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Prince Caspian makes his way through the woods. He hears Trufflehunter and Nikabrik sneaking behind him. “I just think we should wait for the kings and queens,” Trufflehunter says. When Caspian doesn’t pay attention to this, he sarcastically calls after him to “see if the others will be as understanding.” This prospect inspires Nikabrik to say maybe he’ll go along with Caspian. “I want to see you explain things to minotaurs.” Caspian stops walking and looks behind him, not so much scared as intrigued.

Caspian: Minotaurs? They’re real?
Trufflehunter: And very bad tempered.
Nikabrik: Not to mention big.
Trufflehunter: Huge.
Caspian: What about centaurs? Do they still exist?
Trufflehunter: Well, the centaurs will probably fight on your side but there’s no telling what the others will do.

Caspian hesitates before asking another question, this one as if he’s scared of the answer. “What about Aslan?” Now while he’s never the protagonist and usually doesn’t show up until two thirds of the story are over, Aslan is the only character to appear in all seven Narnia books and is probably the most important one. A common fan criticism of these movie adaptations is that he doesn’t feel as important as he does in the books. I feel like Prince Caspian is the Narnia movie in which that is a problem the least, in part because of things like that pregnant pause before asking about Aslan.

Anyway, by this time, Trufflehunter and Nikabrik have overtaken Caspian. Now it’s their turn to stop walking and turn around, intrigued. “How do you know so much about us?” asks Nikabrik suspiciously. “Stories,” replies Caspian. “Your father told you stories about Narnia?” asks Trufflehunter. I’m really not sure why he would assume it was Caspian’s father who would tell him those Narnia. I guess the screenwriters just wanted to establish that his deceased paternal parent is a sore point for the character. Sure enough, he clams up. “No, my professor,” he says^[1]As I wrote in my last post, in the book, it was also his nurse., “Listen, I am sorry. These are not the kind of questions you should be asking.” Just then Trufflehunter smells something dangerous. It’s a group of Telmarine soldiers with their bows pointed at the group who promptly run for it.^[2]I was going to argue that it doesn’t make sense for Caspian to run here since he was heading back to the Telmarines anyway and, at this point, Miraz is pretending that the Narnians were the … Continue reading

This chase scene isn’t from the book, and I know some book fans would criticize Hollywood for adding action scenes for the sake of more action. I was able to do that, to an extent, with the added action scenes in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. But with this scene in this movie, honestly, I really enjoy that. There’s one cheesy shot that tracks an arrow but other than that, I really enjoy the chase for its own sake and feel no desire to make the movie closer to the book by removing it. Sue me.

At one point, an arrow pierces Trufflehunter and he falls to the ground. Both Nikabrik and Caspian turn to go back for him, and the latter tells the former not to bother. Even though he doesn’t trust Caspian, Nikabrik obeys. (I guess he just realizes that Caspian’s legs are longer?) Trufflehunter hands Caspian the horn. “Take it! Go! It’s more important than I am,” he says. As Caspian hastily bundles up the horn, he sees something strange. Something is sneaking under the forest undergrowth and apparently cutting off the feet of the Telmarine bowmen.^[3]We don’t see any feet being cut off, of course. In fact, if you pause the movie, you can see them intact as some Telmarine fall on their backs. But that seems to be the implication. This scene … Continue reading Caspian manages to hoist Trufflehunter onto his shoulder and run away. Soldiers pursue him but more and more of them fall. It starts to feel less like they’re running after the prince and the badger and more like they’re running away from whatever is attacking them.

By the time, Caspian gets Trufflehunter to Nikabrik and tells him to get him out of there, there are only two soldiers left.

Make that one.

Caspian really should take this moment to run himself but as the remaining soldier hacks desperately at the underbrush with his sword, searching for his invisible opponent, he just stands there and stares, apparently overcome by curiosity. Fans of the book will have already guessed what’s happening here and I don’t mean that as a criticism. In fact, as a fan myself, I enjoyed the realization of what was coming-or rather who was coming. The Telmarine falls and its killer heads straight for Caspian, coming closer and closer until, rather than stabbing him in the foot, it (fortunately) leaps onto his chest knocking him backward. It turns out to be a foot-high mouse wearing a swordbelt and, around its head, a little gold circlet with a dashing red feather. It draws its sword and points it at Caspian’s throat, saying (in Eddie Izzard’s voice), “Choose your last words carefully, Telmarine.”

Caspian just stares at it in bewilderment. “You are a mouse,” he says. The mouse sighs. “I was hoping for something a little more original,” he says. This is Reepicheep, one of the most iconic and quotable characters in the Narnia books. He’s also surprisingly complex^[4]Albeit not so much in Prince Caspian as in the next story, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. and I’m not sure any adaptation has gotten him entirely right. That doesn’t mean every adaptation has gotten him terribly wrong though! There’s a lot to appreciate about this version. Reepicheep’s personality here is almost exactly like it is in the book except for one nagging little detail. He’s too quippy and sarcastic. While C. S. Lewis’s Reepicheep was definitely intended to be funny, he was funny in spite of himself. All of his dialogue was elegant, courtly and fiercely dignified. I can definitely see the character being annoyed by his victims being surprised that a mouse was killing them but not him saying, “I was hoping for something a little more original.” If I were to rewrite the scene, I would have him give Caspian a death glare as he started to say “mouse” and have Caspian amend it to “mighty warrior.” That would still be funny while also being truer the book’s character. I’d also have Reepicheep be voiced by a “serious” actor rather than a comedian to send the message that he wasn’t trying to be funny.^[5]Honestly, even granting that the cinematic Reepicheep is more sarcastic than his literary counterpart, the role still doesn’t play that much to Izzard’s strengths as a performer anyway.

Having said that, Reepicheep is easily the best comedic relief supporting character in any of the Narnia movies.^[6]The only one funnier is Eustace Scrubb in the next movie and he’s more of a protagonist than a supporting character. Actually, Reepicheep himself becomes something of a protagonist in that … Continue reading He’s far funnier than the beavers were in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. And to be fair, when the movie gives Reepicheep a serious line-which it does at least as often as it does a humorous one-Izzard delivers it well.

Reepicheep: Pick up your sword.
Caspian: Uh, no thanks.
Reepicheep: Pick it up! I will not fight an unarmed man.
Caspian: Which is why I might live longer if I choose not to cross blades with you, noble mouse.
Reepicheep: I said I would not fight you. I didn’t say I’d let you live!

Fortunately, Trufflehunter, propped up by Nikabrik, intervenes. (Apparently, his wound just winded him; it wasn’t that serious.) “I trust you have a very good reason for this untimely interruption,” says Reepicheep. “He doesn’t. Go ahead,” says Nikabrik. Ha ha! It’s not just Reepicheep actually. This Narnia movie in general makes me laugh louder and more consistently than the previous one did. I criticized The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe‘s screenplay for being written like a generic quippy action movie. That’s as true or truer of Prince Caspian but I find myself enjoying the generically Hollywood-esque banter in it a lot more. It may not be what I’d prefer for a Narnia adaptation but if they had to write it this way, at least they’re doing it well and much the same could be said for the action scenes. Trufflehunter tells Reepicheep that Caspian is the one that blew the horn and Reepicheep looks at him with more respect. “Then let him come forward,” says a voice. It belongs to Glenstorm (Cornell S. John), a centaur who is accompanied by three others, his sons (Ephraim Goldin, Yemi A. D. and Carlos DaSilva.) “This is the reason we have gathered.” C. S. Lewis depicted centaurs in the Narnia books as intimidatingly wise and solemn beings. (“No one ever laughed at a centaur,” says one character in the book Prince Caspian.) John projects that kind of presence perfectly, even with just his voice. He’s much more memorable than Patrick Kake’s centaur in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.^[7]C. S. Lewis almost certainly didn’t intend the centaurs to be dark skinned but, while 2008 was a politically contentious year for my country (America), people were less sensitive about color … Continue reading

It is weird to me that the Narnians assume Caspian must be good because he blew the horn. Very shortly in the movie, Nikabrik will say this just proves the Telmarines have stolen something else from them and… yeah, that attitude makes more sense. But I’ll get into that in the next scene with Caspian.

