouth to feed with nothing in return is fine? Maybe the reason Reepicheep stressed the strictness of the rules was to make Drinian’s surprising tolerance as heartwarming as possible. It succeeds decently enough but it could have been a lot better. I feel that’s largely because of the casting. Not that any of the actors in this little moment give bad performances per se. But in the first two movies, every actor, even those in supporting roles, made a big impression. Hardly anyone in this film does. Just compare moments like Mrs. Pevensie bidding her children farewell, possibly for the last time, in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005) or Glenstorm’s wife realizing that one of her sons is dead or imprisoned, mostly like the former, in Prince Caspian (2008) to this. There’s no comparison.

I’m really not sure how MLG was able to stay hidden for so long by the way. Given how much progress Edmund has made cleaning his sword, it seems like the ship has been sailing for at least a few days.

As the crew gets back to work, Reepicheep tells Eustace, “Good match. I’ll make a swordsman of you yet.” Eustace actually smiles, grateful, before scrunching his face into its usual scowl and saying, “Yes, well…if the playing field were a little more even, it would have been an entirely different result.” Reepicheep chuckles as Eustace stalks off. “Indeed.” Throughout the first part of the book, Eustace never expresses anything but contempt for Narnian culture which he regards as disgustingly primitive compared to that of “a civilized country” such as his own. Here, it’s implied he does find Narnia cool deep down but is too proud to admit it. (Remember the impression I mentioned that Eustace’s character in the book gave the writers ideas whereas with every other character except Reepicheep, they had to force ideas?) I like the change. It makes Eustace feel more multidimensional and since the movie moves his most dramatic character development to later than it is in the book, there’s something to be said for starting to humanize him here to compensate.

The Dawn Treader arrives at the lush green shores of an island.

Caspian: Looks uninhabited. But if the lords followed the Mist east, they would have stopped here
Drinian: Could be a trap.
Edmund: Or it could hold some answers. Caspian?
Caspian: We’ll spend the night on shore, scour the island in the morning.

When the Dawn Treader reaches an island at this point in the book, Caspian won’t let the crew go on shore after dark for safety reasons, let alone sleep there. Of course, this isn’t the same island as the movie rearranges the order of events somewhat. This messes with the book’s subtle structure, something I didn’t realize it had until I’d read it several times. When the literary Edmund and Lucy first arrive on board, Drinian recaps the voyage so far to them. He mentions a tournament and a pirate attack, either of which could have taken place in a realistic story. Then we get the adventure on the Lone Islands and the storm, both of which are fairly mundane. Except for the magical painting and the talking mouse, there’s not much fantastical about the story. Then on the next island, there’s a dragon and after the crew leaves, they encounter a giant sea serpent. While those are fantastical beasts though, they’re still presented as ordinary animals.[5]Something important does happen on Dragon Island that’s explicitly magical. The experience is kept somewhat distant from readers though. Then we get an island that contains something explicitly magical. Then we get one with even more magic. And the islands just get more and more surreal from there. The movie’s restructuring loses this the-further-east-the-crazier-the-story-gets thing. Still, that’s hardly the worst change.

As everyone slumbers on the beach, giant footprints appear in the sand around them. Voices speak but we can’t see anyone. All we can see is fog coming from invisible mouths. This has the potential to be such a scary scene and it’s frustrating that the movie is too fast paced for it to register that way, especially since the changes it makes to the story make it seem like a goal of the filmmakers was to make it more suspenseful and action packed than the book was. Anyway, one of the voices says, “It seems they’ve brought a pig” in response to Eustace’s snoring. “This one,” says another voice, looking at the sleeping Lucy, “It’s female.” A footprint appears next to MLG. “So’s this one,” says a voice. The pages of a book lying next to Lucy turn. “This one reads!” says the previous voice. Now in the book, only a little girl has the power to free these invisible creatures from their spell, but this is never mentioned in the movie, making their specific interest in “females” kind of odd and even a little creepy. Maybe the idea is they think a girl would be easier to capture.

“Let’s take her,” says the voice we heard first. Invisible hands are clamped over Lucy’s mouth, and she’s dragged away through the brush. Since I just criticized the first part of this scene for not being as creepy as it should have been, I’ll praise this part for doing a relatively better job on that score. Lucy is plopped down somewhere in a garden full of fanciful topiary. She draws her sword, but the unseen enemies knock it out of her hand then knock her off her feet.

Voice 1 (Roy Billing): There is no escape.
Voice 2 (Neil G. Young)[6]Trying to match the dialogue to the right actors is kind of a lost cause. This is the best I can do. Sorry for any miscrediting.: Well put!
Voice 3 (Greg Poppleton): Scary.
Voice 4 (Nicholas Neild): Yeah!
Lucy: What are you?
Voice 4: We are terrifying invisible beasts!
Voice 1: If you could see us, you would be really intimidated.
Voice 2: You forgot to mention that we are very large.
Lucy: Well, what do you want?
Voice 1: You. You’ll do what we ask.
Voice 2: She will!
Voice 4: Very clear!
Voice 3: Well put.
Voice 4: Yeah!
Lucy: Or what?
Voice 1: Or death!
Voices (chanting): Death! Death! Death! Death!
Lucy: Well, I wouldn’t be much use to you dead now, would I?
Pause
Voice 1: I hadn’t thought of that.
Voice 2: No, you hadn’t.
Voice 3: Fair point.

That’s pretty funny though I’d maintain these characters were even funnier in the source material. One of the voices tells Lucy if she doesn’t comply, they’ll just kill her friends. She cringes in defeat.

Lucy: What do you want with me?
Voice 1: You will enter the house of the Oppressor.
Lucy: What house?
Voice 1: This one.

An invisible door opens before Lucy, revealing the interior of a house. Actually, this building isn’t so much invisible as it has a cloaking mechanism. If it were really invisible, either we would see all the furniture and everything inside it or when the door opened, Lucy would still see nothing. But enough quibbling.

“Upstairs you’ll find the Book of Incantations,” explains the chief voice. “Recite the spell that makes the unseen seen.” Lucy hesitates and the voices, all of them, remind her of what will happen to her friends if she disobeys. “Why don’t you do it yourselves?” Lucy asks suspiciously. “We can’t read,” says the first voice. “Can’t write either as a matter of fact,” says the second. “Or add,” says the third. In a nice touch, the movie implies they didn’t need to threaten Lucy to get her help. as she responds by saying, “Why didn’t you just say so?” The voices warn her to beware the Oppressor (“He’s very oppressive!”) and Lucy steps through the door. It ominously closes behind her. This scenario is slightly different from the book. There, the invisible enemies didn’t kidnap Lucy. They just confronted the Narnians and refused to let them leave alive unless Lucy went upstairs and worked the spell for them to which she agreed. I don’t mind the simplification though. Perhaps it helps the pacing.

Next Week: The Book of Incantations

References

References
1 I’d say a map but they’re supposed to be in uncharted waters.
2 There will be a terrible storm later in the movie, but it won’t have nearly as serious consequences as the book’s storm had.
3 At least he didn’t say “exclamation point.”
4 This is probably because Eustace was the only character with a major arc in the book. I don’t mean that as a criticism by the way. I don’t believe every book needs to be about character development.
5 Something important does happen on Dragon Island that’s explicitly magical. The experience is kept somewhat distant from readers though.
6 Trying to match the dialogue to the right actors is kind of a lost cause. This is the best I can do. Sorry for any miscrediting.
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The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010) Part 3: The Rear End of a Minotaur

As the sun sets-this scene has some of the nicer lighting in the movie by the way-Drinian announces that the Dawn Treader has reached the Lone Islands, specifically the port of Narrowhaven. Caspian and Edmund look at the oddly still and silent town through a telescope.

Caspian: Strange. Not a Narnian flag in sight.
Edmund: But the Lone Islands have always been Narnia’s.
[1]You may remember that the White Witch was the Empress of them back in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.
Drinian: Seems suspicious.
Edmund: I say we prepare a landing party. Drinian?
Drinian: Forgive me, Your Majesty, but the chain of command starts with King Caspian on this ship.
Awkward pause
Edmund: Right.

I don’t feel like that little moment was necessary. It basically serves to make it very clear there will be some sort of power struggle between Edmund and Caspian later in the story when it wouldn’t have hurt anything for it to be more of a surprise. Still, I don’t hate it or anything.

“We’ll use longboats,” says Caspian, “Drinian pick some men and come ashore.” Two longboats enter the harbor, leaving the Dawn Treader behind. Among the sailors in them are Caspian, Edmund, Lucy, Eustace and Reepicheep. “Onward!” cries the last one. “The thrill of the unknown lies ahead!” That’s kind of an odd thing to say at this point since the Lone Islands are technically part of Narnia though not one that any of the characters have visited recently, making them somewhat unknown but not nearly as much as the unexplored lands the voyagers will see later. In the book, Reepicheep says, “it is after the Lone Islands that the adventure really begins.” But maybe I’m just nitpicking. “Couldn’t it have waited till the morning?” Eustace gripes. “There is no honor in turning away from adventure, lad,” replies Reepicheep. Let me take this moment to applaud the screenwriters. That definitely sounds like something the book’s Reepicheep would say. Well, I could argue his position ends up being a little more nuanced than that[2]Reepicheep did surprisingly advocate nonviolent solutions in two scenes in the book though neither of those counted as “turning away from adventure” and in the last chapter, he chided … Continue reading but that would really be overdemanding of me. “Listen!” says Lucy. “Where is everyone?” This would be a good moment to pause and take in the suspicious silence, but I fear the movie is a little too fast paced for that. “Come on, Jellylegs,” says Reepicheep, extending a paw to help Eustace out of the boat. “I’m quite capable of doing it myself,” says Eustace, stumbling and hurting himself on the stone steps. Reepicheep rolls his eyes. “And you’re certain he’s related by blood?” Caspian asks Lucy as he looks back at Eustace. I feel like that line would be a lot funnier if Caspian said it in a mischievous whisper for only her and Edmund to hear. As it is, he sounds kind of like a jerk. This whole situation was quite different in the book, almost the opposite. There the kings and queen suspected nothing amiss in the Lone Islands and decided to take a little stroll on the most sparsely populated of them before going to Narrowhaven. (“If Caspian had been as experienced then as he became later on in this voyage,” the books tell us, “He would not have made this suggestion; but at the moment it seemed an excellent one.”) They invite Eustace to join them out of politeness and he accepts because he’s desperate to get off the ship. As it is in the movie, there’s no reason why Eustace should be part of this potentially dangerous spy mission but do not question his presence! He’s the best part of this section by a long shot.

A loud bell clangs in a nearby tower, scattering some birds. Caspian automatically aims a crossbow at it. As the noise dies down, he collects himself. “Reepicheep,” he says, “stay here with Drinian’s men and secure the place. If we don’t come back by dawn, send a party.” I’m not sure why he can’t take Reepicheep, as well as a few other people besides Edmund, Lucy and Eustace-Eustace for crying out loud! I understand he doesn’t want to endanger everyone at once but there’s such a thing as strength in numbers too. Oh well. The three monarchs and Eustace explore the seemingly abandoned port town. I do basically like the design of it by the way. Eustace peeks through the window of a house and sees a family huddled together in fear.

Hilariously, his reaction to this is to say to the others, “Yeah, looks like nobody’s in, so do you think we should head back?” This part of the movie really plays up the character’s cowardice whereas the book played up his whininess more but that’s not a huge change. (It’s not like he hasn’t whined at all recently.) But the others want to explore the bell tower. Edmund, wanting to get Eustace out of the way, invites him to cover and “guard something.” Not wanting to explore the mysterious building, he gladly accepts. Caspian wordlessly hands him a knife. “I’ve got it, I’ve got it,” he babbles, “Don’t worry.” After his cousins have been inside for a few seconds, he calls, “I’m ready to go when you are.”

The interior of the tower turns out to be a pretty cool set. It’s dusty and cavernous and features ancient headless statues.

In the center of the room, stands a table with an official looking book on it. Edmund shines his torch on the pages, illuminating a list of names.

Lucy: Who are all these people?
Edmund: Why have they been crossed out?
Lucy: It looks like some kind of…fee.
Caspian (grimly): Slave traders.

Just then, the bells ring again. Men with weapons slide down the ropes, and a fight ensues. Again, this pretty different from the book. There, Caspian and company find the slave traders picnicking in a meadow and it’s only then that it occurs to him that there might be danger here. I prefer the way the book does the scene as the villains are more of a surprise. It’s pretty obvious from the start of the movie’s scene that something bad is about to happen to the main characters. Still, this isn’t the worst change you could make to the story. Anyway, the fight is interrupted by a blood curdling shriek. My first thought, watching the film, was that a woman had just been gruesomely murdered. Everyone turns to see one of the attackers (Colin Moody) holding Eustace and pressing a knife against his throat. “Unless you want to hear this one squeal like a girl again,” he says, “I’d say you should drop your weapons.”

Caspian, Edmund and Lucy reluctantly comply. “Put them in irons,” says the man. “Let’s take these two (Eustace and Lucy) to market. Send those two (Edmund and Caspian) to the dungeons.” Now in the book, Caspian insists that no one tells the slave traders his true identity lest they kill him to save themselves from the penalty of capturing the king, so I’m not exactly thrilled that the first thing the cinematic Caspian says as he’s being cuffed is “Listen to me, you insolent fool! I am your king!” Naturally, his captors don’t listen. One of them strikes Edmund in the face. “You’re going to pay for that!” he snaps. “Actually, someone else is going to pay for all of you,” says another man (David Vallon), one in slightly fancier clothes, stepping out of the shadows. At first, I assumed this was supposed to be Pug, the leader of the slave traders in the book. It turns out he’s actually a combination of him and Governor Gumpas, another character. In the book, Gumpas wasn’t really leading the slave traders. His crime lay in allowing the illegal slave trade in the Lone Island on the grounds that it boosted the economy by drawing tourists or something like that. In the movie, it seems like the slave traders have somehow taken over the government of the Lone Islands themselves. It’s really not explained clearly.

This really isn’t a bad set. Just trying to accentuate the positive here.

Edmund wakes up the next morning in a dungeon to find Caspian angrily kicking the iron door to no avail. Again, the adaptation is making Caspian look hotheaded and pathetic rather than calm and capable as he is at this point in the source material. “It’s hopeless,” says a weirdly calm voice in the darkness, “You’ll never get out.”[3]I don’t mean that “weirdly calm” bit as a criticism. I believe the voice is supposed to sound weirdly calm. “Who’s there?” Edmund demands. “Nobody,” says the voice, “Just a voice in my head.” Caspian investigates and finds another prisoner (Terry Norris), an old man with wild, overgrown hair and very wide eyes.

He recognizes him. “Lord Bern?” he says. “Perhaps once,” says the prisoner sadly, “but I’m no longer deserving of that title.” Edmund asks if this is one of the seven missing lords, which it is of course. Bern studies Caspian’s face. “You remind me of a king I once loved well,” he says. “That man was my father,” Caspian says. Bern cries and kneels before Caspian, begging for forgiveness. Caspian helps him up. In the book, Lord Bern is not a pathetic old prisoner but a free and prosperous man who has settled down on the island of his own free will. He buys Caspian from the slave traders out of compassion and because Caspian reminds him of his old friend, Caspian’s father. I love the irony of the slave traders unknowingly helping Caspian in his quest and bringing about their own destruction by selling him to Bern, so I’m not happy about this alteration.

Edmund hears screaming from outside. He looks out the dungeon window and sees a cart full of prisoners being driven through the streets. A man (Arthur Angel) and a little girl (Arabella Morton) are running after it. The man manages to grab onto the end of the cart but one of the slave traders roughly knocks him to the ground. “Mummy!” howls the girl. “Stay with Daddy!” yells one of the women in the cart (Rachel Blakely.) All this is witnessed not just by Edmund but by Lucy and Eustace who are tied up with some other captives, waiting to be auctioned off in the slave market. “Don’t worry! I’ll find you!” the fallen man calls to his wife. She and the other prisoners on the cart are hustled onto a longboat. Caspian has now joined Edmund at the dungeon window. “Where are they taking them?” he asks Bern. “Keep watching,” Bern replies.

On my first viewing, I assumed that this little scene was just supposed to demonstrate the cruelty of the slave trade, but it turns out to be something less mundane. Suddenly, the bright blue sky darkens, and clouds swell ominously. It’s common of course for the weather in movies to reflect the dramatic situation but this looks a little ridiculous. That’s because it’s magic. Suddenly, a glowing green mist appears in the harbor. No, this is not a surprise appearance by the Time Warp Trio. (We should be so lucky.)

The mist bounces around-I can’t think of a better description than that-in wisps, enveloping the boat full of screaming people. It dissipates as swiftly as it appeared, leaving nothing behind.

Caspian: What happened?
Bern: It’s a sacrifice.
Caspian: Where did they go?
Bern: No one knows. The Mist was first seen in the east. Reports of fishermen and sailors disappearing out at sea. We lords made a pact to find the source of the Mist and destroy it. They each set sail. But none came back. You see, if they don’t sell you to the slave traders, you’re likely to be fed to the Mist.
Edmund: We have to find Lucy! Before it’s too late.

That explanation of Bern’s really raises as many questions as it answers. How did the slave traders realize that they needed to appease the Mist by sacrificing people to it? Can it communicate with them somehow? How? And why can’t they just avoid the Mist by staying away from the east and fishing elsewhere? What’s this distinction Bern makes between the slave traders and “they?” (He speaks of Caspian and Edmund being sold to the slave traders, not the slave traders selling them.) Is the governor of the Lone Islands collaborating with the brigands as I’ve suggested? Why aren’t any of these important characters given names? Exposition has never been a strong suit of these movies, the worst example being in Prince Caspian when the Telmarines brought Trumpkin to be executed at Cair Paravel with no explanation rather than executing him right where he was. But at least with the other two movies, I could follow the plot by reading the book, not that that excuses the screenwriters. Here, I’m totally at sea. And rescuing the Lone Islanders devoured by this mysterious Mist ends up being one of the story’s main goals, so it’s rather annoying that the circumstances of their sacrifice are so vague.

That’s not to say the Mist is completely original to this adaptation. What the filmmakers have done is taken the Dark Island, one of the islands the voyagers discover in the book and easily the scariest one, given it a mind of sorts and made it a villain who is a constant threat to the characters throughout their voyage. I could maybe live with that. I feel that adding an overarching villain to the story[4]As opposed to a villain who only shows up at one island. distracts from the quest for Aslan’s country but an adaptation that made the change could still tell a good story in its own right and making the Dark Island a villain is probably better, from a book fan’s perspective, than inventing an original baddie. But did they have to make it green?! Why not have it be dark like in the book?[5]The reason for the color change, from what I’ve gathered, is that in early drafts of the script, The Lady of the Green Kirtle, the villain of another Narnia book, was behind the Mist. I’m … Continue reading Don’t get me wrong. Pale green can be an effectively eerie color. One of my favorite fantasy movies, Disney’s Sleeping Beauty, uses it to great effect in one of its most memorable scenes. But it works best against a dark background, not a bright blue one. The filmmakers seem to have realized this hence the sudden change in the weather that heralds the Mist’s presence in this scene. But that didn’t help. When the Mist appears in this scene, it looks like a cartoon skunk farted. The weird, bouncy way the Mist is animated also makes it look more silly than creepy.[6]The tendrils of smoke actually look a little like the skipping stone in Walden Media’s logo. Was that intentional?! I believe that adaptations can include things that aren’t from the source material but are great in their own ways. The Mist is not one of those.

We cut to Lucy being auctioned off at the slave market. I assume the merchants bidding on her are from Calormen as they are in the book. Now the Calormenes from the Narnia books have been criticized for embodying negative stereotypes of Middle Easterners and you’d expect filmmakers to be worried about how to depict them. Apparently not the filmmakers who made this movie though. The costumes the bidders sport are quite stereotypically Middle Eastern. What offends me here isn’t any possible racism but how boring and generic those costumes look. Whether adapters want to lean into the whole Middle Eastern flavor of the Calormenes or whether they want to steer away from it, they should look cool. The book describes them as “a wise, wealthy, courteous, cruel and ancient people.” Maybe you find that description racist, but you’ve got to admit it sounds cool! These Calormenes do not look cool, which is disappointing since this is the only glimpse of their culture Walden Media’s Narnia movies would give us. And costume design had been a strength of the series too.

This particular bidder is played by Douglas Gresham, one of the movie’s producers and the head of C. S. Lewis’s literary estate. I’ve mentioned him before but not the fact that The Horse and his Boy, one of the Narnia books, is dedicated to him. Now that’s cool!

While Lucy is sold, Edmund and Caspian are also hustled out of their cell, their hands tied. Bern is too though we don’t see him clearly yet. Eustace is up for auction now. “Who’ll kick off the bidding?” asks the auctioneer, who’s also the one who captured Eustace by the way. Nobody responds.

Auctioneer: Come on now. He may not look like much but, uh, he’s strong.
Man in Crowd: He’s strong all right! Smells like the rear end of a minotaur.
Eustace: That is an outrageous lie! I won the school hygiene award two years running!

While that specific dialogue isn’t from the book, nobody wanting to buy Eustace is and I love that it’s included here. “I’ll take him off your hands,” says a familiar voice in the crowd, “I’ll take them all of your hands!” A man in the crowd pulls off his head revealing himself to be Drinian and the speaker, Reepicheep, to have been under that hood. “For Narnia!” cries the mouse and others in the crowd pull of their hoods and start fighting. It’s the rescue party from the Dawn Treader. The man leading Caspian and Edmund away is distracted by the melee, giving a still handcuffed Caspian the opportunity to knock him out.

Edmund overpowers his guard, allowing Bern, who wasn’t handcuffed for some reason, to get his keys and toss them to Caspian. The terrified Eustace also manages to snag some keys, free himself and sneak away from the fight which other slaves and sympathetic Lone Islanders have joined. The leader of slave traders, whom I might as well call Gumpas to make this easier, also slips away with all the money he can carry. In the book, the Dawn Treader didn’t have enough men to rescue the slaves this way. They hadn’t known they’d need an army when they set out after all. Instead, Caspian and Bern tricked the bad guys into thinking they were a greater force than they were by things like having the ship fly all its flags and hang out its shields, all its fighting men appearing in full armor and send signals to a nonexistent fleet. It may not sound very gripping in summary, but it made for a really funny section in practice. It’s galling for me as a fan to see the movie throw it all in the garbage and replace it with this rather silly action scene. Even if they wanted this part to be suspenseful rather than humorous, the book’s version could have been that too with just a slight twist of emphasis and anyway, this scene in the movie is pretty comedic too. I guess they tried to stay true to spirit of the book by having the rescue party use trickery with their disguises. But, honestly, did the characters even need to do that? Conceal their weapons, yes, but disguises? The implication was that people came to the slave auctions from outside the islands. Drinian and company would have been seen as potential customers, not potential slaves. Reepicheep frees Lucy and she joins the fight. I expressed regret that Lucy took so little part in the action scenes in the last movie when it would have been much more in keeping with her character in the books than it was for Susan’s. I wanted to see her in more action scenes but not like this!