Elsewhere, Peter, Susan, Edmund, Lucy and Trumpkin are threading their way through trees and rocks. Susan isn’t sure they’re going the right direction. “That’s the problem with girls,” says Peter, “Can’t carry a map in your heads.” To which Lucy replies, “That’s because our heads have something in them.” That exchange was from the book though there it was between Edmund and Lucy. As I wrote in my last post, I feel like this Narnia movies includes more dialogue from its source material than the last one. Props to them for that, particularly in this case because it’s hilarious. Susan whispers to Lucy that she wishes Peter would listen to “the D. L. F.” “The D. L. F.?” asks Edmund. “Dear Little Friend,” explains Lucy. “Oh, that’s not at all patronizing, is it?” Trumpkin snarks. That nickname was also from the book. There it was actually bestowed on Trumpkin by Edmund as payback for him calling the Pevensies his “dear little friends”^[8]“Little from you is really a bit too much!” Edmund says in the book. I’m surprised that line wasn’t in the movie. before observing their royal skills and pledging his fealty to them. The nickname would have made more sense in the film if that had been included but, as things are, it’s still very funny.

Peter stops and looks around him in confusion. “I’m not lost,” he insists, mainly to himself, it seems. “No, you’re just going the wrong way,” says Trumpkin. OK, I know I just wrote that I was enjoying the movie’s banter on its own terms even if it’s not what I’d prefer for a Narnia movie, but sometimes, even on those terms, it can be a little tiresome. Characters don’t need to respond to everything with a quip; it can get kind of annoying. To be fair though, the book does portray the characters as being wearied of wandering in the woods with minimal food and generally uncomfortable conditions and as being a bit short tempered as a result.^[9]I actually imagine the exchange about maps and brains in the book as being snippier than it is in the film. I don’t think the movie is actually a huge stretch.

Peter: You last saw Caspian at the Shuddering Woods and the quickest way there is to cross at the river Rush.
Trumpkin: But unless I’m mistaken, there’s no crossing in these parts.
Peter: That explains it then. You’re mistaken.

I feel like the movie’s problem of Peter being unpleasant would be halved if William Moseley just delivered that last line as a cocky joke instead of an angry one. I mean, Peter would be an arrogant jerk either way, which he really isn’t in the book, but at least he could be a fun jerk and our satisfaction in seeing his comeuppance would be less grim. Then again, I kind of admire how seriously the movie takes the character’s flaw of arrogance. It’s pretty typical for Hollywood action heroes to be full of themselves. (Think Robin Hood or Han Solo.) I feel like treating the hero’s pride as a serious vice the way this movie does is somewhat unusual.^[10]Though maybe I’m not giving Star Wars or The Adventures of Robin Hood enough credit.

Peter leads his followers to the Rush, but it doesn’t make him look very good since the river is now at the bottom of a deep gorge.

Susan: See, over time water erodes the earth’s soil, carving deeper-
Peter: Oh, shut up.

Did I mention this movie was really funny?

Edmund asks if there’s a way down. “Yeah, falling,” says Trumpkin. Peter still pathetically insists that he wasn’t lost even if he led everyone in a useless direction. In the book at this point, the characters were trying to find the Rush so they could follow it, not cross it and Trumpkin actually cheers a despondent Peter up by saying that even if the river is now at the bottom of a gorge, they can still follow it.^[11]To be fair to the movie, Caspian hasn’t yet reached the location he’s at when the Pevensies and Trumpkin are searching for him in the book. Here he tells the Pevensies that their best bet is to head for the ford near Beruna. He starts to lead them away when Lucy, still looking across the river, says, “Aslan? It’s Aslan! It’s Aslan over there! Don’t you see? He’s right…” But as everyone turns to follow her pointing finger, Lucy’s face, which has lit up, falls. No Aslan can be seen across the gorge.

“Do you see him now?” Trumpkin asks, sounding a bit worried. “I’m not crazy,” insists Lucy. “He was there. He wanted us to follow him.” The others exchange unsure glances. There’s something subtle I love about this scene in the book. Lewis doesn’t write, “Suddenly, Lucy saw Aslan” or anything like that. Instead, he has her interrupt a conversation between the others with the news. The movie happily captures that by not showing us Aslan from her point of view. This puts us in the same position as her companions. I’d say it works even better dramatically in the book where Trumpkin has made a good argument for following the river and Aslan leading the characters a different direction is something of an inconvenience. Here, Trumpkin has made looking for Beruna seem like a necessary evil (“How do you feel about swimming?”), altering the dynamics of the scene. But it still works.

Peter: I’m sure there are any number of lions in this wood. Just like that bear.
Lucy: I think I know Aslan when I see him!
Trumpkin: Look, I’m not about to jump off a cliff after someone who doesn’t exist.
Edmund: The last time I didn’t believe Lucy, I ended up looking pretty stupid.

Props to the movie for keeping the book’s detail of Edmund being the only one to really advocate for trusting Lucy! That was definitely a memorable character moment. Peter pauses as if considering his brother’s point but isn’t quite convinced. “Why wouldn’t I have seen him?” he asks Lucy. Since I criticized Moseley’s performance earlier, I should say that I like the way he infuses that question with wistfulness, implying that Peter is wishing for comfort from Aslan and really wishes he had seen him. “Maybe you weren’t looking,” Lucy replies. That line could have been written for another book C. S. Lewis wrote, Till We Have Faces. Reminding me of Till We Have Faces is almost always a great thing. “I’m sorry, Lu,” says Peter and he leads Susan and Trumpkin away. Lucy stares sadly at the place she saw Aslan. Edmund gives her a sympathetic look, then they both follow the others. This is far from the flashiest scene in either the book or the movie, but it is a highly pivotal one and they do a great non-flashy job with it.

We cut to what I assume is Dancing Lawn at night. I assume that because it’s where this scene’s equivalent in the book takes place though no dancing takes place there in the movie. The Narnians or what the book calls “the people that lived in hiding” have gathered and are debating whether they should follow Caspian as their king or not. It’s not really clear why the question is on the table in the first place. A couple of marketing tie-in books give Trufflehunter a line about it being said that whoever sounded Queen Susan’s horn would bring back the Ancient Kings and Queens and lead the Narnians to freedom. No such prophecy was in the book but if that line of dialogue was originally in the screenplay, it really should have been kept because the way the Narnians talk about Caspian is confusing without it.^[12]If the line wasn’t in the screenplay originally, I have to credit the people who wrote the marketing tie-in books with being better at exposition than the screenwriters!

Nikabrik: All this horn proves is that they’ve stolen yet another thing from us!
Caspian: I didn’t steal anything.
A Minotaur (voiced by Josh Campbell with Shane Rangi in the suit)^[13]Aren’t the minotaurs supposed to be bad guys? We’ll get to that later.: Didn’t steal anything?! Shall we list the things the Telmarines have taken?
Glenstorm’s Wife (Lejla Abbasova): Our home!
A Faun (Curtis Matthew): Our freedom!
Someone I Can’t Identify in the Crowd: Our lives!
Caspian: You Would hold me accountable for all the crimes of my people.
Nikabrik: Accountable and punishable.

As he speaks that last line, Nikabrik moves toward Caspian menacingly, but Reepicheep gets between them and draws his sword. “Ha!” he says. “That is rich coming from you, dwarf! Or have you forgotten that it was your people who fought alongside the White Witch?” When I first saw the movie, I hated that line because it struck me as way too petty for Reepicheep. But multiple viewings have led me to believe that the movie actually intended him to be making a good point. I just wish they could have had him say it in a tone that sounded less like he wanted to pick a fight and without that little “ha” at the beginning. Anyway, the way Nikabrik casually swats aside Reepicheep’s little blade is funny.

He says he’d gladly fight alongside the White Witch again if it would rid Narnia of “barbarians” like Caspian. “Then it is lucky that is not in your power to bring her back,” says Trufflehunter in the voice of a parent ending an argument between their children. “Or are you suggesting that we ask this boy to go against Aslan now?” This possibility draws a negative reaction from the gathered Narnians. “Some of you may have forgotten,” continues Trufflehunter, “but we badgers remember well Narnia was never right except when a Son of Adam was king.” Nikabrik scoffs at this. “He’s a Telmarine,” he says, “Why would we want him as our king?” Caspian assures him that he’ll make it worth their while. “Beyond these woods, I am a prince,” he says. “The Telmarine throne is rightfully mine. Help me claim it and I can bring peace between us.” Glenstorm speaks up. “It is true. The time is ripe. I watch the skies for it is mine to watch as it is yours to remember, Badger. Tarva, the Lord of Victory, and Alambil, the Lady of Peace, have come together in the high heavens and now here a Son of Adam has come forth to offer us back our freedom.” I doubt many viewers unfamiliar with the book will connect those lines with the planets we saw in the movie’s opening seconds but maybe some do. After all, they had to have been wondering why that seemingly random image was the first thing we saw. And in any case, Cornell S. John does a great job of giving the lines a mystical import.

“Is this possible?” pipes up Pattertwig, a talking squirrel (voiced by soundtrack composer Harry Gregson-Williams.) “Do you really think there could be peace? Do you? I mean-I mean really?” Pattertwig is a minor character in both the book and the movie, but Gregson-Williams’s (intentionally) jittery vocal performance is endearing enough, especially considering he’s not a professional actor, that I kind of wish he could be in it more.

“Two days ago,” says Caspian, “I didn’t believe in the existence of talking animals or dwarfs or centaurs. Yet here you are in strength and numbers that we Telmarines could never have imagined. Whether this horn is magic or not, it brought us together and together we have a chance to take back what is ours.” Glenstorm draws his sword in salute. “If you will lead us,” he says, “then my sons and I offer you our swords.” Not only Glenstorm’s family but practically all the other Narnians follow suit with their weapons. “And we offer you our lives unreservedly,” says Reepicheep.

Now this scene has a lot to commend about it. Much of the dialogue takes inspiration from the book, even if it doesn’t always follow the exact wording. But it also really exemplifies what I consider one of this adaptation’s biggest faults, one that arguably weakens the movie as a story in its own right too. In the book, Caspian has grown up longing for the stories about Old Narnia to be true. At one point in his childhood, “he dreamed of Dwarfs and Dryads every night and tried very hard to make the dogs and cats in the castle talk to him. But the dogs only wagged their tails and the cats only purred.” His only interest in becoming king seems to be that it might give him the power the bring Old Narnia back to life. There’s no question in the book of whether he’ll go back to the castle to accuse Miraz of attempted murder or stay with Trufflehunter and company. “I’ve been looking for people like you all my life,” he tells them. You really get the impression from the book that Caspian was born in the wrong world and that by becoming the leader of Narnians he’s finding his true destiny. This is a big part of the story’s poetic appeal. In the movie however, while Caspian briefly seems intrigued to hear that minotaurs and centaurs aren’t extinct and, credit where credit is due, even more intrigued by the possibility of Aslan being out there, he mostly seems like he’s helping the Narnians so that they’ll help put him on the throne. It’s only thanks to moments like him going back to save Trufflehunter and Ben Barnes’s likeable performance that he doesn’t come across as completely mercenary. The line “whether this horn is magic or not, it brought us together” is especially problematic. It makes this version of Caspian less like the literary one who had a deep faith in Aslan than like Nikabrik who just wants to use others belief in Aslan if it furthers his own ends. While the screenwriters clearly want to tell a story proclaiming the importance of faith, I feel that they tipped their hand with that line, making me think they don’t have much, err, faith in faith. Also, keep in mind, Caspian was always a bit of a bland lead in the book.^[14]The book that bears his name anyway. He’s arguably a bit more charismatic in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader and even in The Silver Chair in which he plays a minor but integral role. By taking away his dissatisfaction with the world into which he was born and his longing for something else, this Prince Caspian just made him that much blander! That is the main reason that while I can concede that the movie’s story improves on the book in several ways, I’m never going to agree that it’s an improvement on the whole.

It’s worth noting that the book also didn’t have a big scene where Caspian convinced all the Narnians to accept him as their king. Some of the dwarfs were described as being understandably suspicious at first but they were also described as quickly convinced. I understand why the movie felt like this was past the point of believability. It might be plausible enough that beasts like Trufflehunter would accept Caspian on the grounds that “Narnia was never right except when a son of Adam was King”^[15]Some may find that rule itself to be ridiculously convenient but if you ask me, it corresponds enough to reality in our world to emotionally resonate. Of course, I know there are philosophers who … Continue reading but it’s a bit much to buy that the skeptical Trumpkin becomes as loyal and obedient to Caspian and the Pevensies as swiftly as he does. Even granting that this was a real storytelling problem in the source material though, this scene in the adaptation is very much a band-aid solution, one that arguably draws attention to the problem. All it took was that speech to get everyone on his side? Is that really better than them all agreeing right away?

“Miraz’s army will not be far behind us, Sire,” says Trufflehunter. “If we are to be ready for them,” says Caspian, “we’ll need to hurry to find soldiers and weapons. I’m sure they will be here soon.”

Next Week: Lucy Gets Another Glimpse of Aslan

Finally, we cut to our title character who was introduced in the opening. (That’s not a necessarily a complaint by the way. It’s not like I was desperately wondering about him or anything. Then again, that might have just been because I’d read the book before watching the movie and knew who he was. A newcomer to the story might really have gotten impatient to return to him.) Prince Caspian awakens to find himself lying in bed with his head bandaged. He’s in a room inside a tree. This is a great set, very much what I wish the beavers’ abode in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005) had looked like.

Caspian overhears a conversation in the next room. He stealthily gets out of bed, sticking close to the wall, and peeks through the door. The conversers are Nikabrik, the black dwarf played by Warwick Davis in the first scene, and a talking badger called Trufflehunter (and voiced by Ken Stott.)

Nikabrik: This bread is so stale!
Trufflehunter: I’ll just get him some soup then. He should be coming around soon.
Nikabrik: Well, I don’t think I hit him hard enough.
Trufflehunter: Nikabrik, he’s just a boy!
Nikabrik: He’s a Telmarine, not some lost puppy! You said you were going to get rid of him.
Trufflehunter: No, I said I’d take care of him. We can’t kill him now. We just bandaged his head. It-it would be like murdering a guest.
Nikabrik: Oh, and how do you think his friends are treating their guest?
Trufflehunter: Trumpkin knew what he was doing. It’s not the boy’s fault.

Of the voice actors in this film, Ken Stott gives what is easily my favorite performance, perfectly capturing the warm, wise old character from the book. The way he sadly lowers when his when speaking of his friend, Trumpkin, whom he has every reason to believe has been executed for helping Caspian, is especially great.

Speaking of Caspian, he makes a bolt for the exit, inadvertently spilling Trufflehunter’s tray of nourishment in the process. Nikabrik blocks his way and draws a sword. Caspian counters by grabbing a fireplace poker. The two of them fight despite Trufflehunter’s protests.