I know, I know. I should really write about how this action scene works on its own terms instead of just complaining that it’s untrue to the book. It’s…not terrible, I guess but I feel like the battle scenes in the first two movies were better. I feel like it’d work better if we knew more about these villains and could enjoy seeing the good guys trounce them more. To be fair, the book’s version required a good amount of exposition which might have felt weird to do in a movie for a conflict that would only last a few scenes. Still, I’d actually rather the Lone Islands section be completely cut from the story than adapted this way.

Anyway, Eustace makes it down to the harbor and gets into a longboat. He’s followed by Gumpas. Eustace looks helplessly down at the oars. “Oh, you’re a boat in a magical world,” he carps, “Can’t you row yourself?” Gumpas draw a knife and sneaks up behind him. Trying to balance a heavy oar in his hands, Eustace accidentally knocks him into the water. “Oh, God, I hope that wasn’t the British Consul!” he says. I love Eustace so much! He’s practically the only good thing about this part of the movie.

Even though this adaptation has completely flown in the face of the book with the scene just described, it could still mollify me by including the scene of Caspian confronting Governor Gumpas, stripping him of his power and making Lord Bern the Duke of the Lone Islands, some version of that scene anyway.

Some slight allusion to it at least.

No?

OK, then!

The victorious Narnians parade through the streets of Narrowhaven as the formerly oppressed people cheer. (It really would be nice to have that explained more clearly.) The desperate man we saw earlier, the one whose wife was fed to the Mist, runs up to Caspian, followed by his daughter and her aunt (Catarina Hebbard.) Drinian, acting as a bodyguard, gets in between the man and Caspian, but Caspian overrules him and allows the man to come forward.

Man: My wife was taken just this morning. I beg you take me with you.
Daughter: I want to come!
Man: No, Gael, stay with your aunt. (to Caspian) I’m a fine sailor. Been on the seas my whole life.
Caspian: Of course, you must.
Man: Thank you!
Daughter: Daddy!
Man: If I ever not come back…(he hugs her) Now be good.

A sympathetic Lucy observes this farewell.

So Caspian is now setting out to find and destroy the source of the Mist, hopefully succeeding where the six lords failed. Shouldn’t this scene feel more tense? Shouldn’t someone (probably Edmund) ask Caspian how they know the Mist isn’t just going to devour them before they get near it? And shouldn’t Caspian say something along the lines of “I don’t know but we have to try to help?” Instead, except for this little bit with the family, the mood of the whole scene is triumphant and even that bit goes by too quickly to have much emotional impact. Mind you, in the book, the crew of the Dawn Treader definitely left the Lone Islands in a triumphant mood so I’m actually asking the adaptation to be less like the book here. But if they’re going to change the story so that the crew is now dealing with a mysterious threat about which they know little, shouldn’t that lead them to changing the mood? It doesn’t really make sense otherwise.

As they’re about to board, the Narnians are met by Lord Bern, now much healthier looking. He hands Caspian an ancient, dirt encrusted sword.

Bern: This was given to me by your father. I hid it in a cave all these years.
Edmund: That’s an old Narnian sword!
[7]Don’t ask me how he can tell under all that grime. I’m stumped.
Bern: It’s from your golden age. There are seven such swords, gifts from Aslan to protect Narnia. (to Caspian) Your father entrusted them to us. Here, take it and may it protect you.

Um, weren’t the Telmarines enemies of Narnia? Why would Aslan give them magical swords (which aren’t from the book) to protect it?[8]To be fair, there are times in the book where C. S. Lewis seems to have forgotten the relationship between Telmar and Narnia in Prince Caspian. I mentioned the dryad thing in the last post. One of … Continue reading Of course, since Bern tells us these swords are from the golden age of Narnia when Lucy, Edmund and their siblings reigned, the implication is that Aslan didn’t specifically give the swords to the Telmarines. Apparently, Caspian’s father just found them somewhere. But how would he know what they were? Shouldn’t Edmund and Lucy be the ones explaining the significance of the swords to Bern rather than vice versa? Maybe when Caspian’s father entrusted the swords to the lords, the idea was that they would stop the swords from helping the Narnians and defeating the Telmarines. Not sure how they could do that if the swords were magical, but it’s the best explanation I’ve got.[9]I’d ask why Caspian IX didn’t just destroy the swords but later we’ll see that one of them is able to resist an enchantment that befell its bearer, so it’s not a stretch to … Continue reading Anyway, the crowd cheers. “Thank you, my lord,” Caspian says, “and we shall find your lost citizens.” Then he gives the sword to Edmund who stares at it in awe. Lucy smiles. Eustace just looks at Edmund like he’s nuts.

Next Week: There’s a Drain on the Dawn Treader’s Food Supplies-Two Drains Actually

References

References
1 You may remember that the White Witch was the Empress of them back in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.
2 Reepicheep did surprisingly advocate nonviolent solutions in two scenes in the book though neither of those counted as “turning away from adventure” and in the last chapter, he chided Caspian that as a king, he can’t “please (himself) with adventures as if (he) were a private person.”
3 I don’t mean that “weirdly calm” bit as a criticism. I believe the voice is supposed to sound weirdly calm.
4 As opposed to a villain who only shows up at one island.
5 The reason for the color change, from what I’ve gathered, is that in early drafts of the script, The Lady of the Green Kirtle, the villain of another Narnia book, was behind the Mist. I’m glad they scrapped that since it would have departed from the spirit of the books. The only Narnia story to set up a villain who is defeated in another installment is The Magician’s Nephew and that’s because it was written as a prequel. I just wish they had removed every trace of the Lady of the Green Kirtle from the final film.
6 The tendrils of smoke actually look a little like the skipping stone in Walden Media’s logo. Was that intentional?!
7 Don’t ask me how he can tell under all that grime. I’m stumped.
8 To be fair, there are times in the book where C. S. Lewis seems to have forgotten the relationship between Telmar and Narnia in Prince Caspian. I mentioned the dryad thing in the last post. One of the missing lords also had Narnian coins in his pocket with images of lions and trees on them even though the Telmarines hated those things. I feel like those continuity goofs are easier to ignore than this sword thing since, as we’ll see, the movie’s plot hinges on it.
9 I’d ask why Caspian IX didn’t just destroy the swords but later we’ll see that one of them is able to resist an enchantment that befell its bearer, so it’s not a stretch to assume they’re indestructible.
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The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010) Part 2: I’m Just Glad to Be Here

When we last left Lucy, Edmund and Eustace, they had resurfaced to find that they were no longer at Cambridge but in the open sea with the sailing vessel from the painting looming over them. I’m pleased to report the ship, the Dawn Treader, looks much as the book describes.

Her prow was gilded and shaped like the head of a dragon with wide open mouth. She had only one mast and one large, square sail which was a rich purple. The sides of the ship — what you could see of them where the gilded wings of the dragon ended — were green.

I’m displeased to report that…it doesn’t look very good. In fact, I distinctly remember when I first saw it, my heart sank. To my eyes, the colors, red, green and gold, clash with each other and the whole thing looks overly shiny and fake, plastic even. It’s very obviously a prop and doesn’t give the illusion of reality that, say, Tumnus’s cave in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005) or the Telmarine castle in Prince Caspian (2008) give. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad if it started out shiny and grew gradually more weathered looking as the titular voyage progressed, but I can’t see that that’s the case.

This may be nitpicking, but the dragon design of the prow strikes me as more like an Oriental dragon when a European one would make more sense for Narnia.

Our heroes desperately try to swim out of the ship’s path. (Eustace is noticeably a less capable swimmer than Edmund or Lucy.) A couple of sailors dive off the ship’s deck and swim after them. There’s hardly enough time to build suspense as to whether they’re enemies before it’s revealed that one of those sailors is Caspian (Ben Barnes.) As you’ve probably guessed, they’re in Narnia. Edmund and Lucy are happy to be rescued but Eustace hysterically fights off the sailor holding onto him, yelling, “I don’t want to go! I’m going to go back to England! I’m going back to England!” That’s not from the book but it sounds exactly like Eustace and it’s hilarious.

Lucy and Caspian are pulled aboard the ship in some kind of pulley contraption and Ben Barnes fangirls enjoy the sight of him in a wet shirt. The crew quickly wraps them in dry blankets. “That was thrilling!” says Lucy because that’s exactly what someone would say after almost drowning. “How in the world did you end up here?” Caspian asks her. “I have no idea,” says Lucy. By the way, Barnes no longer uses his “Telmarine accent” from the last movie. For some viewers, that’s a relief. For others, maybe it’s a distraction. I don’t care either way. Ben Barnes, perhaps because he’d only been in one Narnia movie prior to this, gives a much better performance than Georgie Henley or Skandar Keynes. If anything, he’s kicked his Caspian game up a notch and is one of the best things about this adaptation. Anyway, once Edmund’s on board, he and Caspian throw their arms over each other’s shoulders and talk about how great it is to see each other again. This is kind of weird since they barely interacted in the last movie.[1]To be fair, you could say the same of Lucy and Caspian in the books. At first, I thought the screenwriters were trying to make amends to fans of the books for how unfriendly they made Peter and Caspian towards each other. In retrospect, I think their goal was to make a later conflict between Caspian and Edmund as shocking as possible.

“Didn’t you call for us?” Lucy asks Caspian. “No, not this time,” he says. “Well, whatever the case, I’m just glad to be here,” says Edmund. You know who’s not glad to be there? Eustace. The conversation between the monarchs is interrupted by a shrill scream of his. They turn to see him flopping around on the deck, yelling, “Get this thing off me!” That thing is none other than Reepicheep (voiced by Simon Pegg rather than Eddie Izzard in the only example of an actor being replaced in these movies) whom Eustace manages to push off of himself.

After exchanging pleasantries with Lucy and Edmund, Reepicheep asks about what they should do with “this hysterical interloper.”

Eustace: That giant rat thing tried to claw my face off!
Reepicheep: I was merely trying to expel the water from your lungs, sir.
Eustace: It talks! Did you see? Did anyone just hear that? It just talked!
A Sailor (Tony Nixon): He always talks.
Caspian: Actually, it’s getting him to shut up that’s the trick.
Reepicheep: The moment there is nothing to be said, Your Highness, I promise you I will not say it.

By the way, I’m sure that last line of Caspian’s was stolen from another movie; Shrek, I believe.[2]Though when Caspian lost his temper with Reepicheep in the book, he did say that he promised to be a good lord to the talking beasts of Narnia, not beasts that never stop talking.” Since we’re on the subject of Reepicheep talking, I should give my opinion on Simon Pegg’s vocal performance. That’s hard though since I consider it a mixed bag. When he’s delivering dramatic dialogue, he’s great and to this movie’s credit, it gives him more dramatic dialogue than the Prince Caspian movie did. I should stress that I like what this movie is trying to do with the character better than what the last one did. Even when Reepicheep gets a humorous line, it sounds more like the quip of a swashbuckling hero than that of a snarky malcontent.[3]I wouldn’t describe the Reepicheep of the books as a swashbuckler but it’s better than the snarky option. However, the way Pegg delivers those humorous lines makes Reepicheep sound like a goofy British stereotype. (Think of a swashbuckling Bertie Wooster.) While Eddie Izzard’s Reepicheep had a less dramatic role, he oddly had more dignity.

Anyway, Eustace continues to rant and rave hysterically and hilariously. “Perhaps we should throw him back?” jokes Reepicheep. Edmund looks like he’s considering it and has to be chided by his sister. That’s also an old joke but I can see why the writers found it hard to resist with these character dynamics. Eustace’s rant ends with the words, “I demand to know just where in the blazes am I!” Or rather it is interrupted by a minotaur (Narnia veteran Shane Rangi) saying, “You’re on the Dawn Treader, the finest ship in Narnia’s navy.” Eustace passes out. “Was it something I said?” asks the minotaur. Caspian tells him to see to Eustace and the minotaur obeys though once Caspian’s out of sight, he grimaces over the job. There actually were no minotaurs or any other specifically Narnian creatures besides Reepicheep on board the Dawn Treader in the book. You could argue that made no logical sense and the movie was right to change it. I’d argue though that a human crew made for a better contrast to the fantastic locations they encounter on the voyage. And you’ll remember I never liked making Narnian minotaurs good guys. Still, having more nonhumans in the crew is far from the worst bit of artistic license this movie takes with its source material.[4]If only it were!

Caspian gives a speech. “Men, behold our castaways, Edmund the just and Lucy the valiant, high king and queen of Narnia.” This is another minor thing, I guess, but Edmund and Lucy were never called the high king and queen of Narnia in the books. The title of High King was reserved for Peter. I guess the screenwriters thought calling Edmund and Lucy the ancient king and queen would sound weird. While Caspian speaks, by the way, we get our first look at the ship’s captain, Drinian (Gary Sweet.) He looks a lot older and more grizzled (and grumpier) than I imagined from the book. Mind you, Drinian was always supposed to be older than Caspian but in another Narnia book, The Silver Chair, he was still alive and kicking when Caspian was in his old age. Oh well. This is, again, not the dumbest change to make.

Anyway, everyone bows to Edmund and Lucy as the heroic theme for the Pevensies from the last two movies’ soundtracks plays and we get some establishing shots of the ship. It’s kind of a cool moment.

Caspian leads Edmund and Lucy, now changed into Narnian clothes, into the stern cabin. (Eustace, by the way, remains in his English clothes throughout the movie despite how they must stink. Unrealistic but a good visual way to symbolize his contempt for Narnia.) Lucy notices something the book mentions, a golden image of a lion’s head[5]Though it was on a different wall, I believe., and smiles. “Aslan,” she whispers. OK, there were plenty of images of lions in Narnian art in the last two movies. If Lucy only just now realized they’re supposed to be Aslan, she’s pretty slow.

Let’s talk about this cabin. The book describes it as being beautiful and ornate with pictures on the panels and I’m glad production designer Barry Robison stayed true to that. But I feel like they went a little too far. The cabin ends up looking not so much beautiful as gaudy in my opinion or at least like it could be described either way.

“Look!” says Lucy. “Susan’s bow and arrows!” Susan’s horn isn’t on display, something I appreciate as a fan of the book, since C. S. Lewis specifically wrote that Caspian left it with his regent, Trumpkin. Caspian takes out a box and shows its contents to Lucy. “My healing cordial!” she exclaims. “And dagger!” Henley’s delivery of that line is not good, but I’ll defend her in that…well, you try saying that line, especially in an excited voice, and making it sound natural. Edmund notices Peter’s sword. “Yes, I’ve looked after it as promised,” says Caspian. He takes it from the place of honor where it hangs and hands it to Edmund, saying, “Here. Hold it if you wish.” Edmund declines. “No, it’s yours,” he says, “Peter gave it to you.” This makes it incredibly obvious that there will be a conflict over who gets the sword later. “I did save this for you though,” says Caspian. He takes Edmund’s electric torch from the last movie out of a cupboard and tosses it to him. I have a theory that it really bugged the screenwriters that Edmund never got a special Christmas present in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe like his siblings did. In an early draft of their screenplay version, they had Lucy ask Father Christmas about it and where the other Pevensies had images of their gifts on the back of their thrones, Edmund had an image of the White Witch’s wand smashed by him. The torch is their biggest attempt to balance what they perceived as an injustice.[6]Heh, there’s got to be a joke to be made about Edmund the just somewhere in there. I don’t say that to criticize them by the way. If anything, it kind of makes them endearingly human. And while a torch isn’t as cool as a magical cordial or horn, that arguably fits with Edmund’s implied inferiority complex in this movie.

He actually looks a little embarrassed, doesn’t he?

A bit later, Caspian gives Edmund and Lucy a little update as they look over some maps. “Since you left us, the giants of the north have surrendered unconditionally,” he tells them, “And we defeated the Calormene armies at the great desert.” As you can guess, the northern giants and the Calormenes are antagonists of other Narnia stories and it’s nice to imagine them still existing in Walden Media’s Narnia universe even though they would never get to adapt those stories.

Caspian: There’s peace across all of Narnia.
Edmund: Peace?
Caspian: In just three years.
Lucy: And have you found yourself a queen in those three years?

As Lucy says that line, she grins and brushes her hair behind her ears as she saw the nurse do back in her own world. If the movie was trying to imply that she has a crush on Caspian though, it completely forgot about it after this scene, thank goodness! Caspian looks down, a little embarrassed. “No,” he says, “not one to compare with your sister.” You may remember I thought creating a romance between Caspian and Susan in the last movie was a stupid idea but I’m actually fine with this callback to it. You see, at around this point in the book, Drinian mentions that everyone was hoping for a marriage between Caspian and the duke of Galma’s daughter, but that Caspian found her unattractive. This subtly sets up the idea that Caspian is on the lookout for a wife which he will eventually find by the end of the story. The line about Susan serves the same purpose.

Edmund: Hang on. If there are no wars to fight and no one’s in trouble, then why are we here?
Caspian: That’s a good question. I’ve been asking myself the same thing.

That is an unusual aspect of this story. In another Narnia book, we’re told that “the Sons and Daughters of Adam and Eve were brought out of their own strange world into Narnia only at times when Narnia was stirred and upset.” This is not the case in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. The fact that the script is emphasizing it at this point though is an ominous thing for book fans wanting a faithful adaptation. While Hollywood might make an adventure movie without a big villain to conquer[7]Though it’s worth noting the book does have minor antagonists that show up for a chapter or two., they’d never draw viewers’ attention to the lack of one[8]Actually, that’s not quite true. I haven’t seen Disney’s Strange World, but the internet informs me it contains a meta commentary about stories not needing villains., so lines like these are a promise that there will be a big overarching conflict of which the characters aren’t aware yet. But let’s not worry about that now. “So where are we sailing to?” Edmund asks. “Before I took back the throne from my uncle, he tried to kill my father’s closest friends and most loyal supporters, the seven lords of Telmar.” While he doesn’t give the names of these lords at this point, as he does in the book, he does show drawings of each of them, the closest things they have to photographs in Narnia, which I think is a nice idea on this adaptation’s part.

“They fled to the Lone Islands,” Caspian continues. “No one’s heard from them since.” In the book, the lords weren’t fleeing per se. Miraz actually sent them on an exploratory voyage, hoping they’d never return. I’m fine with this simplified backstory since long scenes of exposition are better on the page than the screen. “So you think something’s happened to them?” asks Edmund as he looks at the pictures of the lords. “Well, if it has,” says Caspian, “it’s my duty to find out.” Lucy asks what’s east of the Lone Islands though she should really know the answer as someone who was once empress of those islands for at least a decade and probably more than that. “Uncharted waters,” says Drinian. “Things you can barely imagine. Tales of sea serpents and worse.” Edmund expresses incredulity at the idea of sea serpents and Caspian affectionately tells Drinian, “that’s enough of your tall tales.” I’m not really sure why sea serpents would be more ridiculous than other fantastical creatures in the world of Narnia, but I won’t press the point since the book could be criticized along those lines. It mentioned sea captains telling “wild stories of islands inhabited by headless men, floating islands, waterspouts and a fire that burned along the water” when what the Dawn Treader actually encounter beyond the Lone Islands was only marginally less crazy.

We get a cool tracking shot passing over the Dawn Treader and its crew[9]I may not like the look of the ship, but I concede it can be filmed in cool ways. but I can’t enjoy it as much as I’d wish since there’s an irritating song in the background. It’s being sung by Reepicheep whom we find on the dragon head of the ship’s prow, a location the book describes him as frequenting. Here are the words to his song.

Where sky and water meet,
Where the waves grow ever sweet,
Doubt not you Reepicheep
To find all that you seek.
There is the utter east.

In the book, this is supposed to be a very haunting song and it fulfills the same function in the movie, so I’m somewhat baffled as to why they give it such a perky, peppy tune. It doesn’t really fit the tone at all.[10]The lyrics are ever so slightly different from those in the book by the way. I hope that’s just because the writers were working from memory and not because they changed them to fit that tune. “That’s pretty,” says Lucy, coming up from behind Reepicheep. Georgie Henley’s line delivery almost makes it sound like she’s trying to find a polite way to say, “Reepicheep! Please stop that horrible singing,” which would be appropriate but I’m not sure if was intentional. “Thank you,” Reepicheep says, “A dryad sung it to me when I was just a mouseling.” There’s actually a big continuity problem here that’s from the book. In Prince Caspian, the dryads had been silent for centuries and there’s no way one of them could have sung over Baby Reepicheep.[11]If I were adapting the book, I might change the dryad to a centaur, Narnian centaurs having prophetic powers. I mention this because I intend to call out the movie on some major lapses in continuity and I don’t want anyone saying I hold it to a standard I don’t hold the book. Now back to the story. “I can’t divine the meaning,” says Reepicheep, “but I’ve never forgotten the words.” In the book, he says, “the spell of it has been on me all my life.” Why you would want to replace that phrasing with “I’ve never forgotten the words” is beyond me but oh well.

“What do you think is past the Lone Islands, Reep?” asks Lucy. “Well, I’ve been told the furthest east one can sail is to the end of the world,” says Reepicheep, “Aslan’s country.” “Do you really believe there’s such a place?” asks Lucy. Um, why not? Lucy has interacted with Aslan, arguably more than anyone else. Why wouldn’t she believe he has a country? I’m not just criticizing this line for being something Lucy wouldn’t say in the book. It doesn’t even make sense for her to say it in the movie! “Well, we have nothing if not belief,” Reepicheep replies, which is an… odd thing to say. It’s like the screenwriters wanted him to say a cool line here but they had absolutely nothing to say. I’ve been ragging on Georgie Henley’s performance in this movie a lot so far, so I should stress that her next line reading, in which she asks Reepicheep if he thinks it’s actually possible to sail to Aslan’s country, is actually really good. “Well, there is only one way of finding that out,” says Reepicheep. “I only hope I will one day earn the right to see it.” There are things I could say about the concept of earning the right to see Aslan’s country, but I’ll wait until the end of the movie to get into them.[12]It’s not exactly wrong but it’s not exactly right either. For now, Reepicheep excuses himself with a polite “Your Majesty” and Lucy looks over the edge of the prow. She sees some water nymphs leaping and diving. One of them waves at her. I think these nymphs were supposed to be sea people AKA mermaids but that wasn’t in the movie’s budget. I also think this moment was likely inspired by an interaction between Lucy and a sea maid towards the end of the book.[13]I actually quoted the book’s description in a post about The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, so I’m not going to quote it again here.

Caspian and Edmund have a friendly fencing match, ending in a draw. “You’ve grown stronger, my friend,” says Caspian. “It seems I have,” says Edmund. A sailor gives him something to drink, and he goes to sit by Lucy. “Edmund,” she says, “do you think if we keep sailing to the end of the world, we’ll just…tip off the edge?” This moment of wondering about the implications of sailing to end of a world that isn’t necessarily round comes from the book though there it comes toward the end, not near the beginning. I feel like that made more sense from a pacing perspective. By the time, we get to the end of the world in the movie, we’ll have forgotten it’s even a thing. Still, realistically speaking, it makes sense for someone to bring up the question before then.