Nikabrik: I told you we should have killed him when we had the chance!
Trufflehunter: You know why we can’t!
Caspian: If we’re taking a vote, I’m with him.
Nikabrik: We can’t let him go! He’s seen us!
Trufflehunter: That’s enough, Nikabrik! Or do I have to sit on your head again?

That last line originates in the book though there its equivalent was said by Trumpkin who hadn’t been captured yet in that version. The same is true of the line about killing Caspian after bandaging his head being like murdering a guest. In general, while this Narnia movie is written very much in the vein of a modern action movie, I believe it has more lines that correspond to ones from the book than the last adaptation had, and I appreciate that. Nikabrik’s reaction to the line about sitting on his head is subtle but funny.

Having subdued him, Trufflehunter turns to chiding Caspian about making him spill the soup. Seeing that his life isn’t in immediate danger for the moment, Caspian takes a moment to really take in his hosts. “What are you?” he asks. “You know, it’s funny you would ask that,” says Trufflehunter, “You’d think more people would know a badger when they saw one.” Caspian clarifies that his shock comes from the fact that Narnians are supposed to be extinct. “Sorry to disappoint you,” snipes Nikabrik. Trufflehunter brings out another bowl of soup. “Since when did we open a boarding house for Telmarine soldiers?” Nikabrik grumbles. “I’m not a soldier,” says Caspian. “I am Prince Caspian the Tenth.” At these words, we hear a wistful musical theme on the soundtrack.

Nikabrik: What are you doing here?
Caspian: Running away. My uncle has always wanted my throne. I suppose I have only lived this long because he did not have an heir of his own.
Trufflehunter: That changes things.
Nikabrik: Yeah, it means we don’t have to kill you ourselves.
Caspian: You are right.

This scene contains the first really long lines from Caspian so I should take a moment here to stop and say something about his “Telmarine” accent. Ben Barnes didn’t have as much time as might be wished to practice it and many viewers, including some who are fans of the film on the whole, find it cheesy. Me, I don’t mind it, but enough people do that I feel I should acknowledge their opinion. Anyway, Caspian put on his chainmail and prepares to leave. “Where are you going?” asks Trufflehunter. “My uncle won’t stop until I’m dead,” replies Caspian, apparently having decided to go back and confront Miraz and maybe get some support from some of the Telmarine nobles we saw a few scenes ago. We’ve now come to a change from the book’s story and protagonist that in this fan’s opinion, really hurt the movie. In the original version, Caspian has no wish to leave Trumpkin, Trufflehunter and Nikabrik once he meets them. He’s grown up hearing stories about what the book calls “Old Narnians” and is utterly delighted to have met some of them even though at least one of them wishes to kill him. Basically, Caspian is a big Narnia nerd/fanboy. That is the main thing that makes him interesting or endearing in the book. In this movie, while he’s not opposed to the Old Narnians the way his uncle is, we really don’t get that smitten fanboy vibe at all. Not only does this make him less distinctive of a character but it means lessening, even losing, the book’s theme of longing for something beyond the mundane world. But maybe it’s too early to lament that. I hope to write more about it in next week’s post. “You can’t leave,” Trufflehunter protests. “You’re meant to save us!” He holds up the horn Caspian blew. “Don’t you know what this is?”

Again, the movie cuts to another scene right when a character is going to explain about the horn! This really is frustrating by now but don’t worry. This next scene actually will explain everything or near enough.

Back at the Telmarine castle, Dr. Cornelius returns to his study^[1]Another great set. to find that the door is ajar, which isn’t how he left it. He enters to find Miraz casually reading a book. “You have quite a library, doctor,” he says. “Is there anything particular you seek, my lord?” asks Cornelius. “I think I’ve already found what I’m looking for,” says Miraz, “in one my soldiers!” And he stabs a book with Susan’s arrow. To be more specific, he stabs it into an illustration of King Peter, Queen Susan, King Edmund and Queen Lucy. This is probably the craziest instance of the characters being able to identify the Pevensies’ Christmas gifts centuries later. Peter’s sword I can maybe buy. But are arrows with the feathers dyed red really that rare in this world? To be fair though, the fact that Trumpkin’s mysterious rescuers appeared near the ruins of Cair Paravel makes this a bit more plausible. It would have been less of a logical leap if they had established that the movie’s Telmarines feared ghosts in that area as the ones in the book do.

Anyway, as Cornelius looks at the illustration, we hear the musical theme associated with the Pevensies at their most heroic from the last movie.

Miraz: What do you know of Queen Susan’s horn?
Cornelius (carefully): It was said to be magic.
Miraz: Magic?
Cornelius: The Narnians believed it could summon their kings and queens of old. At least, such was the superstition.
Miraz: And what does Caspian know of this…superstition?
Cornelius: My lord, you forbade me from mentioning the old tales.
Miraz: So I did.

That last part is a reference to something from Caspian’s childhood in the book that tragically isn’t in the movie. Dr. Cornelius turns to see soldiers ready to arrest him and decides to go down defiantly. “I will say this,” he says, looking Miraz in the eye for what feels like the first time in the scene, “If Caspian does know of the deep magic, my lord would have good reason to be nervous.” In the book at this point, by the way, Dr. Cornelius, who is “a very minor magician,” makes himself scarce, “having no wish to be questioned… in Miraz’s torture chamber” and actually manages to escape and find Caspian. I mention that as an observation by the way, not a criticism.^[2]Though, on reflection, I understand why some fans of the character might object to making him less competent. I also don’t mind taking away the character’s magician status. After all, the only magic he did in the book was drugging Caspian’s gentlemen-in-waiting so he could escape and later magically tracking him to Dancing Lawn.

In the hallway, Sopespian sees Dr. Cornelius being led away and takes the opportunity to try to win Glozelle to his side.

Sopespian: First our prince, now his tutor. If the members of Miraz’s own house are not safe, are any of us?
Miraz (offscreen): Lord Sopespian!
Glozelle: Those are dangerous words, Lord Sopespian.
Sopespian: But these are dangerous times, General. One should choose his words as carefully as he chooses his friends.

In the study, Miraz asks Sopespian how long until “the bridge” is finished. (We’ll see what he means before too long.) “Construction continues on schedule,” Sopespian replies. “That’s not good enough,” says Miraz. “I need my army across that river now!” Sopespian suggests Miraz contribute some of his own men. “I have only so many at my disposal,” he says. “A fact you’d be wise to remember,” Miraz snarls. He turns to Glozelle. “Go to Beruna. Take as many troops as you need. We must get to Caspian before they do.” Sopespian asks whom he means by “they.” “It’s time you learned your history,” says Miraz and storms out of the room. Left alone, Sopespian looks at Susan’s arrow sticking out the book about her. That might not seem like it could possibly be important now but trust me.

Meanwhile, the Pevensies and Trumpkin are rowing inland into Narnia in the boat they got from Trumpkin’s would-be executioners. The scenery is beautiful, but the returning monarchs don’t seem to be enjoying it much.

Lucy: They’re so still.
Trumpkin: They’re trees. What’d you expect?
Lucy: They used to dance.
Trumpkin: It wasn’t long after you left that the Telmarines invaded. Those who survived retreated to the woods. The trees…they retreated so deep into themselves that they haven’t been heard from since.^[3]This makes the trees’ comatose state sound more self-imposed than in the book which describes the Telmarines as silencing them.
Lucy: I don’t understand. How could Aslan have let this happen?
Trumpkin: Aslan? I thought he abandoned us when you lot did.

There’s a lot to unpack here. A minor thing this adaptation specifies that the book doesn’t is that Caspian’s ancestors conquered Narnia fairly soon after Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy returned to their own world.^[4]According to a timeline C. S. Lewis wrote, which was published after his death, it was actually nine-hundred and eighty-three years later. But there are some things in the timeline that don’t … Continue reading This gives the Pevensies more reason to feel guilty for not being there to defend their kingdom.^[5]You could argue they’re responsible however much time passed between their absence and the Telmarines’ invasion since if they had left heirs behind, Narnia might very well have been in a … Continue reading I’ve described this movie previously as packing a bit more of an emotional punch than the book does-or trying to do so anyway. This is one of the reasons why. Another reason is that in the book, this exposition comes from Dr. Cornelius telling it to the young Caspian who has only heard of dryads and naiads in bedtime stories. We never see the Pevensies’ initial reaction to learning how much Narnia has lost. It probably isn’t quite as sad as the movie wants it to be, mainly because we haven’t seen enough of the trees being alive in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe for the contrast to really stand out here.

But that’s a complaint that could be made against the books too^[6]C. S. Lewis, or, more specifically, his characters told us that the trees were listening in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe far more often than he ever showed us evidence of it. and it’s still pretty sad. Georgie Henley’s line readings and Peter Dinklage’s pained facial expressions are very effective.

A side effect of having Trumpkin be the one to give this exposition though is that he has to believe in dryads, the ancient kings and queens of Narnia’s golden age, and Aslan. In the book, he believes in things like dwarfs, fauns, centaurs and talking beasts because, well, he’s one of them and he’s seen them all his life. But he is inclined to agree with the Telmarines’-or the Telmarines’ official story that other parts of Narnia’s past never existed. Note that he says Aslan and the Pevensies abandoned his people, implying that they exist. Whether intentionally or not, this conveniently allows the movie to resonate with theists, specifically Christians, who struggle with the feeling that God has abandoned them without necessarily alienating atheists.^[7]For what it’s worth, the honestly skeptical Trumpkin was more positively portrayed by the book than Nikabrik who says he’ll “believe in anyone or anything that’ll batter these … Continue reading I feel like this makes the world of the story less rich as there are fewer worldviews represented in it. In the book, we get Miraz who denies the entire existence of “Old Narnia,” Trufflehunter, Caspian and Cornelius who believe in all of it and Trumpkin who believes in the parts he can confirm to be true but only them. In the movie, we get a background character who refers to Narnians as fairy tales but otherwise, everyone, good or bad, agrees about the truth of the old stories. They just disagree about whether or not the legendary figures in them can be trusted. To be fair, that’s still an interesting question to explore.

Peter is stung by Trumpkin’s last comment. “We didn’t mean to leave, you know,” he says. “Makes no difference now,” says Trumpkin. “Get us to the Narnians and it will,” Peter insists, quickening his oar strokes. This implied guilt goes some way to keeping the movie’s reimagining of Peter from being totally unsympathetic, but it doesn’t go as far might be wished. Later, the crew pulls up onto the shore. While the others secure the boat, Lucy wanders a little way away from them and sees a bear. “Hello there,” she calls, assuming it can talk. The bear rises on its hind legs, threateningly. “It’s alright,” says Lucy, “we’re friends. Her older siblings see this and aren’t particularly concerned but Trumpkin stiffens in horror. “Don’t move, Your Majesty,” he calls. Lucy automatically turns toward him and the bear charges at her, growling. Susan draws her bow. “Stay away from her!” she cries. But the beast pays her no heed. Before it can hurt Lucy, an arrow brings the bear down but it’s Trumpkin’s arrow, not Susan’s. “Why wouldn’t he stop?” she asks. “I expect he was hungry,” Trumpkin replies.

Lucy thanks Trumpkin for saving her. It’s a brief moment but it serves to show them bonding. She and her brothers and sisters stare at the bear’s body. “He was wild,” says Edmund. “I don’t think he could talk at all,” says Peter. “Get treated like a dumb animal long enough, that’s what you become,” says Trumpkin, taking out a knife and starting to skin the bear. “You may find Narnia a more savage place than you remember.”

What I find interesting about this scene is that fans of the Narnia books who dislike the movie adaptations typically criticize them for adding random action scenes.^[8]If you’re someone who likes the books and not the movies and you feel like I’m stereotyping, I beg your pardon. But this bear attack pretty much was a random action scene in the literary Prince Caspian where its main function was to give the heroes something to eat besides apples. This adaptation gives it much more of a point.^[9]While still having it serve to provide the characters with bear meat. The book had already established that talking beasts had become the exception rather than the rule in Narnia by this point. The movie hasn’t and this bear’s animal behavior is meant to be a shock both to the Pevensies and to the viewers. Again, I don’t think it totally works. If it did, we would empathize more with Lucy’s reaction to the bear, but I feel like she and her siblings just come across as silly. Maybe the problem is that while we’ve seen plenty of talking animals in Narnia before this point, with the major exception of Aslan, they’ve been relatively small.^[10]I believe there was a presumably talking bear in Aslan’s army in the last movie, but he was just in the background. This scene kind of gives the impression there were no dumb beasts in Narnia at all when the Pevensies reigned, which raises some questions, the main one being what did they do for meat then? The Narnia books are a lot more specific about how all this works. The question can be resolved though by the idea that all the bears in Narnia originally talked but other species had both talking and nontalking examples.

Anyway, while I don’t think the scene is as emotionally devastating as the movie intended it to be, the idea behind it was solid and it’s still somewhat emotionally devastating. I especially like the way Lucy weeps into Peter’s shoulder at the end of the scene. Hmm, I hope that last sentence didn’t sound too sadistic.

I Think I’ll Take a Break From Blogging Next Week. But the Following Week, We’ll Meet One of the Most Memorable Narnian Supporting Characters

In a great transition, we cut from the bright and colorful ruins of Cair Paravel to the grim looking Telmarine castle. OK, I admit it’s not very original to give the good guys bright colors and the bad guy’s darker ones, but it works here. And while the contrast isn’t subtle, the muted colors the Telmarines aren’t as much of a villain cliche as them wearing black would be. All of the scenes at the Telmarine court have a very chilly, gray, gritty atmosphere that contrasts wonderfully with the lush, storybook aesthetic of the Narnians.

If I have a problem with the Telmarine aesthetic in this adaptation, it’s that it’s a bit too visually interesting. How can that be?

In keeping with what Aslan tells us about the Telmarines’ history at the end of this story, the filmmakers gave their culture a broadly Mediterranean feel and cast mainly Spanish and Italian actors in their roles.^[1]Many of whom are famous in their own countries but not in the UK or the US. For what it’s worth, I think this makes a pleasing change of pace from the first movie which had a mostly English cast with a few Americans thrown in the mix. The cinematic Telmarines’ armor also suggests that of the conquistadors, probably as a nod to their history of invasion and conquest. I’m a bit bemused by the decision though. Later books in The Chronicles of Narnia have been criticized for making the villainous country of Calormen generically Middle Eastern/Oriental in its culture. The literary Telmarines, by contrast, were clearly intended by C. S. Lewis to be generically European. You’d think the filmmakers would be relieved by the opportunity to have an evil culture that’s so nonspecific but instead they decided to give them a specific nationality and cast somewhat swarthy looking actors as the villains to boot.^[2]Perhaps they were actually thinking ahead to The Last Battle which pits King Tirian, a descendant of Caspian’s, against the Calormenes, the idea being that viewers would be less offended by … Continue reading

I’m not personally offended, I guess^[3]Though I can understand why some Hispanics and Italians would be since Caspian, the one unambiguously sympathetic Telmarine, is the only one played by an English actor., but I wonder if giving these villains a distinctive aesthetic goes against Lewis’s intentions with Prince Caspian. Whereas he meant the Calormenes to be exotic adversaries, he clearly meant the Telmarines to be generically European to the point of dullness in contrast to the varied and fantastic native citizens of Narnia. Often in stories, the bad guys are much more charismatic than the flat heroes. What C. S. Lewis does in Prince Caspian is something of an interesting inversion of that. To be fair though, as I’ve mentioned in a previous post, it’s hard to make something visually boring in a movie without it coming across as laziness rather than a deliberate artistic choice. And you still get a good contrast between the Telmarines and the Narnians with the Telmarines’ costumes (courtesy of Isis Mussenden), buildings and props (courtesy of Roger Ford) looking less like something from a fantasy story and more like something from a historical drama albeit with a few fanciful touches.^[4]It’s a bit odd that they have images of eagles considering that the Telmarines are supposed to be enemies of beasts but, hey, eagles are birds of prey after all. This works very well on its own terms.