Edmund: Don’t worry, Lu. We’re a long way from there.
Eustace (emerging from below deck): I see you’re still talking nonsense, the two of you.
Lucy: Are you feeling better?
Eustace: Yes, no thanks to you![14]In a deleted scene, inspired by the book, Lucy would have given Eustace some of her cordial for his seasickness. I have a fine constitution.
Reepicheep: As effervescent as ever, I see. Find your sea legs?
Eustace: Never lost ‘em! I was simply getting over the shock of things. Mother says I have an acute disposition due to my intelligence.

Edmund spits his drink out at that last line.

Reepicheep confides to Lucy that he doesn’t think Eustace has acute anything. “I’ll have you know,” says Eustace, getting back into ranting mode, “as soon as we find civilization, I’m contacting the British consul and having you all arrested for kidnapping!” I’m delighted to hear Eustace referring to the British Consul here. The lack of one in Narnia is a major sore spot for him in the book. As Eustace tries to storm off, he bumps into an amused Caspian.

Caspian: Kidnapping, is it? That’s funny. I thought we saved your life.
Eustace: You held me against my will!
Reepicheep: Ha!
Caspian: Did I?
Eustace: And I must say in one of the most unhygienic quarters-it’s like a zoo down there!
Reepicheep (to Edmund and Lucy): He’s quite the complainer, isn’t he?
Edmund: He’s just warming up.

This is one of my favorite humorous dialogue scenes in any Narnia movie. Maybe my favorite bar none. One thing I enjoy about the book is that everyone reacts to Eustace differently. Edmund vocally despises him, Lucy tries to be nice to him, Caspian initially finds him amusing and Reepicheep also despises him but is more aloof about it than is Edmund. The movie is happily true to that though Lucy doesn’t so much try to be nice to Eustace as tolerate him and Reepicheep, like Caspian, is more amused than angered by him. I’m not a fan of that last change since it means there’s less of a variety of reactions but still the movie does a nice job of differentiating the characters here.

In fact, I’d like to say that this movie’s first fifteen minutes or so are probably closer to the book it’s adapting than the first fifteen minutes of either of the previous Narnia movies are to the ones they adapt. Mind you, I’d say I strangely enjoy the beginnings of those movies more due to things like music, visuals and acting. But as far as fidelity to the source material goes, there hasn’t been anything majorly wrong with this voyage. Edmund and Lucy’s unhappiness at staying with their relatives and Lucy coping with it better than Edmund. The painting of the ship coming to life. Caspian’s quest for the seven missing lords. Reepicheep’s desire to reach Aslan’s country. Eustace’s personality. It’s all been a relatively faithful and perfectly pleasant adaptation so far.

The reason I stop to emphasize that at this point is that a lookout calls, “Land ho,” and, as you may have guessed, the adaptation is about to take a very wrong turn.

Next Week: All Is Not Well on the Lone Islands

References

References
1 To be fair, you could say the same of Lucy and Caspian in the books.
2 Though when Caspian lost his temper with Reepicheep in the book, he did say that he promised to be a good lord to the talking beasts of Narnia, not beasts that never stop talking.”
3 I wouldn’t describe the Reepicheep of the books as a swashbuckler but it’s better than the snarky option.
4 If only it were!
5 Though it was on a different wall, I believe.
6 Heh, there’s got to be a joke to be made about Edmund the just somewhere in there.
7 Though it’s worth noting the book does have minor antagonists that show up for a chapter or two.
8 Actually, that’s not quite true. I haven’t seen Disney’s Strange World, but the internet informs me it contains a meta commentary about stories not needing villains.
9 I may not like the look of the ship, but I concede it can be filmed in cool ways.
10 The lyrics are ever so slightly different from those in the book by the way. I hope that’s just because the writers were working from memory and not because they changed them to fit that tune.
11 If I were adapting the book, I might change the dryad to a centaur, Narnian centaurs having prophetic powers.
12 It’s not exactly wrong but it’s not exactly right either.
13 I actually quoted the book’s description in a post about The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, so I’m not going to quote it again here.
14 In a deleted scene, inspired by the book, Lucy would have given Eustace some of her cordial for his seasickness.
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The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010) Part 1: Legal Ramifications of Impaling Relatives

This post is part of a lengthy series I’m doing on the Narnia movies. To understand the format, readers should start with this post.

The third and, as it would prove, last of Walden Media’s Narnia adaptations had a bit of a rough start. After Prince Caspian underperformed at the box office in 2008, the Disney company dropped the series. Walden found a new partner for it in Twentieth Century Fox[1]This, of course, was before Disney bought Fox in their unending quest for world domination. but considerably less money was thrown at this third movie. It also had a shorter production time. The Prince Caspian movie was released three years after The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe where The Voyage of the Dawn Treader was released two years after Prince Caspian. Less ominously, this was the first Narnia film not to be directed by Andrew Adamson. (It’s rare for every movie in a lengthy series to have the same director.) Michael Apted was in the hot seat instead.

The result was that my favorite of the first three Narnia books[2]Nowadays the first three books are listed as The Magician’s Nephew, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and The Horse and his Boy but most fans, including yours truly, believe they should be … Continue reading was adapted into my least favorite of the three Narnia movies. That sounds a bit harsh so I’m going to hasten to soften it. Since I really like, even love, the first films in the series[3]Since I’m analyzing them in such detail on this blog, it probably sounds like I’m more critical of them than is actually the case., saying that The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (2010) is my least favorite isn’t the harshest indictment that could be given. While I don’t feel inclined to rewatch it as often as the other two movies, when I do, which is usually because I’ve just rewatched those other movies and feel that I might as well see the series through to the bitter end, I typically end up enjoying it more than I expect.

I should also say in this adaptation’s defense that it’s appropriate that it feels different from the previous two movies in the series since the book The Voyage of the Dawn Treader was very different from the books The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and Prince Caspian. The first two Narnia stories have much the same narrative formula which the third one doesn’t follow at all. Instead of being about overthrowing a tyrant who has taken over Narnia and restoring a rightful (and much younger) ruler to the throne, it’s about an expedition to unknown regions. While this movie adaptation adds a villain and creates an action-filled climax and not to good effect in my opinion, to its credit, that villain is very different from the White Witch or Miraz. Unfortunately, it might have been a better movie if that villain were more like the White Witch or Miraz.

Having written some words in the adaptation’s defense, I’d now like to take issue with some other defenses I’ve read of it. There are definitely fans of the books out there who consider this a better adaptation than Prince Caspian on the grounds that it doesn’t try to turn Narnia into something for teenagers and it doesn’t make the characters who were likeable in the source material unlikeable. Those are valid arguments to an extent, I suppose. It’s true that no character in this adaptation undergoes the character assassination that Peter underwent in Prince Caspian. However, while none of the main characters here are unlikeable in the sense that I dislike them neither are they particularly likeable in the sense that I find them engaging or memorable-except for one and he’s arguably not supposed to be likeable! It’s also true that the Narnia books were written for kids and a really good adaptation, to some extent at least, has to be for them too. But it shouldn’t be just for kids. C. S. Lewis described his approach to the writing The Chronicles of Narnia thus.

I was writing… “for children” only in the sense that I excluded what I thought they would not like or understand, not in the sense of writing what I considered to be below adult attention…I never wrote down to anyone and whether the opinion condemns or acquits my own work, it certainly is my opinion that a book worth reading only in childhood is not worth reading even then.[4]I wouldn’t go that far myself. Disposable things, like Kleenex, can serve a purpose.

Enough preliminaries. Let’s get started.

First, we transition from the Walden Media logo to a stained-glass window. I prefer the logo transition in Prince Caspian, mainly because this one required a weird camera angle, but it’s still nice.

Don’t ask me why someone would make a stained-glass image of a lamp post if they knew nothing of Narnia as the in-universe artist of this one certainly wouldn’t.

The camera pulls back to reveal that this is part of a building in Cambridge. It’s also revealed that the art direction and visuals for this Narnia movie are not going to be as beautiful as those of the last two. I guess that’s a contentious statement but look at any of the screencaps from my previous blog posts about Narnia and then compare them to the ones in this post. To my eyes, the colors are too bright and pastel, and everything looks like CGI even when it isn’t. If I didn’t know better, I would assume this was a made-for-TV or direct-to-DVD spinoff of the Narnia movies rather than a “real” sequel.[5]Arguably, the script gives the same impression. Part of that might be because of a reduced budget or a slightly rushed production but it also probably reflects the times in which these movies were made. It was probably around 2010 that popcorn movies[6]Family popcorn movies anyway. gave up trying to make their worlds look solid and real, opting instead to have everything be bright and shiny and obviously fake. I’m grateful The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005) and Prince Caspian (2008) were made when they were. Another factor in this being the least visually appealing Narnia movie may be the absence of the great Roger Ford as the production designer. At least Isis Mussenden was still the costume designer.

OK, these aren’t the worst visuals ever or anything. But, seriously, compare them to the last two movies.

This entry in the series also has a new composer for its soundtrack, David Arnold. Most of the music he wrote for it is functional but unmemorable. It does have its moments however, particularly in the last scene.

Now the first two movies each opened with a suspenseful nighttime scene of the main characters narrowly escaping being killed in their own homes. This was followed in each case by an opening credits montage of them fleeing those homes. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader doesn’t start that way. Right off the bat, we get the brief opening titles (Fox 2000 Pictures and Walden Media present The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader) and then launch into the first scene, which is not suspenseful or exciting. That’s not a bad thing per se. As I said, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader should be different from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and Prince Caspian. And none of the Narnia books have action-packed openings. The beginning of this adaptation is technically truer to the beginning of its source material than the other two Narnia movies are to theirs. That being said, setting aside the books and just looking at these movies as movies, I’d have to say this one has the least engaging beginning.

Anyway, we see a sign saying, “enlist now”[7]This, by the way, represents a minor change from the book which speaks of “the war years” as being “long ago.” and cut to our old friend Edmund Pevensie (Skandar Keynes) standing in line to do just that.

“Are you sure you’re eighteen?” the skeptical intake officer (Jared Robinsen) asks him. “Why? Do I look older?” replies Edmund. As I’ve mentioned, he has a great poker face. The officer looks at his identity card-or rather the identity card Edmund hands him. “Alberta Scrubb?” he asks incredulously. “That’s a typographical error,” says Edmund, “it’s supposed to be Albert A. Scrubb.” This is a fun scene though it suffers from the fact that the actor is older than the character and it really doesn’t look like he’d be too young to enlist. Anyway, Georgie Henley’s Lucy blows Edmund’s ruse by appearing and reminding him he’s supposed to be helping her with groceries. The officer hands Edmund back the card. (Jared Robinsen does a nice job with the character. Great turns from bit players are uncommon in this movie so I’m happy to point out when there is one.) The man standing behind him in line laughs annoyingly and rumples Edmund’s hair as he departs in disgrace. “Better luck next time, eh, squirt?” he says.

Outside the building, Edmund fumes.

Edmund: Squirt? He barely had two years on me! I’m a king! I’ve fought wars and I’ve led armies!
Lucy: Not in this world.
Edmund (bitterly): Yeah, instead I’m stuck here doing battle with Eustace Clarence Scrubb. If anyone so deserves a name…

You’ll notice that this conversation is almost exactly like the conversation between Peter and Susan near the beginning of the previous movie. I admire that one for giving Peter an inverse of the character arc he went through in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe rather than just rehashing it, so I’m quite disappointed to see that this sequel has no such qualms about rehashing arcs. The sad thing is being frustrated over going back to being a kid after having been a king would be much more in character for the books’ version of Edmund than for their version of Peter. Maybe if the Prince Caspian movie hadn’t given that trait to the latter, I’d be interested to see it in the former. I should stress that Edmund never threatens to become as unpleasant in this film as Peter did in the last one. Unfortunately, that’s largely because the writing for his character doesn’t have the conviction behind it that Peter’s had.

Let’s get back to Edmund’s last line which is a reference to the opening line of the book. “There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb and he almost deserved it.” A great line and I’m tickled that the movie includes a version of it. However, I feel like the way they phrased it makes it harder to get the joke, especially since the camera is focused on something else. You see, Lucy’s attention is drawn to a nearby soldier (Lucas Ross)) who is flirting with a nurse (Megan Hill.) Lucy absently tucks her hair behind her ear as the nurse does. “What are you doing?” asks Edmund. “Nothing,” she says, embarrassed, “Come on then.”

I’d better say a few words about Keynes and Henley who were both so great as these characters in the other two movies. They’re not great here. Keynes’s performance feels fake, compared to what it was in prior installments anyway. He’s obviously playing a character. Part of the problem may be the script by returning screenwriters Christopher Marckus and Stephen McFeely and Narnia newcomer Michael Petroni (The Book Thief.) Previously, the cinematic Edmund had been written as a pretty stoic character. Here he’s, well, basically Peter 2.0. For what it’s worth, that actually strikes me as closer to Edmund in the books in which he could be quite vocal and argumentative. But it doesn’t feel like the same character, and it does feel like a character that Keynes can’t play as easily. If he’s phoning in his line deliveries, Henley is maybe trying too hard with hers. She’s trying to portray Lucy as quiet, thoughtful and somewhat introverted, which is a great idea since she was too old by this point to convince as the perky young Lucy from the last two movies and the ending of this one will stress the character’s increased maturity. But the script doesn’t give Lucy anything thoughtful to say and barely anything thoughtful to do. It feels like the actress and the writers were fighting over the character, metaphorically speaking, and the director did nothing to combine their ideas, let alone contribute any of his own. The Voyage of the Dawn Treader ends with Edmund and Lucy, like Peter and Susan before them, being informed that they’ve “graduated” from Narnia, so to speak, and won’t return. If I hadn’t read the books and didn’t pay attention to the credits saying that this is “based on the book by C. S. Lewis,” I’d assume that was written into the script because Keynes and Henley were tired of this franchise and wanted out of it. That’s certainly how it feels watching their performances. Of course, the impressions I get from their performances are far from foolproof indicators of how the actors were actually feeling.[8]For the record, Henley has spoken of this movie with affection in interviews. But they do impact my experience of watching the movie.

We cut to the bedroom of Edmund and Lucy’s cousin, the infamous Eustace Scrubb (Will Poulter.) One of the first things we learn about his character in the book is that he “liked animals, especially beetles, if they were dead and pinned on a card,” so I’m delighted to report that there’s a whole bulletin board of such cards on the wall. There’s also a school certificate honoring Eustace for personal hygiene. That’s not from the book but it sounds like something that would have been a source of pride to him there.

There are also a number of books in Eustace’s room. We don’t get a very good look at them but I can imagine them being “books of information” with “pictures of grain elevators or of fat foreign children doing exercises in model schools” as the book describes.[9]Sorry if that description of foreign children offends. I didn’t write it.

We find Eustace writing in his diary. In the book, Eustace only started his diary after he became stuck in Narnia. Before that, he just used his notebook to keep track of the marks he got in school “for though he didn’t care much about any subject for its own sake, he cared a great deal about marks and would even go to people and say, ‘I got so much. What did you get?'” But all that would have cumbersome to explain in a movie, so I’m fine with the change. “Dear diary,” Eustace writes, “it is now day number 253 since my wretched cousins, Edmund and Lucy, invaded our house. I’m not sure how much longer I can cope living with them, having to share my things. If only one could treat relatives like one treats insects, all my problems would be solved. I could simply put them in a jar and pin them to my wall. Note to self: investigate legal ramifications of impaling relatives.” In the book, Eustace was actually glad to have Edmund and Lucy stay “For deep down inside him he liked bossing and bullying; and, though he was a puny little person who couldn’t have stood up even to Lucy, let alone Edmund, in a fight, he knew that there are dozens of ways to give people a bad time if you are in your own home and they are only visitors.” However, it’s very much in character for Eustace to write in his diary that his visitors are a pain while really enjoying the chance to torment them. I’m not sure if that black comedy about impaling relatives is in keeping with his character in the book but it’s funny. Hearing Lucy’s voice downstairs, he stashes the diary in his sock, hides the candy pile from which he’s been eating under his bed and heads down.

OK, my comments about this movie have been pretty dismissive so far, so to make up for that, I’m going to write about what is one of its biggest assets even though that’s not immediately apparent with this scene. Will Poulter’s Eustace is one of the greatest things in any Narnia adaptation, far outshining any previous portrayal of the character. In the words of one critic, “Many child actors play jerks like they know they’re supposed to be jerks, but Poulter plays the role with gusto, and convinces you that he believes he’s in the right.” Eustace is also one of the most quotable and entertainingly written characters in these Narnia movies. Sheesh, his comedy bits might even be funnier than their counterparts in the book! And this despite the fact that he’s only featured in this, the one with the weakest overall script. It’s downright bizarre, I tell you!

Downstairs, Eustace’s father sits in his armchair and reads the newspaper. “Hello, Uncle Harold,” says Lucy as she carries the groceries to the kitchen. “I tried to find some carrots but all they had were turnips again.” (The Scrubbs were vegetarians in the book by the way, so that tracks.) “Should I start making soup? Aunt Alberta’s on her way home.” Uncle Harold just coughs and turns the page in response to Lucy’s attempts to get his attention. He doesn’t get any dialogue, and his wife is only an offscreen voice in the movie’s final scene. (Neither actor is even credited anywhere online.) This is reasonable enough since the book told us a great deal about their characters without ever really depicting but it’s somewhat unfortunate as I think those two characters would benefit from expansion.[10]This is controversial coming from a Narnia fan but I’m not crazy about C. S. Lewis’s satire of “very up-to-date and advanced people” in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which … Continue reading

Edmund rolls his eyes and sticks his tongue out at his uncle. “Father! Edmund’s making faces at you!” Eustace calls from the staircase. He then hits Edmund with a spitball. Edmund starts to chase him upstairs. Yeah, this is kind of a dumb scene[11]I did say that Eustace’s greatness wasn’t immediately apparent. but Lucy distracts with the announcement that they’ve received a letter from Susan.

The movie weirdly lingers on this shot of Lucy holding up the envelope like we’re supposed to be reading it or something.

We flashback to Susan (Anna Popplewell) writing the letter in an American hotel.[12]I guess I was wrong about Aslan’s resurrection being the only example of a flashback in the Narnia movies. On her desk, there’s a little figurine of a lamppost and one of a treasure chest. The latter might be a reference to the ancient treasure house in Prince Caspian.[13]I don’t need to explain the former. There’s also a photo of her and her siblings at the train station in that movie. It’s a nice touch though I wonder when they would have taken it as they all look much happier than they did in either of the scenes there. (In reality, of course, it’s a promotional behind-the-scenes photo that’s been repurposed.)

“I do wish you were here with us,” writes Susan, “It’s been such an adventure! Though nothing like our times in Narnia. America is very exciting except we never see Father. He works so very hard.” In the book, by the way, Mr. Pevensie had a job lecturing in America. The implication here is that he’s doing military work. In her room at the Scrubbs’, Lucy reads the letter aloud to Edmund. “I was invited to the British consul’s tea party this week by a naval officer who happens to be very handsome. I think he fancies me. It seems the Germans have made the crossing difficult right now. Times are hard. Mother hopes you won’t mind another few months in Cambridge.” Edmund visibly reacts to this news. Lucy’s reaction is…less visible. “Another few months? How will we survive?” she says, and I honestly can’t tell if she’s genuinely devastated or if she’s sarcastically mocking Edmund. (See my previous comments on George Henley in this movie.) “You’re lucky,” he tells her, “At least you’ve got your own room. I’m stuck with mullet mouth.” Lucy goes over to a mirror to study her reflection. “Peter and Susan are the lucky ones, off on adventures,” she says. “Yeah, they’re the eldest and we’re the youngest,” gripes Edmund, “We don’t matter as much.” I should mention that this is pretty close to the spirit of the book. There, the reason Susan was the one who got to go to America was that “grownups thought her the pretty one of the family and she was no good at schoolwork (though otherwise very old for her age) and Mother said she ‘would get far more out of a trip to America than the youngsters.'”[14]Peter was staying with Prof. Kirke from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe at this point in the book, preparing for exams. The professor would have been happy to have the other Pevensies too, but … Continue reading While Edmund obviously doesn’t try to enlist in the book, he and Lucy are implied to envy their older siblings, and Lucy is implied to resent the attention Susan receives because of her appearance, which subtly sets up later events in the story. The setup is less subtle here and, given the ages of the actresses, the attention Susan gets that Lucy wants is naturally from guys more than from grownups, but this all reasonably close to the source material.

I wonder if that toy dog in the background is supposed to be the same one Lucy had in the first movie. It doesn’t look like something Eustace, or his parents would own.

“Do you think I look anything like Susan?” Lucy asks Edmund. “Lucy, have you seen this ship before?” he says, looking at a painting on the wall. “You didn’t answer my question,” she replies. Actually, no, that’s what she should reply but weirdly doesn’t. Edmund groans before asking about the ship, so maybe the implication is that she asks about her appearance so often he’s sick of it. Either that or he’s too wrapped up in his own problems to hear her and she’s too embarrassed to repeat her query. “Yes,” she says looking the old painting of a ship at sea, “it’s very Narnian looking, isn’t it?”

I’m a bit baffled as to why whoever painted the ship made it so far away and hard to see but whatever.

“Yeah, just another reminder that we’re here and not there,” Edmund grouses. They hear a voice coming from the doorway behind them.

Eustace: There once were two orphans who wasted their time believing in Narnian nursery rhymes.
Edmund: Please let me hit him!
Lucy: No!
Edmund: Don’t you ever knock?
Eustace: It’s my house! I can do as I please. You’re just guests.

To reinforce his point, Eustace walks into the room and sits down on Lucy’s bed. “What’s so fascinating about that picture anyway?” he asks. “It’s hideous.” To this, Edmund responds, “You won’t see it from the other side of the door.” That’s pretty close to the dialogue from this scene in the book. Eustace also made fun of his cousins’ belief in Narnia via poetry in the book too though his poem there was different. “Edmund, it looks like the water’s actually moving,” says Lucy as she stares at the picture. She says something similar in the book but there it was in response to Eustace asking what it was she liked about the art style. Here it kind of sounds like she’s drunk. (See my previous comments on Georgie Henley in this movie.) “What rubbish!” says Eustace. “You see? That’s what happens when you read all those fanciful novels and fairy tales of yours!” That definitely sounds like the sentiment Eustace would endorse in the book.