Anyway, Lord Miraz and Lady Prunaprismia are playing with their newborn son when they see General Glozelle and his soldiers ride into the courtyard with a captive in tow. Miraz leaves his family to go see them. There was originally a brief dialogue scene here where Prunaprismia asked her husband where Caspian was, and he told her they would see him soon. In my opinion, this really shouldn’t have been cut since Prunaprismia is going to get a highly dramatic scene in the middle of the movie after she’s been simply a silent background character, much like she is in the book, prior to that moment and afterwards she goes back to being one until the very last scene. It’s very jarring and awkward and keeping that minute-long dialogue scene could have fixed it.

Miraz strides into the stables where the soldiers are dismounting and heads straight for the horse with the prisoner on it, covered by a cloth. “Wait, my lord,” says Glozelle, “It is not what you think.” “Then what is it?” asks Miraz. “We’re not exactly sure,” Glozelle replies, looking nervous. The cloth is pulled back and Miraz gasps at what he sees. “Impossible,” he murmurs. (Could this be a callback to Susan’s reaction to see Narnia for the first time and the White Witch’s reaction to Aslan’s resurrection in the last movie?) Then wheels start to turn in his head.

Meanwhile, a council is being held in the Telmarine council chamber. Many chairs in it are empty including the fancy one for the king. “I warned this council when it put its trust in Lord Miraz, there would be consequences,” declaims a lord named Sopespian (Damian Alcazar.) In the book, Lord Sopespian, like Glozelle, is initially a supporter of Miraz and only turns against him at the climax. Here he’s antagonistic towards him from the start. I think that change works well. As I’ve mentioned before, Glozelle and Sopespian are a bit of a random deus ex machina in the text. Another lord objects that they can’t accuse the lord protector of Narnia without proof. “How long are we going to hide behind that excuse?” grouses Lord Scythley (Simon Andreu), another council member. “Until every chair in this chamber is empty?” This is a reference to how Miraz has been discreetly killing off nobles who might support his nephew’s claim to the throne as Dr. Cornelius explains to Caspian in Chapter 5 of the book. The meaning isn’t immediately clear to someone who hasn’t read the source material but, to be fair, it’s not too hard to infer the meaning. Sadly, that’s not true of some other parts of this movie’s plot which are only understandable for book fans.

Miraz enters the room and takes his seat.

Miraz: Lords of the council, I apologize for being late. I wasn’t aware we were in session.
Sopespian: No doubt you were otherwise occupied.
Miraz: My lord?
Scythley: Ever since the death of Caspian the Ninth, you’ve behaved as if you were king and now it seems that behind these walls even Prince Caspian has gone missing!
Sopespian: My deepest condolences, Lord Miraz. Imagine losing your nephew, the heir to the throne, on the very night your wife has blessed you with a son.
Miraz: Thank you, Lord Sopespian. Your compassion is a boon in these troubled times.

What those words can’t convey on the screen is the hilariously sarcastic delivery of Damian Alcazar and Sergio Castellitto. The latter’s line readings are especially impressive considering his English language skills weren’t the best when this movie was being filmed and he sometimes needed a translator on set. Alcazar gives his character a smug smile and twinkling eyes that actually let you empathize with Miraz’s annoyance at him. Simultaneously, since we know Miraz is a bad guy, we kind of root for Sopespian. The animosity between these two evil characters is highly entertaining, definitely one of the most fun parts of any Narnia movie that’s not from the books.^[5]Well, it’s kind of in the books but as I said, it’s not developed much and the dynamic between them is a bit different.

“I trust you can tell us how such a tragedy could have occurred,” Sopespian says. Right on cue, Glozelle demurely enters. “That is the most disturbing news of all,” says Miraz, “Our beloved Caspian was abducted. By Narnians!” The council scoffs at this. “You go too far, Miraz!” says Scythley. “You expect us to stand by while you blame such a blatant crime on fairy tales!” Miraz signals to Glozelle who opens the door, and two guards bring in the red dwarf from the forest, bound and gagged. The Telmarines gape at him. “You forget, my lords,” says Miraz, “Narnia was once a savage land. Fierce creatures roamed free. Much of our forefathers’ blood was shed to exterminate these vermin. Or so we thought.” Ironically, in his first scene in the book, Miraz is the one who insists that the Narnians are fairy tales to Caspian and forbids him to ever mention them again. Of course, that was in Caspian’s childhood, which this movie tragically cuts. (I’ll start to really explain why it’s tragic in my next post.) Of course, in the main part of the story, Miraz has to affirm the existence of the native Narnians since he’s waging war against them. Still, it’s sad that the part about him insisting they never existed had to be dropped from this adaptation. It’s a memorable detail. Anyway, back to his speech. “But while we’ve been bickering amongst ourselves, they’ve been breeding like cockroaches under a rock, growing stronger, watching us, waiting to strike!” On the last word, Miraz smacks the dwarf’s face, actually knocking his gag off. (Is that possible?) “And you wonder why we don’t like you,” the dwarf snarks.

Miraz ignores this. “Well, I intend to strike back,” he says, “Even if I have to cut down the entire forest, I assure you, I will find Prince Caspian and finish what our ancestors began.” Here’s another place where I think you could reasonably argue that the movie improves on the book. The literary Miraz has few actual scenes and is easily the most boring villain in any Narnia book. To be fair, I believe C. S. Lewis intended him to be somewhat boring by the design; his mundane, realistic villain makes him something of a foil to the White Witch from the previous story. But that design doesn’t always make for the most fun reading. By dramatizing the way Miraz maneuvers himself from the position of Lord Protector to King of Narnia, something that is only summarized by Cornelius as having happened a long time ago in the book, this movie makes him much more threatening, especially coupled with Sergio Castellitto’s charismatic performance. We’ll see more scenes of how he uses the threat of the Narnians for his own political purposes later. This villain proves to hold up surprisingly well against Tilda Swinton’s White Witch from the previous movie.

Back at the island-oh, I should mention something. In both the books and the movies, Cair Paravel was originally on a peninsula, but it became an island by the time of Prince Caspian. Back at the island, Edmund finds evidence that Cair Paravel didn’t just fall into ruins after being abandoned but was attacked by catapults. Then he and Peter push aside a stone wall to reveal a secret door.

Peter pulls apart the rotting wood then he tears a strip of cloth from his shirt and wraps it around a stick to make a torch.

“Don’t suppose you have any matches, do you?” he asks Edmund. “No, but would this help?” his brother replies, taking out an electric torch from his satchel. This moment is both really funny and allows the filmmakers to avoid confusing American audiences who would call the device a flashlight.^[6]Edmund will refer to it as a torch though in the last scene. Not that I’m complaining. It’ll be a really fun bit from the book. “You might have mentioned that a bit sooner,” says Peter, laughing. It’s nice that this scene shows him accepting this little moment of humiliation in good humor instead of having him be all angry and arrogant as the movie will later portray him.

The Pevensies troop through the door and down a flight of stairs to an ancient treasure chamber. “I can’t believe it,” says Peter, “it’s all still here!” There are four treasure chests, each with a statue of one of the four siblings at the height of their Narnian reign. Edmund, Lucy and Susan rush over to their respective chest and open it.

“I was so tall!” says Lucy as she pulls out an old dress. “Well, you were older then,” says Susan. “As opposed to hundreds of years later when you’re younger,” says Edmund. I’d complain about him explaining the joke, but I love the humorous visual of him wearing a Narnian helmet with his school uniform. Actually, in a clever touch, the Pevensies have already abandoned parts of their uniforms and the girls’ hair has come unbraided, so they appear to be in halfway stage between their English selves and their Narnian selves in this scene.

Although he was the one who seemed to want to return to Narnia the most, Peter is taking his time looking over his former treasure. First, he blows the dust off a golden disc^[7]A shield maybe? with an image of Aslan’s face on it. Then he slowly and reverently approaches his chest with the statue of himself standing guard over it. His attention is momentarily distracted by Susan who has found her bow and arrows from Father Christmas in her treasure chest but not her enchanted horn. “I must have left it on my saddle the day we went back,” she says. Finally, Peter opens his chest and pulls out his sword. He reads part of the inscription aloud. “When Aslan bares his teeth, winter meets its death.” As you may remember, that was the prophecy that was never spoken in the previous movie. Better late than never, I suppose. Lucy wistfully recites another part of it. “When he shakes his mane, we shall have spring again.” There’s a moment of silence. In the book, after Peter unsheathes his sword, “the others all felt that he was really Peter the High King again.” Their silence indicates something a bit different in this version. “Everyone we knew,” says Lucy, “Mr. Tumnus and the Beavers…they’re all gone.” The children in Prince Caspian the book never seem disturbed by the revelation that coming back to Narnia centuries after their last visit means all their friends have long died. It arguably makes the story sadder and, to use a tired word, darker than it originally was. I wouldn’t say it’s untrue to the spirit of the Narnia books in general though.^[8]One of them, The Silver Chair, has a character from this world return to Narnia and be shattered to find that a friend he knew as a strapping youth is now an old man at the point of death. “I think it’s time we found out what’s going on,” says Peter.

Outside, two Telmarine soldiers (stuntmen Mana Davis and Winham Hammond) are rowing in a boat up the coast by way of a river. With them is the bound and gagged dwarf. The dwarf’s name is Trumpkin by the way. That won’t be said in the dialogue until the next scene and in these recaps, I try to avoid saying names until their mentioned in the dialogue to replicate the experience of watching the movie but describing this whole scene without calling Trumpkin by name would just be a pain. One of the soldiers is unnerved by the dirty look the dwarf is giving him and both soldiers seem to be on edge. “Here’s far enough,” the one complaining about Trumpkin’s stare says. They pick him up and are about to throw him into the water. You may wonder why Miraz has had them take a prisoner all the way out here to drown him instead of doing the practical thing and killing him right away in some simpler manner. That was actually explained in the book. There the Telmarines believed that the woods around Cair Paravel’s ruins, as well as woods in general, were haunted by ghosts and ceremonially left certain prisoners there. This seems to be the implication in the movie too, given the soldiers’ jitteriness, but it’s not explained at all. Truth be told, this plot device was already a bit contrived in the book. C. S. Lewis’s reason for including it seems to have been that Trumpkin simply going to the island in search of the ancient kings and queen and then finding them would be boring, so he had to have him captured and taken there against his will.^[9]Incidentally, Trumpkin also wasn’t captured by Miraz in the book but by a random seneschal. But it feels really contrived in this movie which never explains this weirdly specific form of execution. Sadly, that’s not the only plot point in the adaptation that viewers won’t understand if they haven’t read the book. Anyway, back to the scene. The soldiers barely lift Trumpkin before an arrow strikes their boat. They look up to see it came from Susan’s bow. She stands on the beach with her brothers and sister, all of them dressed in Narnian clothes. It’s a bit of a stretch that they would each find outfits their size just lying around the ancient ruins. (In the book, they spend most of the story in their school clothes.) But who cares? It’s a really cool moment to see them in Narnian garb for the first time in the movie. It really feels like the kings and queens of old have returned to rescue a Narnian from Telmarine oppression.

“Drop him,” orders Susan. The soldiers oblige my dropping Trumpkin into the water. Peter and Edmund dive in after him. Susan fires another arrow. One of them hits a soldier in the side. He and his companion jump out of the boat and swim away with all possible speed. (Again, this would make more sense if we knew they were afraid of ghosts.) Edmund drags their boat to the shore. Peter retrieves Trumpkin and Lucy cuts the sputtering dwarf’s bonds with her dagger.^[10]The dagger wasn’t mentioned in the book by the way. I believe C. S. Lewis included it in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe since Peter and Susan each got a weapon from Father Christmas. But … Continue reading

Trumpkin: “Drop him?!” That’s the best you can come up with?
Susan: A simple “thank you” would suffice.
Trumpkin: They were doing fine drowning me without your help!
Peter: Maybe we should have let them.

OK, I hate to say it but I’m really not a fan of the way this movie’s script writes Trumpkin. In the book at this point, he needs to be reassured several times that his rescuers aren’t ghosts, which is quite amusing, and is also very grateful to them. The movie makes him a grouch, mostly because…well, as we’ll see, Trumpkin is the Narnian who is most skeptical about Aslan and the Pevensies and naysaying sidekicks in fiction are expected to be bitterly sarcastic. The literary version of Trumpkin was quite sarcastic but in a cheerfully cynical way.^[11]Imagine Han Solo in the first Star Wars movie if he didn’t start out as a mercenary but were a loyal ally from the start. Staying true to that would have made for a more original character and honestly would have fit in perfectly with this adaptation’s quippy action movie milieu.^[12]For what it’s worth, director Andrew Adamson wrote the part specifically for Peter Dinklage, but I don’t think it would have been that hard for the actor to bring the book’s … Continue reading

Lucy: Why were they trying to kill you anyway?
Trumpkin: They’re Telmarines. That’s what they do.
Edmund: Telmarines? In Narnia?
Trumpkin: Where have you been for the last few hundred years?
Lucy: That’s a bit of a long story.

Susan hands Peter back his sword which he naturally dropped when diving into the water. Trumpkin notices it and his mouth falls open. “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me,” he says. “You’re it?! You’re the kings and queens of old?!” It’s an odd aspect of this movie that people can immediately recognize the Pevensie’s Christmas gifts at a glance. I guess their oral legends included very specific physical descriptions of them and it never occurs to anyone that it could just be a sword or a horn that with a similar design. Anyway, Peter holds out his hand to shake. “High King Peter the Magnificent,” he says. Trumpkin just stares at the hand. “You probably could have left off the last bit,” opines Susan. Trumpkin laughs, looking and sounding more like his literary counterpart, and agrees. “Probably.” Peter draws his sword. “You might be surprised,” he says. “Oh, you don’t want to do that, boy,” says Trumpkin. While the movie has just made Peter insufferably full of himself and will do so later, it happily gives him a moment of humility now. “Not me,” he says and indicates Edmund instead. (It’s depressing that I have to point it out whenever Peter does something likeable in this adaptation.)^[13]In the book, Peter offers to be the one to fight Trumpkin to prove his and siblings’ worth but Edmund objects that “It will be more of a sucks for him if I win, and less of a let-down for … Continue reading

Edmund draws his blade and Peter lends Trumpkin his. For a moment, it looks like the sword will be too big for the dwarf and that this duel will be a bit of a mismatch. But then he almost chops Edmund’s head off and hits him in the eye.^[14]I feel like it’s out of character for him to get so violent in a friendly match but oh well. Lucy actually calls out Edmund’s name in fear at that point though she quickly relaxes. In the book, it was Susan who was uncomfortable with the fight. (She “never could learn to like this sort of thing.”) But this adaptation, as we’ll see, makes her much less squeamish about violence. Anyway, before too long, Edmund disarms Trumpkin who falls to his knees and gapes at him, saying, “Beards and bedsteads!” In the book, that’s something of a mad libs catchphrase for the character. Variants include “horns and halibuts,” “whistles and whirligigs” and “giants and junipers.” Sadly, this is the only example of such an exclamation we get in the movie.