Edmund counters with his own poem. “There once was a boy known as Eustace who read books full of facts that were useless.” Lucy gives this a pity laugh. I think it’s supposed to be a pity laugh anyway. (See my previous comments on…well, you know.) “People who read fairy tales are always the sort that become a hideous burden to people like me,” says Eustace, “who read books of real information!” Now Edmund’s dander is really up. “‘Hideous burden?'” he repeats. “I haven’t seen you lift a finger since we’ve been here!” Seeing that Edmund is becoming threatening, Eustace tries to make a hasty retreat, but Edmund blocks his way and closes the door.

Edmund: I’ve a right mind to tell your father it was you who stole Aunt Alberta’s sweets!
Eustace: Liar!
Edmund: Oh really? I found them under your bed. And you know what? I licked every one of them!
Eustace: Eww! I’m infected with you!

OK, that’s stupid but while those two have been arguing, something magical has been happening. The painting on the wall has come to life. I love how it starts slowly. First, the waves appear to move subtly.[15]Not as subtly as possible but it’s subtle for this movie. Then there’s a little trickle of water coming from the frame. Then it’s unmistakable.

“Edmund, the painting!” cries Lucy. Wind issuing from the frame blows in her face and salt spray splashes her. Edmund and Lucy turn to see water pouring from the picture onto the floor. “What’s going on here?” Eustace demands. “Lucy, do you think…?” Edmund says. “It’s some kind of trick!” declares the frightened Eustace. “Stop it or I’ll tell Mother! Mother! Mother!” In the book, by the way, Eustace called his parents by their first names. I wish that was another little detail this adaptation could have preserved but I understand it might have been confusing for newcomers to the story. When Alberta doesn’t respond to Eustace’s bawling, he says, “Oh, I’ll just smash the rotten thing” and tears the picture off the wall. That’s what he does in the book or rather tries to do and Edmund and Lucy, having more experience with magic, try to stop him though none of them succeeds.

Here, Eustace does pull the picture off, but the force of the water is too much for him and his cousins combined and they have to drop it. By now, the entire room is flooded and in a matter of minutes, the water is well over everyone’s head. When they manage to resurface, they’re no longer at Cambridge but inside the painting. This is a little different from the book’s description of the scene which implies the character stumbled into the picture but it’s a cool transition in its own way. It actually reminds me of surreal images of Chris Van Allsburg’s picture books, such as Jumanji, The Wreck of the Zephyr or The Mysteries of Harris Burdick.[16]Incidentally, Van Allsburg also created cover art for the Narnia books in 1994. Part of me wonders how come the water doesn’t go under the door and flood the rest of the house but the movie’s final scene will (kind of) address that.[17]And to be fair, the book’s version is pretty surreal too. When this film first played in cinemas, it was in 3D since that was all the rage back then. 3D gives me a headache and I would have gladly gone without it, but I will say this was one scene where the device really added to the experience. Just as the water appeared to be shooting out of the painting in the movie, it also appeared to be shooting out of the screen. I may not find this movie’s visuals to be as beautiful as those of the other two Narnia films, but I’m happy to say they can be fun.

Next Week: On Board the Dawn Treader

Bibliography

ON THREE WAYS OF WRITING FOR CHILDREN (scu.edu.tw)

Lewis, C. S. (1952) The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. HarperCollins Publishers.

References

References
1 This, of course, was before Disney bought Fox in their unending quest for world domination.
2 Nowadays the first three books are listed as The Magician’s Nephew, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and The Horse and his Boy but most fans, including yours truly, believe they should be The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Prince Caspian and The Voyage of the Dawn Treader or at least that The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe should be read before The Magician’s Nephew.
3 Since I’m analyzing them in such detail on this blog, it probably sounds like I’m more critical of them than is actually the case.
4 I wouldn’t go that far myself. Disposable things, like Kleenex, can serve a purpose.
5 Arguably, the script gives the same impression.
6 Family popcorn movies anyway.
7 This, by the way, represents a minor change from the book which speaks of “the war years” as being “long ago.”
8 For the record, Henley has spoken of this movie with affection in interviews.
9 Sorry if that description of foreign children offends. I didn’t write it.
10 This is controversial coming from a Narnia fan but I’m not crazy about C. S. Lewis’s satire of “very up-to-date and advanced people” in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, which relies almost entirely on readers sharing his tastes and biases. I didn’t mind it as a kid but by now, I’ve grown disenchanted with how, say, liberal movies will use a character having stereotypical conservative tastes as shorthand for them being evil and/or stupid. (Conservative movies do the same thing in reverse.) Lewis’s descriptions of the Scrubb family are very much along those tribalistic lines. In another Narnia book, The Silver Chair, he would do a much better job of satirizing modern trends, specifically those in education and school discipline, he was against. He did this by actually demonstrating their negative consequences in the story itself.
11 I did say that Eustace’s greatness wasn’t immediately apparent.
12 I guess I was wrong about Aslan’s resurrection being the only example of a flashback in the Narnia movies.
13 I don’t need to explain the former.
14 Peter was staying with Prof. Kirke from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe at this point in the book, preparing for exams. The professor would have been happy to have the other Pevensies too, but he’d somehow lost all his money between books.
15 Not as subtly as possible but it’s subtle for this movie.
16 Incidentally, Van Allsburg also created cover art for the Narnia books in 1994.
17 And to be fair, the book’s version is pretty surreal too.
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Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella Three-Way Faceoff

In The Sound of Music‘s words, let’s start at the very beginning. Well, OK, not the very beginning. That would require getting into the complete oral and literary history of Cinderella. Let’s start with 1957 when CBS did a musical version of the iconic fairy tale on live television. In 1965, they did another TV-movie version of the musical and in 1997, the Wonderful World of Disney did yet another. While each of the three movies features (mostly) the same songs, each has a different script and it’s interesting to compare and contrast their individual strengths and weaknesses.

Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella (1957)

The original version of the musical directed by Ralph Nelson (Lilies of the Field, Charly) is the one people are least likely to have grown up watching. Unlike the others, it only aired on TV twice and second time was as part of PBS’s Great Performances in 2004. It’s also the one that modern viewers are least likely to find appealing. While it was broadcast in color, the only surviving recordings of it are in black-and-white. The sets are very obviously sets-well, that’s true of the other two movie versions too but these sets, combined with the slightly fuzzy black-and-white cinematography, have a rather claustrophobic feel. And while many of the actors were big stars back in the day, only Julie Andrews is a recognizable name now. That’s too bad because there’s a lot to love about this little museum piece and it’s a grave injustice that NBC’s live musical version of Peter Pan played so much more often on television.[1]I much prefer the filmed staging of that show from 2000. See my blog post for details.

This version’s most obvious strength, of course, is one it shares with the other two: the songs by legendary musical theatre duo, composer Richard Rodgers and lyricist Oscar Hammerstein II. While this musical is considerably less adult than Oklahoma, The King and I or South Pacific, its set of showtunes is just as consistently sparkling. In fact, I’d set this soundtrack against that of any musical this blog has covered. I love the running joke in the opening song, The Prince Is Giving a Ball, with the ridiculous full names of each royal family member and the Stepsisters’ Lament in which they disparage their rival for the Prince (Jon Cypher)’s affections.

She’s a frothy little bubble
With a flimsy kind of charm
And with very little trouble,
I could break her little arm.

And the songs have more than wit to recommend them. There are also two beautiful love duets for Cinderella (Andrews) and the prince: the ecstatic Ten Minutes Ago and the melancholier and more conflicted Do I Love You Because You’re Beautiful?

There is one forgettable song in the musical, Your Majesties, in which the royal chef (Iggie Wolfington according the IMDB) and the royal steward (George Hall) present the expense list for the ball to the king (Howard Lindsay) and queen (Dorothy Stickney.) Neither of the later versions retains that one and they’re probably right not to do so.[2]The 1997 movie unwisely incorporates part of it into The Prince Is Giving a Ball with new lyrics. Even that one isn’t bad by any means though it’s just not nearly as memorable as the other songs.

What this version has that the other two don’t is a script by Hammerstein as well as lyrics, meaning it’s just as witty and entertaining. I love the ironically named stepsisters, dour Joy (Alice Ghostly) and clueless Portia (Kaye Ballard.)[3]To understand why the name Portia is ironic for a dumb character, check out The Merchant of Venice.

The characters of the king and queen are also a hoot and their relationships with each other and with their son end up being surprisingly touching.[4]Perhaps because Lindsay and Stickney were a couple in real life.

Another great character is the counterintuitively pragmatic and no-nonsense fairy godmother (Edie Adams.) She might be my favorite version of that character in any Cinderella retelling. Actually, she resembles another counterintuitively no-nonsense woman with supernatural powers whom Julie Andrews would go on to play.[5]Do I really need to name her?

If this script has a shortcoming, it’s unfortunately the character of Cinderella herself who is always either cheerful or sad, never anything else. In my experience, the character can be a lot more interesting than that. Of course, I realize this is supposed to be a fluffy, tongue-in-cheek version of the story aimed at children, so it’d be beside the point to expect anything too dramatic. But Disney movies are also known for being fluffy and aimed at children and their animated Cinderella character showed a wider emotional range seven years prior to this one and was the more compelling for it. Here the role feels like a waste of Julie Andrews’ charisma though not of her singing voice. It’s also odd that the movie seems to set up a character arc for the heroine on which it doesn’t really follow through. The fairy godmother initially advises her to act on her own behalf and not just sit around wishing and dreaming. (Remember what I mentioned about her characterization being counterintuitive.) Cinderella agrees with the sentiment but says she can never think of what to do. Later, in the scene of every single lady in the kingdom trying on the glass slipper, there’s a twist on the story and it looks like Cinderella is going to be the one to approach the prince rather than waiting for him to find her. But then she chickens out and the godmother has to intervene to save the day, so I’m not really sure what the intended message is supposed to be.[6]Interestingly, Hammerstein wrote a stage version, not to be confused with the 2013 Broadway version with a book by Douglas Carter Beane, that fixes this somewhat. Still, as I wrote, things like that are largely beside the point of this movie.

Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella (1965)

The 1957 production kept its setting vague. The first thing you’ll notice about this one directed by Charles S. Dubin is that it’s explicitly set in a medieval kingdom albeit, after the tradition of fairy tale movies, a generic one without much attention to historical accuracy. This is in keeping with how the new script by Joseph Schrank plays the story straight whereas Hammerstein’s original script played it for laughs. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. I love a good self-aware tongue-in-cheek Cinderella but, in part because it’s so easy to take that approach with this story, there’s something refreshing about a straightforward retelling that doesn’t wink at the audience.

I’ll even say this improves on the 1957 version in some ways. While the bossy and ungrateful stepmother there (who was played by Ilka Chase by the way) certainly wasn’t nice to Cinderella, she wasn’t as nasty as the one here (Jo Van Fleet.) In her first scene, Cinderella (Lesley Ann Warren) actually says that her stepmother will beat her for talking to anyone without her permission. This creates more of a driving need for her to get away from her stepfamily, making the story more engaging. The 1957 version was also limited by technology when it came to showing Cinderella’s rags[7]They’re really more like work clothes but never mind. transforming into finery. Julie Andrews’s Cinderella just put a fancy wrap over them and then after the commercial break, she took it off to reveal she’d changed into a ballgown. The transformation in this 1965 production is far from an impressive special effect but it’s a big moment as it should be. That being said, this isn’t the most interesting straightforward retelling of Cinderella. At times, it’s downright dull, mainly during the scenes with the king (Walter Pidgeon) and the queen (Ginger Rogers) who are nowhere near as much fun as their 1957 counterparts.

What’s more, the tone of the script doesn’t mesh particularly well with the tone of the lyrics. This Cinderella is even more of an innocent ingenue than the previous version so it’s downright jarring for her to fantasize about her stepsisters’ faces being “a queer sort of sour apple green” while she’s being “coy and flirtatious when alone with the prince.” With the fairy godmother (Celeste Holm)’s song, Impossible, the script blatantly has to write around the lyrics. In 1957, the godmother presented herself as an ordinary woman and initially kept her magical powers a secret. Here she materializes before Cinderella in a glimmer of fairy dust and explains that she is “made of all (her) most beautiful dreams and hopes and wishes,” so it isn’t very natural for her to start singing about how Cinderella’s wishes are a bunch of “folderol and fiddledy dee.” The movie tries to make it work by having her preface the song with the words, “sensible people say….” I guess that was the best fix if they couldn’t just follow the original.

Speaking of singing, this version gives the prince (Stuart Damon) a romantic solo, Loneliness of Evening, that was cut from South Pacific, another Rodgers and Hammerstein musical. It’s a beautiful song and I’d rather it be in this movie than nowhere. But it doesn’t really fit in with the other songs, being much more serious and since the movie places it in the first scene, it arguably does a bad job of setting the tone for the soundtrack. (I’m also not sure why the prince would be “looking out on a silver-flaked sea.” There’s no such body of water in sight.)

It would be wrong to say there’s no comedy at all in this version. I’ve described the stepmother as more villainous than in the 1957 Cinderella and so she is, but Jo Van Fleet’s cartoony facial expressions also make her very funny.

There’s also a running joke about one of the stepsisters, Esmeralda (Barbara Ruick)[8]Who played Carrie Pipperidge in the movie adaptation of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Carousel, constantly batting her eyelashes and the knees of the other, Prunella (Pat Carroll)[9]Who voiced the sea witch in Disney’s The Little Mermaid., creaking. This can be funny though when the prince jokes about their infirmities at the ball, you may feel that he’s a jerk.

Esmeralda trying desperately not to bat her eyes.
Prunella realizing she’s made a creak.

That being said, of the three actors who play the prince in the different screen versions of this musical, Stuart Damon probably has the best screen presence. And while the squeaky voice she adopts to play Cinderella annoys me, Lesley Ann Warren’s eloquent facial expressions shine.

To end on a positive note, let me mention a major improvement the 1965 version of the musical makes over the previous one. In 1957, prior to Cinderella’s arrival at the ball, formal and stately (though beautiful) music accompanied a formal and stately dance[10]The technical term is gavotte. in keeping with the prince’s boredom. Then when Cinderella arrived, and he danced with her, the same music played in a livelier key. After the songs Ten Minutes Ago and Stepsisters’ Lament, the couple danced to a sweeping romantic waltz. Here that waltz is the first thing which they dance. The contrast this creates may be less subtle, but the unsubtlety honestly works better, and the 1997 movie would wisely follow suit. Each of the three films has a moment when Cinderella enters the ballroom, everyone stares at her and the prince approaches her. By eliminating all background music until the dancing resumes, this version is the one that makes the moment the most electric.

Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella (1997)

For someone who’s seen the first two screen versions of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella, a pleasure of watching the third one directed by Robert Iscove is seeing how it incorporates elements of each of them. The first scene combines the beginning of the 1957 movie, with Cinderella (Brandi Norwood) and her stepfamily out shopping and Cinderella stuck carrying all the packages, and the 1965 one with a chance between meeting between Cinderella and the prince (Paulo Montalban) whose identity she doesn’t initially realize. The scene of the stepsisters rehearsing what they’ll do when they meet the prince is particularly packed with allusions to the earlier versions. First, they argue which of them will flutter her eyelashes and which will start with a curtsey, recalling the characters’ quirks from 1965. Then one of them, Minerva (Natalie Deselle), says she intends to impress the prince by reciting a poem like Portia the would-be intellectual stepsister in 1957. The other, Calliope (Veanne Cox), plans on charming him with her supposedly infectious laughter, bringing to mind Portia’s sister, Joy. At its best, the script by Robert L. Freedman combines the sound storytelling instincts of the 1965 one with the 1957 script’s sense of humor.

This version adds not one but three songs by Richard Rodgers to the score. Shockingly, the one with the least memorable lyrics is the only one with lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein. That would be There Is Music in You, originally written the 1953 movie Main Street to Broadway in which the famous musical duo had a cameo. Here it’s sung at the end of the film by the fairy godmother (Whitney Houston who was also a coproducer.) The “inspiring” lyrics are generic to the point of being vapid. The song was clearly a throwaway effort on Rodgers and Hammerstein’s part, and I imagine it was only put in this movie so Houston could sing more. The added songs without Hammerstein are surprisingly better. One of them is The Sweetest Sounds, which was originally from the 1962 musical No Strings and features lyrics by Rodgers himself. Here it becomes a lovely duet between Cinderella and the prince which they unknowingly sing together in the opening scene as they navigate a crowded marketplace, unaware of each other’s existence, establishing that they’re destined for each other. Not the most original idea but it works. The other new song is Falling In Love With Love, which hails from the 1938 musical The Boys from Syracuse, a collaboration between Richard Rodgers and lyricist Lorenzo Hart.[11]A musical inspired by Shakespeare’s The Comedy of Errors incidentally. It’s a fun, cynically humorous song in which the stepmother (Bernadette Peters) cautions her daughters against romance.[12]That’s its context in this movie, I mean, not in Boys from Syracuse. The lyrics of these songs naturally don’t connect to the story as organically as those written specifically for it but to my mind, they all mesh with them better than Loneliness of Evening did in 1965.

I also feel this production does the best job of adapting the classic songs. I love the way they slow down the reprise of Cinderella’s song about daydreams, In My Own Little Corner, making it melancholier and even have her voice trail off before she can finish the last line. Earlier the song sounded more genuinely cheerful but now we get the impression that Cinderella is losing the ability to take comfort in her imagination. Why didn’t the earlier two versions do that? It makes so much sense! The movie also takes advantage of Whitney Houston’s vocal cords to make Impossible a bigger showstopper than ever.

There’s only one song whose reimagining I dislike. In 1957, The Prince Is Giving a Ball was driven by Hammerstein’s clever lyrics. Here it becomes a big ensemble dance number in which the main singer, royal aide Lionel (Jason Alexander) is in constant danger of being trampled by various other servants preparing for the festivities. I suppose this was done because the only cinematic musicals that were popular in the 1990s were Disney animated ones and those typically a featured a big production number or two like this, often with an element of slapstick comedy. Other than that, this iteration of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella has the best staged songs, thanks to choreographer Rob Marshall. Not only are they the most fun to watch out of all three movies but they’re the only ones where the staging assists the storytelling and characterizations rather than just being an ornamentation.

But then there’s the dialogue which is a mixed bag. Whenever it tries to be inspiring or romantic, it’s dreadfully trite and flat and only little kids will find it moving. I know the romantic dialogue in the 1957 movie was also cornball[13]I’d argue deliberately so. but that was good solid corn. Or maybe 50s era corn was just better than 90s era corn. Exhibit A: this dialogue between Cinderella and the prince in the original movie.

Prince: You haven’t yet told me your name.
Cinderella: It’s a silly name. You wouldn’t like it.
Prince: Whatever you are called is the most beautiful name in the world. Whatever your name is, I love you. I will always love you. You don’t say anything? I have just told you that I love you and you don’t say anything?
Cinderella: I’m afraid to. I’m afraid I might…wake up.
Prince: Are you sure you are asleep?
Cinderella: Oh yes!
Prince: Are you dreaming I’m about to kiss you? (They kiss.) I am deeply in love. And yet I don’t know why. Do you?
Cinderella: Do I what?
Prince: Do you know why I am in love? What did you think I meant?
Cinderella: I thought you said do I know why I am in love.
Prince: Are you?
Cinderella: Oh yes!
Prince: And do you know why?
Cinderella: No but I’m a girl and girls don’t care why.
Prince: I always want to know why I do anything, why I feel anything and so I ask myself why. Why is the sound of your voice the sweetest sound in the world? Why is the color of your hair the only color a girl’s hair should be? Why would I rather hold you in my arms than do anything else in the world? Why?

Compare that to the conversation between Cinderella and the incognito prince when they first meet in the 1997 movie.

Prince: Tell me, Cinderella, what would a man have to do to find himself in your good graces?
Cinderella: Who wants to know?
Prince: Let’s just say a charming stranger.
Cinderella: This charming stranger seems pretty sure of himself. But he’d have to get to know me a lot better than some girl he just met on the street.
Prince: Oh, but he’d like to! Very much!
Cinderella: Oh my. I’m not sure I want to meet this stranger. I doubt if he has any idea how a girl should be treated.
Prince: Like a princess, I suppose.
Cinderella: No. Like a person, with kindness and respect.
Prince: You’re not like most girls, are you?

Arrgh! It’s such bad dialogue! And yet I really like this movie. And I don’t think that’s just 90s kid nostalgia.[14]Amusingly, that line of thought recalls the lyrics to one of this musical’s songs. Do I love it because it’s beautiful? Or is it beautiful because I love it?

You see, while the script usually falls flat when it tries to be serious, whenever it tries to be funny, it’s brilliant. Take this exchange between the king (Victor Garber) and the queen (Whoopi Goldberg) at the ball. For context, their son has agreed to attend on the condition that if he doesn’t meet the love of his life there, they’ll leave him to his own devices.

Queen: So many beautiful girls! He’ll find the one he’s looking for tonight, I’m sure of it.
King: And if he doesn’t?
Queen (through gritted teeth) This ball will never end.
Lionel: I don’t think we ordered enough food.

The same scene features the stepmother flirting with Lionel unsuccessfully.

Stepmother: Look at you! That manly physique, those handsome chiseled features, that wonderful full head (notices he’s balding) of skin.
Lionel: No touching, please.
Stepmother: Surely, there’s no need to pretend. I know that you’ve felt that certain something between us.
Lionel: You know, I honestly wish there was something between us.
Stepmother: You do?
Lionel: Yes. A continent.

In fact, the whole scene of the ball prior to Cinderella’s entrance is hilarious. The scene of the stepsisters trying on the glass slipper is also the funniest version not only in any of these movies but in any Cinderella movie period.

This isn’t the funniest part. I don’t want to spoil that.

This movie also benefits from strong casting. Brandi Norwood is sweetly appealing as Cinderella, and she even manages to transcend the lame dialogue she’s given. (Paul Montalban doesn’t transcend his but that may just be because the prince is a worse written character.)

Cox and Deselle outshine any of the actresses who played the stepsisters in previous versions. But Bernadette Peters outshines the previous portrayals of the stepmother even more so, making her every line memorable and stealing every scene with her in it. Sure, her performance is pure ham-sweet, succulent juicy ham. With this kind of musical, I feel that’s the right way to play it.

Conclusion

So which of these movies is the best? My heart wants me to vote for the 1997 one but the 1957 version has the easily the most consistently great script. It’s a pity that it’s practically impossible for modern viewers (besides me, I mean) to enjoy it. Then again, the theme of this musical is “impossible things are happening every day.”

You know what else is possible these days? Listening to the soundtrack of each of these movies on YouTube. Cheers!

References

References
1 I much prefer the filmed staging of that show from 2000. See my blog post for details.
2 The 1997 movie unwisely incorporates part of it into The Prince Is Giving a Ball with new lyrics.
3 To understand why the name Portia is ironic for a dumb character, check out The Merchant of Venice.
4 Perhaps because Lindsay and Stickney were a couple in real life.
5 Do I really need to name her?
6 Interestingly, Hammerstein wrote a stage version, not to be confused with the 2013 Broadway version with a book by Douglas Carter Beane, that fixes this somewhat.
7 They’re really more like work clothes but never mind.
8 Who played Carrie Pipperidge in the movie adaptation of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Carousel
9 Who voiced the sea witch in Disney’s The Little Mermaid.
10 The technical term is gavotte.
11 A musical inspired by Shakespeare’s The Comedy of Errors incidentally.
12 That’s its context in this movie, I mean, not in Boys from Syracuse.
13 I’d argue deliberately so.
14 Amusingly, that line of thought recalls the lyrics to one of this musical’s songs. Do I love it because it’s beautiful? Or is it beautiful because I love it?
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Prince Caspian (2008) Part 13: It’s Not How I Thought It Would Be but It’s All Right

Caspian, the Pevensies and the Narnians parade through the Telmarine capital as the populace cheer and throw flowers. OK, remember how I mentioned that cutting Aslan’, Bacchus and company restoring Beruna and other towns back to their natural, Narnian state had a negative impact on the story? This is it. Why would the Telmarines be cheering for the Narnians now? Given the world we’ve established, shouldn’t they view Glenstorm, Trumpkin, Reepicheep, etc. as dangerous freaks? Dangerous freaks that have risen seemingly out of nowhere and taken over their country? In the book, Dr. Cornelius tells Caspian that many of his fellow citizens secretly wish that their ancestors hadn’t destroyed the Old Narnians and in the end, we’re informed that “Some of (the Telmarines), chiefly the young ones, had, like Caspian, heard stories of the Old Days and were delighted that they had come back. They were already making friends with the creatures.” Idealistic, sure, but it works in the storybook context. Had the movie kept the scenes it cut from the book’s penultimate chapter, of some Telmarines fleeing from Aslan and the divine revelers while others happily join them, it would have been easier to communicate that some Telmarines would welcome a return to the Narnians’ golden age. As it is, I suppose it’s possible they’re cheering because they hate Miraz so much, but he’s been king for such a short time in this version that I doubt there’s any reason for them to consider him a tyrant. On the other hand, I really enjoy the scenes this movie has created showing him maneuvering his way onto the throne rather than having that all be in the past as in the book. See, this is why I decided to do a thirteen-part series on this adaptation instead of a couple of posts. It has so many issues of which I can see both sides. The best explanation for the peasants cheering for this victory parade, the best that I can come up with anyway, is that they’re frightened of what the new king will do to them if they don’t, and that cynical interpretation doesn’t fit in with the scene’s joyful atmosphere. It would work so much better if the movie had included those scenes from the book, some versions of them anyway. You may not like those scenes, but you’ve got to admit the story is incomplete without them.

But don’t feel too bad for the conquered Telmarines. We’ll soon see they get a happy ending of sorts. We transition to the Telmarine castle at night, lit up by fireworks. The next morning, Caspian emerges from the castle and walks across the courtyard. A(n uncredited) passing maidservant bows her head, a good way to establish Caspian is king now without the bother of showing the coronation. He sees Aslan talking to Peter and Susan. They all look very serious, particularly her.

“We are ready,” says Caspian, “Everyone has assembled.” This assembly turns out to be at the edge of one of the majestic cliffs near the castle.

You’ll notice that this location looks considerably less gloomy and more Narnian than it did at the beginning of the movie.

“Narnia belongs to the Narnians just as it does to Man,” Caspian proclaims. “Any Telmarines who want to stay and live in peace are welcome to. But for any of you who wish, Aslan will return you to the home of our forefathers.” In the book, Aslan is the one who gives the equivalent of this speech but I’m fine with Caspian giving this part. He has so little to do in the second half of the story. “It’s been generations since we left Telmar,” says a(n also uncredited) Telmarine in the crowd. The script, by the way, gives these characters more dignity than does the book in which they grumble, “We don’t remember Telmar. We don’t know where it is. We don’t know what it is like.” “We’re not referring to Telmar,” says Aslan. “Your ancestors were seafaring brigands, pirates run aground on an island. There they found a cave, a rare chasm that brought them here from their world, the same world as our kings and queens.” The Pevensies react to this. You’d think Aslan would have already mentioned to Peter and Susan that the Telmarines come from their world in the little offscreen talk he gave them but, hey, the book implies that they were surprised at this point too. Caspian, in the book, expresses regret here that he didn’t come “of a more honorable lineage.” Aslan replies, “You come of the Lord Adam and the Lady Eve. And that is both honour enough to erect the head of the poorest beggar, and shame enough to bow the shoulders of the greatest emperor on earth. Be content.” I’d have loved it if the movie could have included that. It’s a great quote and I’d have liked to have seen Ben Barnes act the moment. Still, there are a lot of great things from the scene in the book that are included by the movie’s version.

“It is to that island I can return you,” continues Aslan. “It is a good place for any who wish to make a new start.” The Telmarines murmur amongst themselves. Suddenly, a voice in the back says, “I will go.” To Caspian’s surprise, the voice belongs to General Glozelle. “I will accept the offer,” he says. There’s a brief silence as he steps forward. Then, to Caspian’s further surprise, Prunaprismia says, “So will we,” and follows Glozelle. “We” includes the baby she’s holding and Lord Scythley who stands beside her. (At first, I thought the two of them had hooked up after her husband’s death but according to online material, he’s actually supposed to be her father.)

“Because you have spoken first,” says Aslan, “your future in that world shall be good.” Then he breathes on them, bestowing a blessing. Now, as I’ve written before, I’m against adaptations redeeming minor villains who weren’t redeemed in the source material but I’m willing to allow it here because otherwise the filmmakers would doubtless have cut this moment from the book and it’s an interesting one, being one of the few examples in The Chronicles of Narnia-almost the only example-of background antagonists showing decency and implying that they have a larger story about which we never learn. But if the first Telmarine to volunteer and receive the blessing had been a random guy we’d never seen before, as in the book, the randomness would likely have felt more confusing than intriguing.

Aslan then turns to two gnarled old trees that have grown twisted around each other at the edge of the cliff. They magically separate at their bases, creating a doorway leading seemingly off the cliff. In the book, this scene takes place in a glade with no cliff in sight and the magic doorway is just made out of three pieces of wood. I think the Hollywood gloss works in this instance.

Glozelle, Prunaprismia and her family, looking, in the book’s words, “startled but not unhappy,” step through the door and vanish. The crowd understandably panics. “How do we know he is not leading us to our deaths?” yells one man (Marcus ‘O Donovan.) “Sire, if my example can be of any service,” Reepicheep says to Aslan, “I will take eleven mice through with no delay.” This sacrificial offer on the mouse’s part is happily not played for laughs. Peter and Susan look at each other. Aslan gives them a look too. “We’ll go,” says Peter solemnly. “We will?” Edmund asks in surprise. “Come on, time’s up,” says Peter, “After all, we’re not really needed here anymore.” With those words, he hands his sword to a shocked Caspian. It’s a nice moment of redemption.

“I will look after it until you return,” says Caspian. “I’m afraid that’s just it,” Susan says gently. “We’re not coming back.” This is one of the scene’s quieter bombshells but it’s still a bombshell. “We’re not?” Lucy. “You two are,” Peter says, looking at her and Edmund. “At least I think he means you two,” he adds, turning to Aslan deferentially. Peter saying he thinks Aslan means Edmund and Lucy to return to Narnia rather than that he knows it is a good way of demonstrating he’s learned humility, and it comes from the book.[1]While Peter wasn’t as arrogant in the literary Prince Caspian, he did express incredulity in Lucy’s claims on the grounds that Aslan had never been invisible to them before. Arguably, … Continue reading “But why? Did they do something wrong?” Lucy asks Aslan. “Quite the opposite, Dear One,” says Aslan. “But all things have their time. Your brother and sister have learned what they can from this world. Now it’s time for them to live in their own.” I know I’ve described Liam Neeson’s vocal performance as not very interesting in the past, but I really do admire how he conveys with lines like those that Aslan is amused by Lucy without sounding annoyingly smug. It really does give the impression that he’s a supernatural being with knowledge no one else has. The animators also do a great job with the character’s facial expressions. Incidentally, the part about the Pevensies needing to learn from Narnia wasn’t mentioned in the book version of Prince Caspian, only in the next book, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. It was probably a good idea to introduce the idea earlier because the idea that characters can grow too old for Narnia can be rather jarring to readers initially. Lucy still needs some comforting. Fortunately, Peter is ready to provide it. “It’s all right, Lu,” he says. “It’s not how I thought it would be. But it’s all right. One day you’ll see too. Come on.” That dialogue is quite close to that in the book. In fact, I almost think I like the way the movie phrases it better![2]For comparison, here’s the relevant quote. “It’s all rather different from what I thought. You’ll understand when it comes to your last time. But, quick, here are our … Continue reading I don’t remember saying that about anything in these scripts before!

The Pevensies bid farewell to the friends they’ve made. After an initially formal bow, Lucy impulsively gives Trumpkin a big hug.

Then…Oh no! Susan and Caspian are talking.

Susan: I’m glad I came back.
Caspian: I wish we had more time together.
Susan: It would never have worked anyway.
Caspian: Why not?
Susan: I am thirteen hundred years older than you.

Initially, the whole romantic tension thing between these characters was treated as a humorous subtext and while I thought the idea of adding romance to the story was dumb, I could kind of tolerate it, even laugh at and enjoy it. Then as the relationship was treated more seriously, with Caspian disappointing Susan and having to redeem himself in her eyes, it started to bug me more. But it was still presented as a subtext. Now, all of a sudden, it’s supposed to be this big dramatic thing? Granted the conversation ends with a joke but lines like “I wish we had more time together” and “It would never have worked out anyway” make it unambiguous that the characters are thinking about a romantic relationship in a way none of their previous dialogue has. As a book fan, I want to just be able to ignore this and as a movie fan, I don’t feel like it’s earned. Couldn’t the scene have just relied on the actors’ performances to convey their romantic regrets without those lines making them explicit? By the way, the book had Caspian offer Susan her horn back at this point and her tell him he could keep it. That is the only interaction between them C. S. Lewis records. How do you do an adaptation where they’re a couple and not include that?

Susan starts to head to the door, then turns back and… now they’re kissing?! Argh! “I’m sure when I’m older, I’ll understand,” says Lucy in disgust. “I’m older and I don’t want to understand,” says Edmund. Peter just laughs. OK, now it’s really impossible for me to ignore this pointless added romance and, even if I liked the idea, I don’t feel Caspian and Susan have earned this big romantic moment. Couldn’t she have just kissed him on the cheek? Or given him a hug? How about a nice firm handshake? Actually, after they kiss, they also hug and I’m just going to show an image of that, not of the kiss. Because that’s how I prefer to remember the scene.

Our first end credits song, The Call by Regina Spektor starts. On my first viewing, this jarred me. You may remember I didn’t mind having pop songs play over the end credits of a Narnia movie but couldn’t accept the idea of them in the movies’ bodies. However, repeated exposure, has made me appreciate this instance of that. The Call is a very pleasant song that really does fit with the atmosphere of the ending. I think when I first saw it, I was too unsettled by the kiss to notice how nicely Harry Gregson-Williams’s score was transitioning into the song. I was also jarred because the first lyric is “It started out as a feeling” and for one terrible moment, I thought there was going to be an entire credits song devoted to Susan and Caspian. Even if you find their romance cute, you can’t seriously believe it deserves that. Fortunately, the feeling the song describes turns out to be the Narnians’ wish for their kings and queens to return to them and vice versa.[3]I think that’s what the song is about anyway. It’s a pleasant song, not a great one.

The Pevensies take one last look at Narnia and their friends before turning to go.

Lucy takes a second last look at Aslan specifically. He gives her a reassuring nod. Lucy looks like she might cry.

The Pevensies step through the door and are back at the train station in England and are wearing their school uniforms. In the book, they had to change out of them before going back. The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is actually the only Narnia book in which the characters clothes magically change when they return to their own world, understandably so since those characters were adults reverting back to being children. I don’t mind the movie making that change. Showing them changing their outfits before leaving would be cumbersome and the transition is really smooth. While the movie’s railway may be underground and urban rather than outdoor and rural like the book’s, watching this scene, my feelings about it are the same as those of the characters C. S. Lewis described. It’s “a little flat and dreary for a moment after all they had been through, but also, unexpectedly, nice in its own way.”

The Pevensies are seemingly too overwhelmed to think of boarding their train. The geeky boy Susan rejected[4]Not Caspian, the other one. does so. “Aren’t you coming, Phyllis?” he calls hopefully. Poor sap! The Pevensies scramble to get their luggage. As they all climb aboard, Edmund looks preoccupied with something. “You don’t think there’s any way we could get back?” he asks. “I’ve left my new torch in Narnia.” The others laugh. Geeky Boy is standing within earshot of them and I like to imagine he’s baffled as to why their laughing about someone leaving their new torch in an ancient hillside commune in central Italy.

“I’ve left my new torch in Narnia” is also the last line of the book, it being the tendency of the Narnia books to end with humorous lines, and I love the movie for keeping it. As the train disappears down the tunnel, we hear Aslan’s triumphant roar. If you can ignore the kiss, which, of course, you can’t, this is a beautiful ending that captures the bittersweet complexities of the equivalent scene in the book.[5]Incidentally, for some reason, two versions of one of the end credits songs, This Is Home by Switchfoot, were made, one for the credits and one for the soundtrack. I have no idea why. This seems like … Continue reading

Concluding Thoughts

Throughout my education, I always hated having to do concluding paragraphs for my essays. Why should I waste ink summarizing what I just wrote? Did my teachers and professors really have such bad memories? But now that I have my own blog where I can write however I desire, I find myself feeling the need to write some conclusion for this series on Prince Caspian (2008) that will basically repeat several points I’ve made in previous posts. If I don’t, it’ll just feel incomplete. Oh well. Hopefully, my readers have forgotten most of my points by now.

The public seems split over whether this movie or The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005) is superior. If you’ll pardon the generalization, critics seem to prefer the former and fans of the books seem to prefer the latter. I consider them equal on the whole. Prince Caspian has more problems with characterizations and lacks the childlike sense of awe and wonder I found so breathtaking in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. But on the other hand, with The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, the generically Hollywood banter and quips as well as the action scenes are things I endure more than I enjoy. I don’t hate them all or anything but they’re really not the parts of the movie I consider great. With Prince Caspian, I get a kick out of the jokes and the action scenes, generically Hollywood though they may be, for their own sake. I know I wrote that the final battle drags for me but that’s the exception rather than the rule and the ending with the trees and the river god makes up for it.[6]Upon reflection, I think the reason I prefer the scene of the Narnians infiltrating the Telmarine castle to the battle is that I enjoy seeing the details of how they do so and when things start to go … Continue reading And, of course, there are many virtues both the first two Narnia movies share like great casting and beautiful visuals. (It was surprisingly hard choosing images to include in this series since so many shots caught my eye.) Sure, the reimagined story for Prince Caspian may be a bit of a mess but it’s my mess!

While I don’t agree with those who say this movie is an improvement on the book’s story as a whole, I do agree that it improves on it in parts, which is rare for me to say about a Narnia adaptation. I actually feel that combining the movie’s story and that of the book would be ideal or would make the most compelling version of Caspian’s character anyway. If he were a High King Peter fanboy since childhood, as in the book, and then became disgusted by his actions, as in the movie, and realized in the end that the kings and queens of old aren’t perfect but they’re still heroes, meaning that his imperfect self could be a hero too, wouldn’t that be more interesting than his arc in either the book or the movie? Of course, I know many fans aren’t going to like any version with the movie’s assassination of Peter’s character. All I can say is that I respect their viewpoint though it isn’t mine.

I feel like I’m supposed to describe this Prince Caspian as “a bad adaptation but a great movie.” But I’m disinclined to do so. For one thing, the movie has artistic problems of its own, such as unclear exposition, which hewing closer to the source material could very well have fixed. For another…while I can’t, in good conscience, call this a good adaptation of the book, I really can’t call it a bad one either.[7]It’s rather like the 2019 David Copperfield movie in that respect. There are so many fun little things from the book it includes, like the argument about girls and maps and somebody threatening to sit on Nikabrik’s head. I know it sounds ridiculous to praise those in light of the massive artistic license this adaptation takes, but what can I say? That’s how I feel. The last scene is a great little microcosm of the whole thing. It has the kiss, a huge thing that’s not true to the book and irritates me, surrounded by beautiful stuff that’s from the book like Aslan blessing the first Telmarine to trust him and Reepicheep offering to go through the door to prove Aslan’s trustworthiness. I admit I don’t feel as inclined to randomly revisit this Narnia movie as I do the first one. But after I rewatch that first one, then I always want to rewatch this one and I don’t notice any particular quality gap between them when I do. Hey, what do you know? That exactly describes my relationships to the two books that inspired them.

References

References
1 While Peter wasn’t as arrogant in the literary Prince Caspian, he did express incredulity in Lucy’s claims on the grounds that Aslan had never been invisible to them before. Arguably, even in the book, his story was about learning that the Lion wasn’t tame.
2 For comparison, here’s the relevant quote. “It’s all rather different from what I thought. You’ll understand when it comes to your last time. But, quick, here are our things.”
3 I think that’s what the song is about anyway. It’s a pleasant song, not a great one.
4 Not Caspian, the other one.
5 Incidentally, for some reason, two versions of one of the end credits songs, This Is Home by Switchfoot, were made, one for the credits and one for the soundtrack. I have no idea why. This seems like a pointless expense. Anyway, of the two, the soundtrack version is superior. While it has some cheesy lyrics (“We are miracles and we’re not alone”), it also does a better job of communicating some of the book’s themes than the movie itself does.
6 Upon reflection, I think the reason I prefer the scene of the Narnians infiltrating the Telmarine castle to the battle is that I enjoy seeing the details of how they do so and when things start to go wrong, like Caspian not being at the gatehouse and Edmund losing his torch, I wonder what will happen. With the battle, the only question is which characters will die and I already know that.
7 It’s rather like the 2019 David Copperfield movie in that respect.
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Prince Caspian (2008) Part 12: Do You See Him Now?

Finally, we’re back to Lucy. She’s still riding through the forest and now another Telmarine soldier is chasing her. Suddenly, there’s a lion running beside her too. Is it Aslan or is it some random lion who’s going to kill her? OK, it’s obviously going to be Aslan but let’s bear with the movie and pretend that, like Lucy, we’re not sure yet. (To be fair, this at the tail-end of a rather overindulgent action scene so it doesn’t feel so a random lion attacking doesn’t feel so unlikely in context.) The lion roars, frightening her horse who rears back, knocking Lucy off.

For a moment, it looks like the snarling lion is going to pounce on the fallen girl, but it leaps right over her and attacks her pursuer, knocking him off his horse. Lucy crawls to her feet in time to see the soldier running off. The lion turns to face her and, yes, it really is Aslan![1]As long we’re making the story grittier, I wouldn’t have minded Aslan killing the Telmarine. After all, he’s not like a tame lion. Lucy runs over and hugs him. The interaction between the flesh and blood actress and the CG lion is very impressive and I think Liam Neeson kicked his game up a notch as Aslan’s voice in this sequel. While saving Lucy from an attacker wasn’t from the book, I enjoy this reimagined reunion.

“I knew it was you!” Lucy declares ecstatically. “The whole time, I knew it! But the others didn’t believe me” to which Alsan replies, “And why would that stop you from coming to me?” Lucy’s smile fades. It’s a very nicely acted moment on Henley’s part.

Lucy: I’m sorry. I was too scared to come alone. Why wouldn’t you show yourself? Why wouldn’t you come roaring in and save us like last time?
Aslan: Things never happen the same way twice, dear one.

You may remember that Aslan said that exact same thing in his last scene with Lucy. Is the repeated line to demonstrate that that encounter wasn’t just a dream? Or did the screenwriters just forget they’d already used it? I prefer the believe the first possibility but there are enough clumsy things in these scripts that I can’t entirely discount the second one. I’ve got to say it’s a pretty ironic line to repeat if it was an accident.

Lucy: If I’d come earlier, would everyone have died? Could I have stopped that?
Aslan: We can never know what would have happened, Lucy.

Now some fans of the Narnia books, particularly Christian fans, take justifiable issue with the way that line has been adapted. In the book, Aslan says, “To know what would have happened, child? No. Nobody is ever told that.” It isn’t that Aslan himself doesn’t know; he’s just not telling. Since Aslan is meant to be God, having him say, “we can never know” is problematic from a Christian perspective. To be fair, the book doesn’t describe Aslan as omniscient outright though the longer the series goes on, the more strongly it’s implied. I believe the adaptation changed the line unthinkingly, not out of a conscious goal of keeping Aslan from being all knowing.[2]If that really was a conscious goal on their part, I’m mystified as to how they were planning to adapt The Silver Chair. Anyway, in both the book and the movie, Lucy is informed that she should have followed after Aslan despite being the only one to see him. But in the book, the Pevensies and Trumpkin still hadn’t found their way back to Aslan’s How at that point and Aslan commanded her to lead them to him. This allowed Lucy to redeem her earlier mistake though it never actually came to her leaving the others to follow Aslan by herself since they, more or less, listened to her that time. I generally approve of the way the movie restructures the book’s plot and think it makes a lot of sense but the fact that Lucy isn’t given that opportunity to redeem herself is a negative side effect of it. Still, I love that they kept Aslan calling her out on not having enough faith too, even if it no longer goes anywhere. It makes the conflict much more interesting than Lucy being totally right and her siblings being totally wrong.[3]In the book, Lucy is actually rather self-righteous when she complains to Aslan about the others not believing her and he reprimands her with a growl. The movie makes him much less stern.

Aslan: But what will happen is another matter entirely.
Lucy: Then you’ll help?
Aslan: Of course. As will you.
Lucy: Oh, I wish I was braver.
Aslan: If you were any braver, you’d be a lioness.

This is similar to the dialogue between Lucy and Aslan in the book but less dramatic. There she actually breaks down crying but after burying her face in Aslan’s mane, she feels stronger, and he calls her a lioness. It’s a bit sad that the movie couldn’t have had that more dramatic version but since Lucy now doesn’t need to wake up four people older than her and tell them to follow someone they can’t see into the dark, it wouldn’t have felt warranted. Like I said, negative side effect of restructuring.

“Now I think your friends have slept long enough, don’t you?” says Alsan. He raises his head and roars, and the camera pans up into the tree branches. But before we can see what happens, we cut back to the battle. (Despite what you might think from my last post, I don’t mean that as a criticism.) Trumpkin, Caspian, Susan, Edmund and Peter are killing everyone who tries to kill them though it’s ambiguous how Reepicheep is faring. We see him charge under the enemy’s feet and don’t see him again for quite a while. Still, things aren’t going that well for the good guys. Caspian tumbles on his back into the pit and Glozelle points his battle axe at him. But then in the heat of battle, he hesitates. He admired the way Caspian chose to establish his kingship by rule of law rather than by killing the current occupant of the throne in the Telmarine tradition. He doesn’t feel good about killing him now. It’s a very well-acted moment for Favino.

Glozelle starts to lower his weapon but before he can figure out what to do next, a giant root shoots out the ground above him, wraps itself around his waist, bangs his body around and drops it. In earlier versions of the script, this would have killed Glozelle but the filmmakers realized that having him die because he hesitated to kill our hero felt horrible wrong.[4]In the book, it’s implied that Glozelle dies at some point during this scene, but it isn’t described as is Sopespian’s death.

Peter helps an amazed Caspian out of the pit, and we see that the Narnians have been joined by an army of trees who walk above the ground with their giant roots acting as tentacles. One of the trees is felled by a stone from one of the catapults but another tree crushes the catapult with its roots. Peter leads the reinforced Narnians with a cry of “For Aslan!” and the terrified Telmarines turn and run. Now I know that there are critics out there who dismiss the Narnia movies, particularly this one, for ripping off The Lord of the Rings and, in this case anyway, they have a point. The climax of The Two Towers (2002) also features an army of treelike creatures defeating the technologically advanced villains. (Both stories probably owe something to Macbeth.) It doesn’t help that these trees look relatively more like the ents than the dryads in the previous Narnia film did. Still, if this is a rip-off, it’s a well done one and since The Lord of the Rings doesn’t hold the same place in my heart that it does in the hearts of many, including many Narnia fans, I’m not too bothered. In fact, I really enjoy the visual.

Another Telmarine tells Sopespian they can still defeat the Narnians if they draw them to the river. He orders his troops to regroup at Beruna. But there’s another surprise awaiting them. The Telmarines, pursued by the Narnians, surge toward their bridge but halt in confusion when they see Lucy, a little girl, on the other side, fearlessly walking toward them. If you’re quick-eyed, you can see Edmund smile upon seeing her even as her other siblings and the Narnians look concerned. This is very much in keeping with the book in which Edmund is the first to believe Lucy’s claims of seeing Aslan and the first besides her to gain the ability to see the lion.

To the Telmarines’ further bafflement, Lucy smiles smugly at them and draws her dagger.

I love it!

Then Aslan calmly walks into view and stands by Lucy’s side. Sopespian leads a charge across the bridge. Other Telmarines lead their horses right into the water. Aslan roars, sending ripples across the river. Sopespian stops halfway across the bridge. Something is happening to the water. He turns to see what at first appears to be a huge wave heading towards him. Sopespian turns his horse around but it’s too late. The wave takes the form a giant man who glides across the land.[5]It’s rather reminiscent of the nature spirits from The Firebird Suite in Fantasia 2000.

Some of the Telmarines on the bridge just scream and jump off it into the river. The towering water giant, whom the book describes as the river god, looks to Aslan who gives him a little nod. Then he lifts the bridge, with several Telmarines still on it, into the air. They all fall of except for Sopespian.

The giant glares at him. Sopespian flails his sword at him and yells in a pathetic attempt at defiance. Then the river god simply swallows him and the bridge-that’s what it looks like anyway-before collapsing into water.

The remaining Telmarines simply hand their weapons over to the Narnians as they haul themselves out of the river. Now in the book, the river god simply asked Aslan to remove his “chains” before the Telmarines even arrived and Aslan magically made ivy destroy the bridge. The Telmarines surrendered when they found it gone. The river god never fought anyone, let alone drowned one of the story’s main villains.[6]I assume when a creature made of water devours you, you drown. I know I’m expected, as a fan of the book, to roll my eyes and complain about Hollywood making everything over the top and ridiculous but that’s not what I’m going to do. I love this reimagining of the scene and I feel it’s very true to the spirit of the book’s climax in that it’s awe-inspiring, funny and just a little bit creepy. I do think it would have worked if, as I’ve suggested before, the last movie had established this location. Then removing the bridge made by the bad guys and restoring the ford to the way it was in Narnia’s golden age would have been more emotionally resonant. But, hey, it’s still a cool scene even without that.

Another thing I’ve mentioned before is that in the book, there’s a Telmarine township near the bridge. Aslan summons Bacchus, the classical god of wine and revelry, Silenus, his mentor, and the maenads, his crazy followers. He leads them on a romp through the town, magically destroying it with greenery, and beyond. Throughout this scene, various unlikeable Telmarines flee in terror or suffer worse fates[7]This is in keeping with the myths about Bacchus punishing uptight people who refuse to join in his worship though it’s much more G-rated. while various likeable, downtrodden Telmarines (a bored schoolgirl, a weary schoolteacher, a boy being beaten by a man) happily join the merrymaking. This all culminates in a surprisingly heartwarming scene which I’m not going to spoil for anyone who hasn’t read it yet. Not everyone likes this surreal scene, but I love it.[8]Keep in mind that I probably didn’t come to the Narnia books with the same expectations as many young readers did. You see, I was a big fan of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through … Continue reading However, I’m not as upset about the movie cutting it as you’d expect though because of how much I love the reimagined river god scene. I do think cutting the unconventional conquering of Beruna and the other Telmarines towns has a negative impact on the story, but I’ll get to that in the next post.[9]I understand that nobody knows about Bacchus these days, but they could still have done the scene with just Aslan and Lucy. If nothing else, you’d think they’d have wanted to include that … Continue reading At least the movie’s version of Prince Caspian‘s climax is better than that of the 1989 BBC miniseries adaptation which omitted not only Bacchus and Silenus but the dryads and the river god. That was easily the lamest of the BBC’s Narnia adaptations.

Back to the movie. Edmund, Caspian, Peter and Susan wade across the ford and kneel before Aslan. This could just be my interpretation, not what the filmmakers intended, but they all look a little penitent. I hope it’s what the filmmakers intended because it makes sense. “Rise, Kings and Queens of Narnia,” says Aslan. Peter, Susan and Edmund do so. “All of you,” the lion adds. Caspian looks up uncertainly. “I do not think I am ready,” he says. “It’s for that very reason, I know you are,” says Aslan. In the book, what he says is “If you had felt yourself sufficient, it would have been a proof that you were not.” Personally, I think that makes more sense than the movie’s version. It’s not like a lack of confidence qualifies someone to be a good king. It’s just that overconfidence disqualifies them. But maybe I’m being too nitpicky. I really am glad the movie includes that moment from the book. Ben Barnes acts it very well and since we’ve seen the cinematic Caspian be a little cocky before, the contrast now arguably makes this an even more interesting moment than it was in the source material.

Caspian rises and the others look at him encouragingly. They are interrupted by the sound of mournful bagpipe music. The mice have brought a gravely injured Reepicheep on a stretcher and-OK, whose idea was it too play bagpipes for this bit? I know that C. S. Lewis wrote that one mouse here “piped on his slender pipe a melancholy tune” but did it have to be a bagpipe? They sound so comical, and this is supposed to be a serious moment.

Speaking of music, this last section of the movie is one of those which mostly reuses musical theme’s from the last Narnia film’s soundtrack. It’s a bit creatively lazy on the composer’s part but I can’t complain too much since all the themes work so well in this context. Anyway, Lucy runs over and heals Reepicheep with her cordial. After a little suspense, he thanks her and rises. “Hail, Aslan,” he says, “it is a great honor to be in-” But when he tries to bow, he topples over and it’s revealed that he’s lost his tail in battle. In my experience, this is the scene that gets the biggest laughs from viewers. The animators do a great job with Reepicheep’s embarrassed body language.

Reepicheep: I am completely out of countenance! I must crave your indulgence for appearing in this unseemly fashion! (to Lucy) Perhaps a drop more?
Lucy: I don’t think it does that.
Reepicheep: We could have a go.
Aslan (chuckling): It becomes you well, Small One.
Reepicheep (offering up his sword): All the same, great king, I regret that I must withdraw for a tail is the honor and glory of a mouse.
Aslan (a little sternly): Perhaps you think too much of your honor, friend.
[10]In the book, this line is “I have sometimes wondered, friend, if you do not think too much about your honor,” implying Aslan has known Reepicheep for a while, so maybe it really was a … Continue reading
Reepicheep: Well, it’s not just the honor. It’s also great for balance and climbing and grabbing things…

Much of this is close to the book but I’m really disappointed how they changed that last line of Reepicheep’s. Here’s what C. S. Lewis wrote for him.

“Highest of all High Kings,” said Reepicheep, “permit me to remind you that a very small size has been bestowed on us Mice, and if we did not guard our dignity, some (who weigh worth by inches) would allow themselves very unsuitable pleasantries at our expense. That is why I have been at some pains to make it known that no one who does not wish to feel this sword as near his heart as I can reach shall talk in my presence about Traps or Toasted Cheese or Candles: no, Sir— not the tallest fool in Narnia!” Here he glared very fiercely up at Wimbleweather, but the Giant, who was always a stage behind everyone else, had not yet discovered what was being talked about down at his feet, and so missed the point.

That explanation for why Reepicheep is so touchy about his honor would have added a nice bit of depth to (what is in this movie) a comic relief character.[11]In the next Narnia story, Reepicheep will play a more dramatic role. And it’s not like it wouldn’t have fit with the film’s characterization. Granted it would need to be shortened a little for pacing purposes, but I can hear Eddie Izzard’s Reepicheep saying that line in my head!

Reepicheep’s second-in-command, Peepiceek (editor Sim Evan-Jones), draws his sword and says, “May it please, Your High Majesty, we will not bear the shame of wearing an honor denied to our chief.” The other mice follow suit and make ready to cut their own tails off. This does not get laughs from viewers in my experience and nor should it get them since this a serious and rather heartwarming moment.

“Not for the sake of your dignity but for the love of your people,” says Aslan and Reepicheep’s tail grows back in an instant. (In the book, Aslan gave another reason for restoring the tail. I’d have loved it if that had been kept but I guess I can live without it. It serves as a nice surprise for people who read the book after watching the film, I imagine.) “Thank you! Thank you, my liege!” says Reepicheep. “I will treasure it always! From this day forward, it will serve as a great reminder of my huge humility!” Did the movie have to add that last bit? I do consider Reepicheep an amusing character[12]If you don’t believe me, check out Lewis’s description of him realizing his tail is missing or read about his chess skills-or lack thereof-in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. but he’s far from just a caricature and even putting that aside, jokes about people being proud of being humble are so old.[13]To be fair, they’re probably old because taking pride in one’s humility is depressingly common in real life. We didn’t need another one. However, I’m making it sound like I love this little vignette in the movie much less than I do. I’m really grateful to the adaptation for including it when it’s not necessary to the story[14]I imagine they were motivated by knowing the large role Reepicheep would play in their series’ next installment. and while it’s not as great as in the book, it’s still pretty great.

“Now where is this ‘dear little friend’ you’ve told me so much about?” Aslan asks Lucy. Everyone looks at Trumpkin who is supervising the surrendering Telmarines nearby. He’s also keeping one very wary eye on Aslan. Seeing that he’s wanted, he nervously approaches him and kneels. Aslan gives a great roar which makes the dwarf shudder. If all this sounds scary, I’m doing a bad job with the description. It’s actually quite funny. “Do you see him now?” asks Lucy. Trumpkin manages a weak smile. When I first saw this scene, I was disappointed that Aslan didn’t pick Trumpkin up in his mouth, shake him, toss him in the air and then gently set him down as in the book. But I understand that would have been hard from a technical standpoint and I’ve come to appreciate this quieter version. Peter Dinklage’s little smile is perfect, conveying that Trumpkin now has a healthy fear of Aslan but that they’re also friends now.

Aslan roars so often in this finale that I had to include one image of him doing it. This is the least significant of his roars, but the others would have come in places that already had a lot images.

Next Week: Aslan Makes a Door in the Air

References

References
1 As long we’re making the story grittier, I wouldn’t have minded Aslan killing the Telmarine. After all, he’s not like a tame lion.
2 If that really was a conscious goal on their part, I’m mystified as to how they were planning to adapt The Silver Chair.
3 In the book, Lucy is actually rather self-righteous when she complains to Aslan about the others not believing her and he reprimands her with a growl. The movie makes him much less stern.
4 In the book, it’s implied that Glozelle dies at some point during this scene, but it isn’t described as is Sopespian’s death.
5 It’s rather reminiscent of the nature spirits from The Firebird Suite in Fantasia 2000.
6 I assume when a creature made of water devours you, you drown.
7 This is in keeping with the myths about Bacchus punishing uptight people who refuse to join in his worship though it’s much more G-rated.
8 Keep in mind that I probably didn’t come to the Narnia books with the same expectations as many young readers did. You see, I was a big fan of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There by Lewis Carroll growing up. To a lesser extent, I was a fan of the Wayside School books by Louis Sachar. I went to fantasy for surreal silliness more than I went to it for stories about epic clashes between good and evil. I was also a fan of Greek mythology. All of which means the scene at Beruna in Prince Caspian probably plays better for me than it does for the average Narnia fan.
9 I understand that nobody knows about Bacchus these days, but they could still have done the scene with just Aslan and Lucy. If nothing else, you’d think they’d have wanted to include that heartwarming climax I mentioned!
10 In the book, this line is “I have sometimes wondered, friend, if you do not think too much about your honor,” implying Aslan has known Reepicheep for a while, so maybe it really was a conscious goal of the screenwriters to avoid Aslan being all-knowing.
11 In the next Narnia story, Reepicheep will play a more dramatic role.
12 If you don’t believe me, check out Lewis’s description of him realizing his tail is missing or read about his chess skills-or lack thereof-in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.
13 To be fair, they’re probably old because taking pride in one’s humility is depressingly common in real life.
14 I imagine they were motivated by knowing the large role Reepicheep would play in their series’ next installment.
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Prince Caspian (2008) Part 11: Treachery!

Were you annoyed by the way my last post, after all the buildup to the duel between Peter and Miraz, ended just as it was beginning? Probably not because I’m not that gripping of a writer. But if you were, you know how I feel when the movie cuts from the beginning of the fight to Susan and Lucy galloping through the forest. (Well, technically, the horse is the one galloping.) Suddenly, some Telmarine soldiers are pursuing them. Once there’s a good distance between the pursuers and the pursued, Susan dismounts and tells Lucy to go on without her. The soundtrack plays a great melancholy variation of the Pevensies’ heroic theme as Lucy just before she’s ridden out of sight, stops and turns back for what might be a last look at her sister.

As soon as Lucy’s gone, the soldiers ride into view but by this time, Susan has drawn her bow. She takes them down one by one (she’s really good at nocking those arrows quickly) until a horse coming from an unexpected direction knocks her down and her weapon out of her hand. Things look bad when all of a sudden, Caspian, who apparently has been stalking Susan, rides onto the scene and slays her attacker. “Are you sure you don’t need that horn?” he asks playfully, holding out his hand. Susan beams and accepts it.

So, the whole reason the movie had Susan accompany Lucy was that they wanted a scene of Caspian rescuing her and (almost literally) sweeping her off her feet? Argh! I know some readers are probably annoyed that I keep carping about that added romance, but the film was asking for it there. And the funny thing is this adaptation tries so hard to make Susan’s character more feminist friendly. You know what many feminists would like to see? The leading lady not needing to be rescued by her male love interest!

All right. Back to Peter and Miraz. Although I wrote that I was annoyed that the movie cut away from their duel just as it was beginning, I don’t have much to say about it. That’s better than having bad things to say about it. Still, considering this is the beginning of the movie’s big climax, I wish I had really good things to say about it. Probably, the problem is that Peter has been such an unpleasant character for so much of the film prior to this so I’m not as invested in him as might be wished. I’m not horribly uninvested though. After all, the Narnians don’t deserve to lose to the Telmarines just because their champion is hard to like. And Peter has had some sympathetic aspects to his character, such as his guilt over not being there when Narnia was conquered. Still, this scene would, I believe, be more gripping if we really liked him.

As in the book, Peter and Miraz seem pretty well matched at first with Peter even being the one to draw the first blood. But before long, it starts to look bad for the Narnians. At one point, when Peter falls on his back, Miraz stamps on his hand[1]Actually, it looks like he just steps on his shield but the way Peter roars, it makes more sense for him to have stepped on his hand so that’s what I imagine., an act more brutal than anything I can think in the book’s description of the duel.[2]There is some violence in the battle after the duel in the book that I’d describe as brutal. The Bulgy Bear gasps and puts his paw in his mouth, which would work better if they had kept that deleted scene that I discussed in the last post but is still funny as it is.

Peter recovers quickly and Miraz is soon the one knocked off his feet. Not for long though. As Miraz rises, Peter sees Caspian and Susan returning to the How.

Miraz (panting): Does his highness need a respite?
Peter: Five minutes?
Miraz: Three!

I’m glad they kept this respite from the book when it could easily have been cut for fear of breaking up the tension. It’s a good emotional beat in both versions. The movie has given a reason for it besides Peter’s shoulder being dislocated. He now wants to ask about Lucy. The other reason is still clearly a thing though.[3]In the book, by the way, Peter describes his shoulder as sprained, not dislocated.

Susan tells Peter that Lucy “got through. With a little help.” She indicates Caspian as she says the last bit. “Thanks,” Peter says to Caspian. “Well, you were busy,” he replies. You know, maybe I was too hard on the movie when I said it only created that scene of Caspian rescuing Susan to add pointless romance. Maybe the idea was to create a moment of Peter thanking Caspian to make up for the earlier unpleasantness between them. It doesn’t really register that way onscreen though. William Moseley’s Peter doesn’t look like he’s reevaluating Caspian. He just looks exhausted as well he might. Anyway, Peter warns Susan that she’d better get to higher ground. “I don’t expect the Telmarines will keep their word.” She gives him a farewell hug, which unfortunately hurts his shoulder, and tells him to be careful. Like I said, this would be more effective if we really liked Peter but as it is, it’s certainly not ineffective.

Edmund notices the Narnians looking worried and urges Peter to “keep smiling.” Peter turns to his army, puts on a forced smile for their benefit and salutes them with his sword. They cheer, either because they appreciate the effort or because they’re genuinely convinced by his bravado.

The movie also shows us the respite from Miraz’s perspective, something the book doesn’t. First, he berates Glozelle for letting Peter get so close. Then while Glozelle is tending to his wound, he asks his marshals how Peter looks to them. “Young,” Sopespian says tauntingly. “But His Majesty is doing extremely well,” says Glozelle, “for his age.” As he says that, he tightens Miraz’s bandage and makes him scream, no doubt on purpose.

Meanwhile, Edmund tends to Peter’s shoulder and Peter asks him, “What do you think happens back home if we die here?” That question isn’t asked in the book, Prince Caspian, but it is asked by the characters in the last and darkest Narnia story, The Last Battle. Since no movie adaptation of The Last Battle has been made, I’m glad the moment was worked into this film. In spite of the ominousness of its inclusion, the respite ends on a more humorous note than it does in the book. There Peter told Edmund to give his love to everyone at home if he died and to “say something specially nice to Trumpkin,” and Edmund was too upset to speak. In the movie, Peter starts to say, “You know, you’ve always been there and I never really-” He’s cut off by his own cries of pain as Edmund finishes adjusting his shoulder. “Just save it for later,” Edmund says.

Susan and Trumpkin exchange worried looks. Glozelle offers Miraz his helmet back and he refuses it out of bravado. (Peter lost his helmet earlier since the movie wants us to be able to see his face.) Then it’s back into the fray. At first, an increasingly desperate Miraz looks like he might overpower Peter. But if that happens, Peter is going to make him work for it. At one point, Miraz actually loses his sword and can only hold up his shield against the blows Peter rains down. Then he punches him, which I’m pretty sure is against the rules, and then he sort of tries to crush Peter with his shield and then Peter twists it away from him. I’m afraid this part of the scene comes across as rather silly.

Eventually, Miraz gets his sword back but Peter wounds him in his already sore knee and Miraz is on his knees, begging for another respite. “Now’s not the time for chivalry, Peter!” Edmund calls. This is actually inspired by an inner monologue of Edmund’s in the book when Miraz trips and Peter pauses for him to rise.

“Oh bother, bother, bother,” said Edmund to himself. “Need he be as gentlemanly as all that? I suppose he must. Comes of being a Knight and a High King. I suppose it is what Aslan would like. But that brute will be up again in a minute and then —”

I feel like the book’s version is funnier, but I can understand why it would need to be shortened. Then something happens that doesn’t in the book. As Peter turns away, Miraz, snarling, leaps to feet and tries to swipe Peter’s head off from behind. Peter turns just in time and stabs his treacherous opponent under the arm. Miraz is on his knees again and this time, it looks like Peter really will take the opportunity to finish him off. But no.

Miraz: What’s the matter, boy? Too cowardly to take a life?
Peter: It’s not mine to take.

Peter offers his sword to Caspian who steps up to the metaphorical plate. Is this normal in these war-determining duels?[4]For what it’s worth, in C. S. Lewis’s Till We Have Faces, which depicts a similar dramatic situation, the antagonistic king says he will disarm the main character, Queen Orual, and then … Continue reading Caspian raises the sword. “Perhaps I was wrong,” says Miraz, “Maybe you do have the makings of a Telmarine king after all.”

Caspian roars and brings down the sword but instead of stabbing Miraz, he just stabs a conveniently placed patch of grass.

“Not one like you,” he says, “Keep your life but I am giving the Narnians back their kingdom.” Caspian turns and heads back to the How. The Narnians cheer him. Sopespian, who doesn’t want the Narnians to take over but very much wants Miraz dead, is disappointed. Glozelle, on the other hand, looks impressed.

Susan also looks impressed, and can I carp about the romance thing one more time? Part of what annoys me about it is that in the book, Susan’s storyline was all about her relationships with Aslan and Lucy. Those are still definitely there in the movie but most of the emphasis falls on her relationship with Caspian. Even the scene of her protecting Lucy as they go to find Aslan ultimately ended up being about Caspian saving her.

Still, I will say this for the movie. While it does add romance to the book’s story, at least it doesn’t add a love triangle. The love triangle is one of my least favorite dramatic devices. Not that it can’t be done well. One of my favorite plays, Edmond Rostand’s Cyrano de Bergerac, is all about a love triangle. But too often they just feel like easy ways to get the story’s fandom warring against itself. Even in my beloved Les Misérables, the love triangle is the most dramatically flawed and potentially annoying part.[5]I am referring to the musical version, not the literary one in which Eponine is a villain albeit an interesting one and very few readers root for her to end up with Marius.

Let’s talk about the whole Caspian-sparing-Miraz thing. I’m glad that the adaptation didn’t make the duel between Caspian and Miraz even though that would be the conventional thing to do. I believe it’s thematically important that it be a showdown between Peter, the champion of Old Narnia, and Miraz, the Telmarine who’s been most dismissive of Old Narnia. At the same time…I can understand feeling that it should have been between Caspian and Miraz. Despite having his name in the title, Caspian has practically nothing to do in the last third of the book. The movie is arguably trying to fix a real dramatic problem with the source material. But the compromise they found strikes me as awkward with Peter doing all the work and then suddenly saying Caspian should kill Miraz. And then there’s what come next.

In the book, nobody has a problem with Caspian wanting to avenge his murdered father. Peter just objects because he’s been wounded by the werewolf and his uncle wouldn’t take a challenge from him seriously anyway. In two other Narnia books, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader and The Silver Chair, wanting to avenge someone’s death is portrayed sympathetically. C. S. Lewis was coming from a more medieval morality whereas the movie takes a more modern view. I don’t necessarily think that that medieval view was right and the modern one wrong. (Not on this subject anyway.) But I do feel that the whole if-you-kill-him-you’ll-be-just-like-him thing comes across as cliche, especially that bit where Caspian looks like he’s going to kill Miraz but then stabs something else. I admit I’m not enough of a cinephile to give examples of this from other films, but it really smells rote and boring to me, making this sadly the first example in a Narnia movie of an arc that I simply do not like as opposed to one that I just think could have been executed better. I really wish the movie could have focused instead on Caspian’s dissatisfaction with the world into which he was born and his longing for the Narnia of his bedtime stories. That was arguably the heart of the book. And, yeah, I know the book isn’t the most beloved entry in The Chronicles of Narnia but that was in spite of that theme, not because of it.

Back to the movie. Sopespian helps the humiliated Miraz to his feet. “I’ll deal with you when this is over,” Miraz snarls, desperately trying to regain his dignity. “It is over,” says Sopespian with a grin and stabs Miraz to death with a Narnian arrow, Susan’s arrow that Miraz showed him earlier, I believe. It’s a great creepy moment.

Then Sopespian points at Aslan’s How and yells “Treachery! They shot him! They murdered our king!” Peter, seeing that the Telmarines are now about to attack commands the Narnians to be ready.

Now I enjoy the book’s surprise of Glozelle and Sopespian being the ones to kill Miraz when convention would dictate that Peter or Caspian would do so-or maybe Aslan given the precedent set by The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. And I’m glad the movie kept it, but it makes less sense because of that whole Caspian sparing Miraz thing and their (understandable) desire to make Miraz’s death a bigger moment. Here’s the relevant part of the source material. Miraz has tripped and Peter is waiting for him to get up.

The Lords Glozelle and Sopespian had their own plans ready. As soon as they saw their King down, they leaped into the lists crying, “Treachery! Treachery! The Narnian traitor has stabbed him in the back while he lay helpless. To arms! To arms, Telmar!”
Peter hardly understood what was happening. He saw two big men running towards him with drawn swords. Then the third Telmarine had leaped over the ropes on his; left. “To arms, Narnia! Treachery!” Peter shouted. If all three had set upon him at once he would never have spoken again. But Glozelle stopped to stab his own King dead where he lay: “That’s for your insult, this morning,” he whispered as the blade went home.[6]You’ll notice that it’s Glozelle who kills Miraz here, not Sopespian. I don’t blame the screenwriters for mixing them up as the book gives them no individual personalities.

Of course, doing the scene that way would require making it clear that the Telmarine army was chomping at the bit, eager for any excuse to start slaying Narnians.[7]In the book, they heckle Peter during the duel. Maybe the movie should have kept that. Even as it is, it feels a bit odd that the ones near the front with good views wouldn’t be able to tell that Sopespian was the one to kill Miraz. And even they probably wouldn’t be able to see that the arrow that killed Miraz was a Narnian one so what was the point of that?

Anyway, Caspian calls out a warning to Peter who turns around to see the unnamed Telmarine marshal coming for him with a drawn sword.[8]Well, he’s unnamed in the dialogue. According to the credits and presumably the official screenplay, which is sadly unavailable to read online, he’s Lord Gregoire but in these recaps, I … Continue reading They fight and Peter wins. The movie pauses to show his helmet lying on the ground. From what I understand, this was to assure viewers that it was the helmet they just saw Peter knock off, not his head as it was in the book,[9]In which Peter also cuts off the man’s legs. I told you there was some brutal violence after the duel in the literary version. preserving the PG rating. I actually think focusing on the empty helmet makes the moment creepier. Without that little pause, I would have forgotten about the guy, being so caught up in the scene. With it, I think about what a gruesome fate the poor man just suffered. Shows how much the MPAA and I agree.

In the book, it’s actually Sopespian whom Peter beheads at that point but since he’s now made himself the main villain, the movie wants to keep alive a tad longer. Not that I’m complaining. Damian Alcazar earns it. Glozelle rallies the Telmarine cavalry[10]I appreciate that the movie keeps the line, “To arms, Telmar!” and the catapults start heaving boulders at the How. Caspian and Glenstorm rush inside it to rally the Narnians within while Susan commands the archers. I’ll be honest. I’m really not a fan of the battle scene that ensues. Of course, I’m not interested in epic battle scenes in general and you’ll remember I resented the one at the end of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005) for taking time away from what I consider some of the book’s most memorable material. But I still felt that scene worked on its own terms. This battle just drags on and on and on and I keep wondering what Lucy is doing. The pacing on this part is so off! First, they cut to Lucy when I was all set to focus on Peter and now, they stay with him and his army when I want to go back to her. I’ll try to get through describing the scene as quickly as possible without leaving out any highlights.

Caspian leads the Narnians he’s rallied racing underground, chopping down pillars as they go. This causes the ground beneath the charging Telmarines’ horses to collapse. Only then does Susan order the archers to fire and Peter and Edmund lead their foot soldiers in a charge.

Another part of the ground turns out to be a trapdoor that the Narnians lower, allowing Caspian and his troops to back above ground and surround the enemy.

We get to see Wimbleweather hurl an enemy soldier across the field. Since I mentioned that his already minor role in the book is reduced by the movie, I feel like I should also mention it when it gives him something to do.

We also see Trufflehunter in battle. (Well, him or another badger.) As one Telmarine (animation supervisor Adam Valdez) crawls out of the pit the Narnians created, he sees Reepicheep standing above him with a sword. “You’re a… mouse?” he says, unable to believe his fate. “You people have no imagination!” Reepicheep cries in exasperation before (it’s implied) finishing him off. I love that line! It’s not something C. S. Lewis’s Reepicheep would have said but it makes me laugh.

On the other side of the pit, the massive Telmarine army keeps advancing. Gryphons fly Narnian archers over them, but they’re taken down by the Telmarines’ giant war machines. Peter orders the Narnians to retreat into the How. Susan gets what is easily the movie’s cheesiest line. As the walls of Aslan’s How are bombarded by the catapults, she yells, “brace yourselves!” in slow motion to the archers. When are filmmakers going to learn that yelling things in slow motion always sounds dumb? I feel sorry for poor Anna Popplewell whose performance did not deserve that. Anyway, the onslaught accomplishes its purpose of blocking the entrance to the How for the Narnians. “Crush them all!” Sopespian says gleefully. Peter, Caspian, Susan, Edmund and their followers have no choice but to meet the enemy head-on.

Maybe the reason I’m not as much on the edge of my seat as I should be for this scene is that I’ve read the book, so I already know that nobody about whom I really care is going to die. I suppose that’s inevitable. Then again, in the aforementioned adaptation of Les Misérables, I’m still invested in the characters knowing which ones are going to die.[11]Spoiler: Most of them. Honestly, even if I weren’t familiar with the original book, I don’t think I’d be worried about my favorite characters dying because I’d still be able to tell that this isn’t that kind of movie. Sure, they’re trying to give this one a darker, more dangerous feel than its predecessor. But apart from Nikabrik, who deserved his death, the closest they’ve come to killing off a good guy we know well was Glenstorm’s son and we arguably don’t even know Glenstorm that well. (The dialogue didn’t even specify their relationship. I just picked up on it because I know the book.) Since I’m not really in suspense here, I wish the movie would stop pretending this was suspenseful and move on to stuff that really interests me.

Next Week: Stuff That Really Interests Me!

References

References
1 Actually, it looks like he just steps on his shield but the way Peter roars, it makes more sense for him to have stepped on his hand so that’s what I imagine.
2 There is some violence in the battle after the duel in the book that I’d describe as brutal.
3 In the book, by the way, Peter describes his shoulder as sprained, not dislocated.
4 For what it’s worth, in C. S. Lewis’s Till We Have Faces, which depicts a similar dramatic situation, the antagonistic king says he will disarm the main character, Queen Orual, and then have her hung since “his sword should not be stained with woman’s blood.” Her taunting response is kind of awesome.
5 I am referring to the musical version, not the literary one in which Eponine is a villain albeit an interesting one and very few readers root for her to end up with Marius.
6 You’ll notice that it’s Glozelle who kills Miraz here, not Sopespian. I don’t blame the screenwriters for mixing them up as the book gives them no individual personalities.
7 In the book, they heckle Peter during the duel. Maybe the movie should have kept that.
8 Well, he’s unnamed in the dialogue. According to the credits and presumably the official screenplay, which is sadly unavailable to read online, he’s Lord Gregoire but in these recaps, I usually only use the characters’ names if they’re in the dialogue to replicate the experience of watching the movies.
9 In which Peter also cuts off the man’s legs. I told you there was some brutal violence after the duel in the literary version.
10 I appreciate that the movie keeps the line, “To arms, Telmar!”
11 Spoiler: Most of them.
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Prince Caspian (2008) Part 10: The Telmarine Who Saved Narnia

The morning after the White Witch fiasco-or maybe later that day-Caspian sits atop the entrance to Aslan’s How, staring at the misty landscape below. Honestly, I wish this were a real place so that I could sit there and do the same. But enough of me praising the art direction.

Dr. Cornelius comes out of the How and wordlessly sits next to him.

Caspian: Why did you never tell me about my father?
Cornelius: My mother was a black dwarf from the northern mountains. I risked my life all these years that someday you might be a better king than those before you.
Caspian: Then I have failed you.
Cornelius: Everything I told you, everything I didn’t, it was only because I believe in you. You have the chance to become the most noble contradiction in history. The Telmarine who saved Narnia.

I don’t really see the connection between Caspian’s initial question and the revelation about Dr. Cornelius’s heritage. And the bit about “everything I told you, everything I didn’t” is a bit weak too. How would telling Caspian the truth about his father’s death be a bad influence on him? But other than that, this is a lovely scene and not just because of the acting though Ben Barnes and Vincent Grass give beautiful performances. The line about “the most noble contradiction in history” is one of the best quotes from a Narnia movie that isn’t taken from the books.

Within the How, Peter is also staring wistfully at something. Rather than staring down at something though, he’s staring up at the image of Aslan in the Stone Table room. Lucy, like Dr. Cornelius, wordlessly approaches and sits by him. There’s some nice acting from William Moseley as he thinks about what he’s going to say to her before he says it. “You’re lucky, you know,” is what he says, “To have seen him. I wish he’d just given me some sort of proof.” Peter’s voice sounds less bitter towards Aslan now and more desperate. There still might be a little bit of bitterness but that serves to make the scene more interesting. “Maybe we’re the ones who need to prove ourselves to him,” Lucy suggests, massaging Peter’s arm to comfort him.

Now there are some people out there, mainly fans of the Narnia books,[1]Not every fan of the books of course. who condemn this movie as being nothing but empty action scenes. I was prepared to defend it against those charges, using these two quiet dialogue scenes. However, I realized with a start that these scenes are both very short whereas the movie’s action scenes are quite lengthy. Still, I’m going to stick to my defense since these two scenes are still very emotional and even a little thoughtful. Also, while we’ll be getting a major action scene soon, there will be a handful of dialogue/action scenes leading up to it. And, hey, action scenes aren’t enemies to character development and good storytelling. Both the attack on the castle and the White Witch scene were action scenes which were also very concerned with furthering character arcs. Mind you, I didn’t love everything about how they furthered character arcs since I think the arc the movie gives Peter needed some ironing and the arc it gives Caspian is dull but it’s slander to say the movie isn’t interested in story and character. I’m going to quote from An Experiment in Criticism, a nonfiction work of C. S. Lewis. In it, he partly defends the “unliterary,” by which he means those who just read books for exciting plots and wish fulfillment, not to appreciate the style.

Let us be quite clear that the unliterary are unliterary not because they enjoy stories in these ways, but because they enjoy them in no other. Not what they have but what they lack cuts them off from the fulness of literary experience. These things ought they to have done and not left others undone. For all these enjoyments are shared by good readers reading good books. We hold our breath with anxiety while the Cyclops gropes over the ram that bears Odysseus, while we wonder how Phèdre (and Hippolyte) will react to the unexpected return of Thésée, or how the disgrace of the Bennet family will affect Darcy’s love for Elizabeth. Our inquisitiveness is strongly excited by the first part of The Confessions of a Justified Sinner or the change in General Tilney’s behaviour. We long to discover Pip’s unknown benefactor in Great Expectations. In Spenser’s House of Busirane every stanza whets our curiosity. As for the vicarious enjoyment of imagined happiness, the mere existence of the Pastoral gives it a respectable place in literature. And elsewhere too, though we do not demand a happy ending to every story, yet when such an ending occurs and is fitting and well executed, we certainly enjoy the happiness of the characters. We are even prepared to enjoy vicariously the fulfilment of utterly impossible wishes, as in the statue scene from the Winter’s Tale; for what wish is so impossible as the wish that the dead to whom we have been cruel and unjust should live again and forgive us and ‘all be as before’? Those who seek only vicarious happiness in their reading are unliterary; but those who pretend that it can never be an ingredient in good reading are wrong.

C. S. Lewis also criticized movie adaptations of literature for adding action scenes, so he’d doubtless dislike the 2008 Prince Caspian. But I think the argument he makes could very well be used in the film’s defense. Action scenes shouldn’t be the raison d’etre of a movie-or not of a Narnia movie anyway. But they can still be an ingredient in it.

Speaking of movies, let’s get back to the plot. Edmund enters and tells Peter he’d better come quickly. The Pevensies rush out of one of the How’s many entrances to stand beside Caspian. The Telmarine army, led by Miraz, emerge from the trees. And they’ve got catapults.

OK, as much as I love the overall look of the movie, I’ve got to say those metal masks look silly with their eyebrows and mustaches.

In better news, I was wrong when I claimed that “Beards and bedsteads” was the only one of Trumpkin’s characteristic exclamations from the book to make into the movie. We cut to another of the Narnians and hear him say, “Cakes and Kettledrums![2]Actually, in the book, it was “Cobbles and kettledrums” but never mind. That’s your next big plan?! Sending a little girl off into the darkest parts of the forest alone?!” “It’s our only chance,” insists Peter. “And she won’t be alone,” adds Susan. The little girl is obviously Lucy but why is their only chance sending her into the darkest parts of the forest? The scene doesn’t really explain. You sort of have to watch the movie twice to figure it out. As I wrote before, this would make so much more sense if Aslan had told Lucy in her dream to come meet him somewhere. “Haven’t enough of us died already?” Trumpkin asks with an uncharacteristic stutter in his voice, looking like he might very well break down crying.

“Nikabrik was my friend too,” says Trufflehunter, “but he lost hope. Queen Lucy hasn’t. And neither have I.” Reepicheep draws his sword in a salute. “For Aslan,” he says solemnly. “For Aslan,” intones a nearby talking bear (voiced by David Walliams.) In the book, the Bulgy Bear is a major source of comic relief. I imagine the filmmakers trimmed his part because they wanted this to be a serious action movie with no comedic talking bears in it. Humph, I say! But that makes it rather odd that they’d give the character this one line in a big dramatic scene.[3]It may strike some as even odder that they’d bother to hire Walliams, a professional actor, rather than give one of the crew a vocal cameo as they did for, say, Pattertwig, another minor … Continue reading

Back to the scene. “Then I’m going with you,” says Trumpkin to Lucy. “No, we need you here,” she replies, putting a hand on his shoulder. “We have to hold them off until Lucy and Susan get back,” says Peter. “If I may…,” says Caspian. Instead of getting told off by Peter, Caspian receives everybody’s attention. “Miraz may be a tyrant and a murderer but as king, he is still subject to the traditions and expectations of his people. There is one in particular that may buy as some time.”

Later, Miraz and Glozelle watch from afar as Edmund and two Narnians approach with green branches, the equivalent of olive branches or white flags in this culture. “Perhaps they have come to surrender,” Glozelle suggests. “No. They are much too noble for that,” says Miraz. The two Narnians are the same ones that accompany Edmund in the book, Glozelle and Wimbleweather the giant (Jan Filipensky.) Wimbleweather is another major source of comic relief in the book who is sadly reduced to a cameo here. Perhaps this is partly because giants are expensive. If so, I wonder how the filmmakers intended to adapt The Silver Chair, a Narnia book in which giants play a big role. Still, this cameo is better than nothing.

We cut to Edmund reading a challenge to Miraz and other Telmarine bigshots. The language of the challenge, I’m pleased to relate, is close to the book though it’s much shorter and easier for people not versed in this kind of culture to understand. “I, Peter, by the gift of Aslan, by election and by conquest High King of Narnia, Lord of Cair Paravel and Emperor of the Lone Islands, in order to prevent the abominable effusion of blood do hereby challenge the usurper Miraz to single combat upon the field of battle. The fight shall be to the death. The reward shall be total surrender.”

“Tell me, Prince Edmund-” begins Miraz, sounding unimpressed, before Edmund interrupts to clarify that he’s actually King Edmund. “Just king though. Peter’s the high king. I know, it’s confusing.” Some fans might reasonably object that that moment of humor has undertones of criticizing the source material. For what it is though, it can be enjoyed. The movie’s comedic timing is very good.

Miraz: Why would we risk such a proposal when our armies could wipe you out by nightfall?
Edmund: Haven’t you already underestimated our numbers? I mean, only a week ago Narnians were extinct.
Miraz (grimly): And so you will be again.
Edmund: Then you should have little to fear.

Miraz laughs at this, not a stereotypically evil sounding laugh, a genuinely amused one. “This is not a question of bravery,” he says. “So you’re bravely refusing to fight a swordsman half your age?” says Edmund. Miraz’s smile freezes. He leans forward and says in a much less relaxed tone of voice, “I didn’t say I refused.” Sergio Castellitto is so great in this role!

“You shall have our support, Your Majesty, whatever your decision,” one of the Telmarine lords (David Bowles) says. “Sire,” says Lord Sopespian smoothly, “our military advantage alone provides the perfect excuse to avoid what might otherwise be-” Miraz jumps to his feet, drawing his sword. “I am not avoiding anything!” he snarls. It’s as fun to see him nettled as it was not fun to see Caspian and Peter nettled earlier. “I am merely pointing out that my lord is well within his rights to refuse,” says Sopespian innocently. “His Majesty would never refuse,” puts in Glozelle. “He relishes the chance to show the people the courage of their new king.” This is a minor change from the book’s story that I think arguably improves upon it. As C. S. Lewis wrote the scene, Glozelle and Sopespian manipulate Miraz into accepting Peter’s challenge for purposes of their own in the exact same way. Having one of them act like of course he wouldn’t accept and the other act like of course he wouldn’t decline makes the scene interesting.

Miraz’s eyes dart around as he realizes he’s trapped but he manages to keep from looking too helpless. “You,” he says, pointing his sword at Edmund[4]You’ll notice it trembles a bit., “you should hope your brother’s sword is sharper than his pen.” Fortunately, Edmund has a great poker face.

Now I’m going to write about a deleted scene in some detail[5]I’m actually not sure whether it would have come here or after the next scene. because in my opinion, it most definitely should not have been deleted! And I’m not just saying that because much of it is from the book. OK, I’m mostly saying it because of that. But even with the story the filmmakers were telling, the scene would have improved the storytelling. It would have begun with Caspian respectfully arguing that he, not Peter, should be the one to fight Miraz and Peter disagreeing.

Peter (kindly): Look, if there’s ever going to be peace with the Telmarines, you have to be the one who brings it.
Caspian: How can I if you won’t let me?
Peter: Not like this. If I don’t make it, well, Narnia’s future’s in your hands.
Caspian: And what about your own future?
Peter: I was thinking about a career in medicine.

As it is, the idea that Caspian’s goal should be uniting the Telmarines and the Old Narnians comes rather out of nowhere at the climax of the story. This dialogue would have served to set it up.[6]OK, it would be setting it up right before the climax but that’s still better than not setting it up at all. This also would have made Peter and Caspian’s relationship less unpleasant. Peter would have given Caspian good advice and acknowledged him as his successor. Caspian would have expressed concern for Peter’s safety. These strike me as important beats for their character arcs without which the movie suffers dramatically. The scene would have gone on to show Peter picking his marshals of the list for the duel. The Bulgy Bear would have invoked his species’ ancient right to provide one of them and Trumpkin objecting that he’d end up sucking his paws and embarrassing the Narnians. Reepicheep would have also volunteered, and Peter would have come up with a diplomatic reason for declining the offer rather than saying, “The enemy would have laugh at you because you’re so small.” These humorous moments from the book weren’t important character beats but come on! It’s classic stuff! Earlier in this post, I defended the movie against charges it favored action above all else, using this talky section as a counterargument. But the fact that the scene I just described was deleted while the climactic battle, to which we’ll get in the next post, drags on and on weakens my case.

Back at the How, Caspian helps Susan and Lucy mount his horse. “Destrier has always served me well,” he says, “You are in good hands.” “Or hooves,” jokes Lucy. (Not one of the movie’s better jokes but it feels like something someone would say in real life.) “Good luck,” says Caspian, trying to meet Susan’s eye. She says, “Thanks,” but coldly turns her face away. Caspian apologetically hands her the enchanted horn, saying maybe it’s time she had it back. Now Susan manages a small smile. “Why don’t you hold on to it?” she says. “You might need to call me again.” She gallops off. “You might need to call me again?!” Lucy repeats incredulously. “Oh, shut up!” says Susan. I’m with Lucy here. Was that a cell phone joke? That makes no sense! Neither Susan nor Caspian comes from a world with cell phones. What were the writers thinking?!

Look, even he’s like, “what did she just say?”

We cut to Peter emerging from Aslan’s How for the duel. The Narnians cheer for him while the Telmarines cheer for Miraz. In a nice touch, Peter wears armor nearly identical to what he wore in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005.) This is appropriate since he’s one of Old Narnia’s greatest heroes, if not the greatest, come from the ancient past to do battle for it but the gambeson(?)[7]I googled “cloth part of armor” and that’s the word that came up though the images I found weren’t a perfect fit. is a darker shade of red than the one in the first movie, indicating that this is a sadder, wiser Peter.

The Narnian marshals of the list are Edmund, Glenstorm and the Bulgy Bear. The Telmarine marshals are Glozelle, Sopespian and that guy who told Miraz he would have their full support whatever they decided.

“It should appear to be going badly,” Miraz says in an undertone to Glozelle who holds a crossbow. “Understood, Your Majesty,” says Glozelle. Does this mean that Glozelle is supposed to shoot Peter if it looks like he’s winning? I can’t think what else the implication could be, but I don’t quite get the line. Shouldn’t it be “if it should appear to be going badly?” Adding that one word to the beginning of the sentence would have made it so much clearer.

Anyway, unlike in the book, Miraz has no misimpression that Sopespian didn’t really want him to accept this challenge. As he takes his helmet from him, he says, “I hope you won’t be too disappointed when I survive.”[8]Speaking of weapons, here’s something readers will hopefully find funny. The beloved modern fantasy series, His Dark Materials, was intended by its author, Philip Pullman, to be sort of an … Continue reading Peter and Miraz circle each other as both armies watch with bated breath. Then the kings engage in a little trash talk.

Miraz: There is still time to surrender.
Peter: Feel free.
Miraz: How many more must die for the throne?
Peter: Just one.

And they fight.

Notice the Bulgy Bear about to suck his paw.

Next Week: Who Will Win?

References

References
1 Not every fan of the books of course.
2 Actually, in the book, it was “Cobbles and kettledrums” but never mind.
3 It may strike some as even odder that they’d bother to hire Walliams, a professional actor, rather than give one of the crew a vocal cameo as they did for, say, Pattertwig, another minor Narnian speaking part. As I’ll explain in a bit, the bear was originally going to have more lines that were cut, making it a bit more explicable. But even if those had been kept, waiting this long to introduce his character would have been weird.
4 You’ll notice it trembles a bit.
5 I’m actually not sure whether it would have come here or after the next scene.
6 OK, it would be setting it up right before the climax but that’s still better than not setting it up at all.
7 I googled “cloth part of armor” and that’s the word that came up though the images I found weren’t a perfect fit.
8 Speaking of weapons, here’s something readers will hopefully find funny. The beloved modern fantasy series, His Dark Materials, was intended by its author, Philip Pullman, to be sort of an anti-Narnia series since he found those books highly offensive. A year before the cinematic Prince Caspian‘s release, there came a movie adaptation of the first Dark Materials book, The Golden Compass. (Actually, it was only titled The Golden Compass in America, I guess, because that matched the titles of the other books in the series better. In the UK, it was titled Northern Lights.) Some of the villainous Telmarines have what looks like a compass design on their shields. It’s amusing to imagine that this was intended by the filmmakers as a little Take That at their competition though I’m sure that wasn’t the case.
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Animation Station: Were the 70s Really a Dark Age for Disney Animation?

Note: Originally, this post wasn’t going to be published for quite some time. But with the passing of Bob Newhart, who memorably lent his voice to a main character in one of the movies under discussion, I decided to go ahead with it now as a tribute to him.

Animation critics and historians generally regard the 1970s as the beginning of a dark age for Walt Disney animation that last until roughly 1989.[1]Actually, some critics would say this dark age started with the 60s and even pickier ones would say it actually began right after the release of Bambi. This, they’d say, coincides with the death of Walt Disney himself. Now I don’t buy the idea that the Disney company needed its namesake to make great animated movies. From what I understand, he’d already begun to pay more attention to live action cinema and theme parks during the 50s and I’d say they were still going strong then though that opinion isn’t universally shared by critics. And even when he’d been the guiding force behind the animation studio, he wasn’t the only one with ideas. Neither were his ideas always great. The man wanted to cut the iconic spaghetti scene from Lady and the Tramp for crying out loud! That being said, if you wanted to make the argument that Disney animation couldn’t survive without Walt Disney, The Aristocats (1970) would strongly support your case, much as it pains me to say so as a cat person.[2]Actually, I’m not really a pet person but if I were, I’d be a cat person.

Based on a story by Tom McGowan and Tom Rowe, the movie begins with a Parisian millionaire (voiced by Hermione Baddeley)[3]Disney fans may be interested to note that she also played the maid in Mary Poppins. As a Dickens fan, I remember her for playing Mrs. Cratchit in Scrooge (1951) and Mrs. Bardell in The Pickwick … Continue reading) leaving her entire fortune to her beloved cat, Duchess (Eva Gabor), and her three kittens, Toulouse (Gary Dubin), Marie (Liz English) and Berlioz (Dean Clark.) A second beneficiary is her butler and the cats’ caretaker, Edgar (Roddy Maude-Roxby.) Not taking this well, Edgar drugs the cats and leaves them in the middle of nowhere at night. Not understanding what has happened, they journey back to Paris with the help of stray cat, Thomas O’ Malley (Phil Harris.)

The Aristocats really feels like a fusion of three Disney movies that had recently done well, only not as good as any of them. Most obviously and shamelessly, the romance between Duchess and O’ Malley is straight from Lady and the Tramp. Again, we have a sheltered, ladylike female pet, loyal to her human owner but separated from them, helped by a worldly wise, roguish but ultimately goodhearted male stray who thinks of humans as either enemies or beings to be exploited. Again, we have a scene where the male invites the female to share a life with him, but she regretfully declines out of loyalty to her owner. Again, the male proves his mettle in the end by saving the day and the female’s owner adopts him. Even the names of the leading ladies aren’t that far removed from each other! Still, the addition of three kids, even if they’re not very memorable themselves, does shake up the dynamic a bit. So does the fact that Duchess is less naive than Lady and responds to O’ Malley’s flirting in kind. All in all, the Lady and the Tramp parts of the Aristocats are probably the parts that work best, dramatically speaking.

Less obviously but unmistakably once you notice it, the movie follows in the pawprints of 101 Dalmatians with a family of pet characters, including kids, living in a European capital, abducted by a villain, and journeying across the countryside back to their owner. But The Aristocats, unlike Dalmatians, seldom plays the material for suspense. Instead, it takes its tonal cues from The Jungle Book (1967), being a road trip comedy, whose plot is largely an excuse for encounters with comedic talking animals, many of them modeled on the most famous personas of the celebrities voicing them. We even get a group of jazz playing animals (swinging apes in The Jungle Book, hep alley cats in The Aristocats), the leader of whom, Scat Cat (Scatman Crothers), is, like Louis Prima’s King Louie of the Apes, modeled on the musician providing his voice[4]Actually, he was supposed to be voiced by Louis Armstrong but that didn’t work out., and who also give a show stopping musical number in a long abandoned human dwelling they end up damaging. Said musical number is even about wanting to be someone. Credit where credit is due though: Everybody Wants to Be a Cat is the only song from this movie most people remember. (Personally, my favorite of the songs is Thomas O’ Malley Cat.)

The character animation for The Aristocats is fine but lacks the great comedic timing of The Jungle Book.[5]I wouldn’t say either film has a lot of great verbal humor, but The Jungle Book‘s character animation makes it more entertaining (for kids anyway) than it has a right to be. The fact that the animals it features are considerably less exotic doesn’t help. And the story just isn’t as dramatic as that of 101 Dalmatians. We’re told that the cats’ journey is arduous more than we’re shown it and honestly, we’re not even told that it’s arduous that often. The story structure precludes the villainous Edgar from threatening the heroes until they finally reach their destination in the last act. To keep viewers from forgetting about him, the movie indulges in a pointless subplot. The implied reason Edgar abandons the pets rather than drowning them is that he gets chased by a couple of overzealous farm dogs, Napoleon (Pat Buttram) and Lafayette (George Lindsey.)[6]Why give such obviously French names to characters with rural American accents? Your guess is as good as mine. He later realizes that he left his motorcycle’s sidecar, his bowler hat and his umbrella at the farm and has to go retrieve them lest the police trace the items back to him. The cats’ friend, Roquefort the mouse (Disney veteran Sterling Holloway)[7]Yes, the cats are friends with a mouse, tries to hitch a ride with Edgar back to the scene of the crime to find Duchess and her kittens. He doesn’t succeed and even if he did, we know the cats have already left, so who cares? The first chase scene with the dogs is more painful than funny.

Did I mention I’m not a dog person?

But the second scene is a comedic highlight of the movie. Weirdly though, it makes more sense if we’re supposed to root for Edgar the bad guy.

Fortunately, once the cats reach their destination, the story finally becomes exciting as Edgar stuffs Duchess and her kittens in a sack and O’ Malley, Roquefort and the alley cats have to rescue them. The movie’s humor also picks up at the climax with some laugh-out-loud visual gags. The final minute even contains a great variation on a running joke with the dogs. (“Wait a minute! I’m the leader! I’ll say when…”) Even more fortunately, Disney’s next animated movie, the 1973 Robin Hood, a retelling (sort of) of the familiar English legend with anthropomorphic animals as the characters, would be a big step up from The Aristocats.

If Fantasia, as I’ve written before, is an animated Disney movie that’s enjoyed by analytical critics but not by your average moviegoer, Robin Hood is the opposite. Historically, it’s been dismissed, if not savaged, by film critics and liked, nay, loved by “normal” people. The movie is primarily a comedy, and I can’t really explain why fans find it hilarious and others don’t, humor being so subjective. But maybe I can illuminate some other things. The film’s visuals tend to be serviceable at best. The backgrounds are fine but undistinguished. We’re a long way from Gustaf Tenggren, Mary Blair or Eyvind Earle.

The character animation is likewise fine, but it lacks the extra artistry and wit that make Disney animation at its best appealing to the analytical eye.[8]This movie also has an unusually high number of bits where the animators clearly just traced over animation from the company’s other movies. One would assume this was to save money but, … Continue reading The only character who is really fun to watch is the villainous Sir Hiss (Terry Thomas.)

For critics interested in story structure, the movie doesn’t have much to offer either. It (sort of) builds to a climax and a pretty fun one too, involving a massive jailbreak/heist and a burning castle, but it only builds to it in the loosest sense of the term. Most of the film is just a meandering series of scenes, each of which naturally leads into the next but not without really building much momentum. The story’s main problem is resolved entirely offscreen. Some of the scenes don’t even try that hard to be funny. But I’ve never really had a problem with episodic storytelling. I’d argue it makes sense for Robin Hood, considering the source material, even if episode storytelling can be done better. I’d also argue that those less humorous scenes serve the purpose of endearing us to the characters.

That’s the movie’s real strength. It has a fun, likeable cast of characters and a lot of great vocal performances, starting with Brian Bedford’s as Robin Hood himself. Not only is he fun and charming when the character is speaking normally but he also shows an impressive range as the various alter egos he adopts. I like that the movie has Robin Hood genuinely be a master of disguise when it would have been easier to just have his enemies be ridiculously gullible. Phil Harris as Little John doesn’t even try to alter his voice when his character goes undercover but he’s great fun anyway and the animators do their best to disguise the distinctive character design.[9]Speaking of range, I’ve read some call Little John a recycled version of Baloo from Disney’s The Jungle Book, but I’d argue that while both characters are bears voiced by Phil … Continue reading

I also like that, effective as Robin’s disguises are, Prince John (Peter Ustinov) sees through one in a big scene, making him a somewhat formidable villain and not just a pathetic dupe. Instead, he’s 98% a pathetic dupe and a hilarious one. Ustinov’s vocal performance is the funniest in the movie and that’s saying something. As long as Prince John and his aforementioned sidekick, Sir Hiss, are onscreen together, and especially when they’re mad at each other, the movie is a hoot.

Other fun characters are the gleefully sadistic sheriff of Nottingham (Pat Buttram),[10]In olde England, a sheriff was the king’s representative in a county but the movie to avoid taxing American audiences (see what I did there?), portrays him as a sheriff from a western, complete … Continue reading, the jolly when not angered Friar Tuck (Andy Devine) and the pugnacious Lady Kluck (Carole Shelley), sidekick to Maid Marian (Monica Evans.)[11]Yes, foxes are friends with chickens in this movie and with rabbits. You’ve just got to go with it.

Something else I like is that the movie devotes a fairly lengthy scene to Robin Hood helping the oppressed poor of Nottingham. It isn’t as fun to watch as the scenes of him robbing Prince John but it’s a big part of his previously mentioned likability. This movie also boasts one of the best Disney soundtracks from the 70s. Not all of the songs by Roger Miller, who also voices Allan-a-Dale the minstrel, are great but all of them are pleasant and one of them, The Phony King of England, is one of the best songs to come from a Disney movie of any decade. Why don’t you give it a listen right now?

Ultimately, I agree with the mainstream audiences that Robin Hood is a very fun movie. However, I can’t resist mentioning that twenty-one years prior to this take on the Robin Hood legend, Disney released what I consider a better one, The Story of Robin Hood and his Merrie Men, and too few people have seen that in my opinion.

1977 saw the release of The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, a truly delightful movie but one which was mainly composed of three preexisting featurettes, two of which had been made in the 60s. Thus, it’s not particularly indicative of 1970s Disney animation.[12]Well, you could argue there wasn’t much stylistic difference between the animated content Disney made in the two decades, but I feel like there was a kind of ambition in their 60s output you … Continue reading It’s also adapted from two great books, so I’d prefer to devote a whole blog post to it as part of The Adaptation Station and not one of these Animation Station bonus thingies. Moving on…

It’s rather jarring to go from either Robin Hood or The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh to The Rescuers (1977.) It opens with one of the darkest, most ominous openings to any animated Disney film. Before the credits begin, we see a rickety old riverboat at night in a bayou somewhere in Louisiana. A little girl backs out of the boat’s interior and onto the deck as if she’s terrified of being seen. Two fearsome looking crocodiles on chains[13]They’re referred to as “crocs” in one line of dialogue, but from what I understand the designs are inconsistent as to whether they’re those or alligators. watch her. Furtively, the girl drops a bottle with a message in it into the water.

“Who will rescue me?” Shelby Flint hauntingly sings in the first of the movie’s pleasant 70s-style pop songs. We follow the bottle’s tumultuous journey to New York harbor where it is found by mice, the least likely creatures to be able to help. Or are they?[14]OK, technically, bugs would be less likely rescuers. I consider this one of the most gripping openings, if not the most gripping, to any Disney movie though I admit it would probably be even better if the bottle’s journey was fully animated instead of shown to us through a series of paintings by Mel Shaw. But, hey, they’re good paintings.

Beneath the United Nations building, the bottle is brought before a meeting of the Rescue Aid Society, an international organization of mice dedicated to rescuing people. The message tells them that Penny, its writer, is in terrible trouble and needs help but the part that would have told her location has been rendered illegible by water. Miss Bianca (Eva Gabor), a glamorous member of the society who appears to lead a rather cushy life, is moved by the letter and to everyone’s surprise, volunteers to go on the rescue mission. When the chairman (Bernard Fox) suggests she take someone with her, every male agent eagerly raises their hand but Miss Bianca further surprises by choosing the humble, scruffy janitor, Bernard (Bob Newhart.) (The implication is that she’s attracted to him by the way, not that she’s worried about one of her fellow agents harassing her.)

Does the idea of an international organization of mice dedicated to rescuing people sound a bit random to you? Well, it made more sense in the children’s books by Margery Sharp that inspired this movie. There it was called the Mouse Prisoners Aid Society, and it played on the literary convention of prisoners befriending mice in their cells and taking comfort from them. That was the service the society had always provided at the beginning of the first book, published in 1959, but it quickly evolved into a society for busting prisoners out. The movie takes its title from that first book, but its story has much more in common with the second book, Miss Bianca (1962), with an orphan girl whose name begins with a P being held captive by an evil woman with a pathetic male sidekick and two guard animals. It’s really only an adaptation in the loosest sense of the word though. But while I prefer the book series[15]Well, the first three or four books in it anyway. Margery Sharp was forced to continue writing the series long after it should have ended, and the stories became increasingly dumb., but the movie benefits from following its formula. As in your average Miss Bianca book, we see the heroes track down the prisoner they need to liberate, make contact with them, devise an escape plan, put the plan into action, experience some setbacks and ultimately triumph.[16]Sorry if that’s spoiling anything. I assume everyone knows children’s stories usually have happy endings.

The movie also benefits from keeping the characters of Bernard and Bianca close to their literary versions. Well, they’re pretty close. Bernard is a bit more bumbling and fearful, but he still proves invaluable in a real crisis. Miss Bianca doesn’t get the character arc she had in the first book in which she had to be convinced to go on a dangerous mission and was initially uncomfortable talking to members of the lower classes. But that character arc was really finished in one book. The movie’s selfless, risk-taking Miss Bianca who can talk to anyone is pretty much the character we get in every other book in the series. She and Bernard are actually some of my favorite animated lead characters. Something about The Rescuers that was unique for the time was the way that their relationship was portrayed. They were attracted to each other from their first scene, but this was handled as a subtext. And they clearly bonded with each other over the course of the movie, it was never a love story with wedding bells explicitly ringing at the end. The focus was on their mission, not their romance.[17]A beef I have with the later sequel, The Rescuers Down Under, is that the entire middle section consists of repetitive scenes of Bernard and Bianca traveling across the Australian outback to find the … Continue reading

This movie has a much more threatening villain than any other Disney animated movie from the 70s. True, Madame Medusa (Geraldine Page), looks like a comical figure at first glance. But while she’s definitely over-the-top and caricatured, she can be quite disturbing in the way that dangerously unhinged, obsessive people willing to endanger children to get what they want are disturbing.

Her crocodiles, Brutus and Nero, are also very intimidating and the movie makes great use of their size during action scenes.

They can also be quite funny, most notably in a scene where Bernard and Bianca take refuge from them in a pipe organ and the crocs try to flush them out by playing it.

The Rescuers has less in common with the lighthearted cartoon comedies Disney typically made the 70s than it has with the animated films the studio would make in the 80s featuring more intense villains, darker visuals, occasional morbid humor and violent action climaxes.[18]The Little Mermaid (1989) is generally seen as the prototype for 90s Disney animated features rather than the culmination of the 80s ones but everything I’ve just written about them applies to … Continue reading

But there are still some elements that cross over. (I don’t mean that as a bad thing by the way.) Pat Buttram and George Lindsey, who were in both The Aristocats and Robin Hood, voice supporting characters. So does John Fiedler who was in both Robin Hood and The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh. Orville (famed radio performer Jim Jordan) the clumsy yet naively confident albatross who gives Bernard and Bianca a ride on his back feels like he could have come from any of the Disney movies had come recently. So does Evinrude the long-suffering dragonfly ferryman.[19]Ferrydragonfly? Perhaps neither is as memorable as the Robin Hood sidekicks but they’re better than those in The Aristocats.

The movie kind of has two climaxes. First, a rather dark and intense one with Penny and her rescuers trapped in an underground cave that fills up water.[20]Yes, there’s apparently a strong tide in this bayou. Then there’s a more comical, slapstick climax that sees the bad guys get their comeuppance. Even that one throws more than a few unexpected obstacles in our heroes’ way, making it more genuinely suspenseful than the similar climaxes of The Aristocats and Robin Hood.[21]Well, I’d argue that last one was a little suspenseful. Both scenes are great in their own ways.

Not everything about The Rescuers works brilliantly and it’s not a movie for everyone. But it is a movie for some people, and I am one of them.

So, were the 1970s a dark age for Disney animation? I can’t really say that since I like all but one of these movies and I don’t hate the one I don’t like. And not discussing The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh really does make the decade sound less impressive for Disney than it was.[22]To be fair, when critics speak of “the dark of age of (mainstream American) animation,” they’re usually referring to both the 70s and the 80s. But it was a very unambitious age. I remember when I was blogging my way through the various movies the studio made during the 1940s that were compilations of short cartoons. Pretty much any Disney animated film from the 70s has a bigger fanbase than those and there are reasons for that. Yet I can still tell that, for all their budget limitations, the creators of those compilation movies were still trying take viewers to strange and fantastical worlds, the likes of which they’d never seen before. By contrast, except for The Rescuers, none of these 70s movies aims for anything more than getting some laughs and creating some endearing characters. And on bad days, they can’t even accomplish that. Even if you’re just looking for a fun Disney animated comedy, I’d say The Sword in the Stone from 1963 is funnier and more interesting than all but their best from the 70s. Maybe we should call the decade the Dim Age of Disney Animation.

Eh, that sounds way too harsh. Like I said, there’s far more good than bad here. If what you (or your kids) seek from Disney animation is fun turn-off-your-brain Saturday morning entertainment, this is the decade for you.

References

References
1 Actually, some critics would say this dark age started with the 60s and even pickier ones would say it actually began right after the release of Bambi.
2 Actually, I’m not really a pet person but if I were, I’d be a cat person.
3 Disney fans may be interested to note that she also played the maid in Mary Poppins. As a Dickens fan, I remember her for playing Mrs. Cratchit in Scrooge (1951) and Mrs. Bardell in The Pickwick Papers (1952.
4 Actually, he was supposed to be voiced by Louis Armstrong but that didn’t work out.
5 I wouldn’t say either film has a lot of great verbal humor, but The Jungle Book‘s character animation makes it more entertaining (for kids anyway) than it has a right to be.
6 Why give such obviously French names to characters with rural American accents? Your guess is as good as mine.
7 Yes, the cats are friends with a mouse,
8 This movie also has an unusually high number of bits where the animators clearly just traced over animation from the company’s other movies. One would assume this was to save money but, according to some animators, it didn’t actually accomplish that. I don’t really mind myself though it does mean there’s an entire dance scene where none of the choreography particularly matches the music.
9 Speaking of range, I’ve read some call Little John a recycled version of Baloo from Disney’s The Jungle Book, but I’d argue that while both characters are bears voiced by Phil Harris, they have opposite personalities.
10 In olde England, a sheriff was the king’s representative in a county but the movie to avoid taxing American audiences (see what I did there?), portrays him as a sheriff from a western, complete with badge.
11 Yes, foxes are friends with chickens in this movie and with rabbits. You’ve just got to go with it.
12 Well, you could argue there wasn’t much stylistic difference between the animated content Disney made in the two decades, but I feel like there was a kind of ambition in their 60s output you don’t get in the 70s stuff.
13 They’re referred to as “crocs” in one line of dialogue, but from what I understand the designs are inconsistent as to whether they’re those or alligators.
14 OK, technically, bugs would be less likely rescuers.
15 Well, the first three or four books in it anyway. Margery Sharp was forced to continue writing the series long after it should have ended, and the stories became increasingly dumb.
16 Sorry if that’s spoiling anything. I assume everyone knows children’s stories usually have happy endings.
17 A beef I have with the later sequel, The Rescuers Down Under, is that the entire middle section consists of repetitive scenes of Bernard and Bianca traveling across the Australian outback to find the prisoner they hope to rescue and Bernard fretting about his relationship with Bianca. They only meet the child they’ve come to help when the movie is almost over and never forge anything like the bond they built with Penny. Neither do we see them planning the escape. But I know there are people out there who consider The Rescuers Down Under an improvement on the original so don’t take my word for it.
18 The Little Mermaid (1989) is generally seen as the prototype for 90s Disney animated features rather than the culmination of the 80s ones but everything I’ve just written about them applies to it too. Pay attention to some of the lyrics Under the Sea sometime. They’re pretty dark.
19 Ferrydragonfly?
20 Yes, there’s apparently a strong tide in this bayou.
21 Well, I’d argue that last one was a little suspenseful.
22 To be fair, when critics speak of “the dark of age of (mainstream American) animation,” they’re usually referring to both the 70s and the 80s.
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