“Maybe that horn worked after all,” Trumpkin says. “What horn?” asks Susan. Before he answers, we cut to another scene. You’ll remember that the movie had Dr. Cornelius give Caspian a horn and tell him only to blow it at his greatest need but didn’t have him explain why. That was because the screenwriters wished to eliminate the original book’s nonlinear storytelling but wanted Susan’s horn being the thing that summoned her and her siblings back to Narnia to be a big revelation just as it is in the book. While Cornelius withholding the vital information didn’t make much sense in-universe, I appreciate the movie trying to be keep the book’s sense of mystery. But it does start-only start-to get annoying for it to hold back on explaining everything here.

Next Week: Hey, We Still Haven’t Seen Caspian Since the First Scene, Have We?

In a nice transition, we cut from the sound of Caspian blowing the horn to the sound of an automobile horn in our world as our old friend, Lucy Pevensie (Georgie Henley), runs across a London street, wearing a school uniform and carrying suitcases. The car’s (uncredited) driver yells at her to watch where she’s going, and she apologizes as she hurries off. For the first time in this movie, we hear a musical theme from the last film’s the soundtrack. The movie reuses a lot of musical themes from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe actually, sometimes without even remixing them. The first time I watched it, I found this something of an annoying distraction, but repeated viewings have given me an appreciation for it. The movie never musically hearkens back to the last movie without there being a good thematic reason for doing so. Even on my first viewing, I liked that we first hear an old theme in the scene where, after a scene entirely about new characters, we’re reintroduced to ones we already know.

We find Anna Popplewell’s Susan before her sister does. She’s wearing a uniform for the same school and browsing a magazine rack. (The movie doesn’t make a big deal of it but there’s a newspaper being sold there announcing the raid is over.) A rather geeky looking boy (Ash Jones) tries to strike up a conversation with her.

Geeky Boy: You go to St. Finbarr’s?
Susan: That’s right.
Geeky Boy: I go to Hendon House. Across the road. I’ve seen you. Sitting by yourself.
Susan: Yes, well…I prefer to be left alone.
Pause
Geeky Boy: Me too! What’s your name?
Susan: Phyllis.

This dialogue is pretty hilarious though I feel like Susan is being kind of mean. (Her counterpart in the books always tried to avoid hurting people physically or emotionally.) Of course, other viewers might feel that this guy is being a clueless stalker and Susan (and the movie) should be harder on him. But there’s something I really appreciate about this little bit of comic filler. The Narnia books describe Susan, both in Narnia and her own world, as the most physically attractive of the Pevensies. And the idea persists among both lovers and haters of the series that she’s really into boys. But I’d argue that they’re the ones who are into her. She’s not particularly into them.^[1]A major part of one book’s plot is actually Susan rejecting a suitor and him not responding well. The common perception of Susan being boy crazy comes from the final Narnia book, The Last … Continue reading So it gratifies me greatly that this movie is portraying a guy as being attracted to Susan and her being uninterested. Now if only the film could keep that up for its entire runtime!

Anyway, Susan’s alias (Phyllis) is blown when Lucy runs up and tells her she’d better come quickly. The girls run into an underground railway station. (In the book, this station was above ground and rural by the way.) They find a crowd of other school children gathered to watch a fight between three boys. Two of them are handing the third his posterior. That third is Peter (William Moseley.) He and Susan lock eyes and she looks at him with reproach and disgust.

Just as Peter is getting his face pressed against the wall, another boy comes to his aid. It’s Edmund (Skandar Keynes.) He does his best, but Peter still takes quite a beating. Fortunately, two soldiers (John Bach and Jack Walley) come along and break up the fight. “Act your age,” one of them tells Peter. We then cut to the four Pevensies glumly seated on a bench with their luggage.

Edmund: You’re welcome.
Peter: I had it sorted.
Susan: What was it this time?
Peter: He bumped me.
Lucy: So you hit him?
Peter: No, after he bumped me, they tried to make me apologize. That’s when I hit him.

Um…yikes! In the literary Prince Caspian, Peter is a completely noble hero albeit one that makes a major mistake. He’s also a very humble hero and arguably as great a diplomat as he is a warrior. And here the adaptation has him brawling in public like a common hooligan. And it’s implied that this is something he’s been doing regularly for a while. Even if the movie really wanted to include this fight for the sake of more action, it would have been so easy to give Peter a more sympathetic reason for getting into it. He could have been defending a smaller boy against bullies.^[2]That would have actually tied into his larger character arc in the movie anyway. We could have at least seen the two boys being really rude to Peter when they bumped into him, so that we’d be more likely to sympathize with him lashing out at them. Either of those ways to make Peter more sympathetic are so obvious that I’m not sure if I’m angry with the movie for not using them or impressed by it avoiding the obvious route.

Perhaps most troublingly for fans of the book, we’ll learn in a matter of seconds that his issues stem from a sense of wounded pride and entitlement. For many fans, this one change to this one character is enough to ruin the adaptation for them. I can understand that if King Peter was a huge role model for you growing up. But while I consider Peter in the book to be admirable and well written, he’s not a particular favorite of mine and while there’s a lot I dislike about the execution of this character arc for him, as well as with William Moseley’s performance, which feels like he’s playing a different character from the likeable one in the last film, there’s also a lot that appeals to me about it conceptually. In The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Peter’s journey was all about him learning to have more confidence. I like that this sequel gives him the opposite arc rather than rehashing what we’ve already seen. Also, I don’t really get why so many kids’ movies, like The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, feel that the main thing they need to teach their young viewers is to be more confident. Doubtless, there are some children who need to learn that but aren’t there also many-possibly even more-who suffer from overconfidence? Having the protagonist in a mainstream kids’ movie^[3]I know I described this as being the Narnia movie most geared toward teenagers, but I also mentioned that I was speaking relatively. learn to be humble is an interesting and refreshing move if you ask me and one more in line with the broad themes of the Narnia books.^[4]To be fair, while I’m not much interested in superheroes and haven’t kept up with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I’m informed that many of its heroes start out as prideful and end … Continue reading

Back to the conversation.

Susan: Really! Is it that hard to just walk away?
Peter: I shouldn’t have to! I mean, don’t you ever get tired of being treated like a kid?
Edmund: Um, we are kids.
Peter: Well, I wasn’t always!^[5]Some fans have argued that English children in this time period were expected to mature as soon as possible what with World War II going on, making this angst on Peter’s part anachronistic. The … Continue reading It’s been a year. How long does he (Aslan) expect us to wait?
Susan: I think it’s time to accept that we live here. There’s no use pretending any different.

That last line is interesting in that it foreshadows events in the final Narnia story, The Last Battle. (If you haven’t read that one and don’t want anything spoiled for you, skip the rest of this paragraph.) There we’re informed that the older Susan has reached a point where if her siblings bring up Narnia, she says, “What wonderful memories you have! Fancy your still thinking about all those funny games we used to play when we were children.” Many readers find this development for the character random and it’s not a bad idea for an adaptation to foreshadow it though I feel like this one may be trying too hard to make Susan sympathetic. Still, that’s better than just dropping the plot point entirely. That would be both the easiest and the most cowardly route to take if you ask me.

Susan notices her unwanted admirer from the magazine rack heading her way. (Don’t worry. He’s not stalking her. He’s just going to take the same train.) Quickly, she instructs her brothers to pretend they’re talking to her. “We are talking to you,” Edmund points out. Suddenly, Lucy yells, “ow!” and jumps to her feet. Even though I’d read the book, I assumed at first, she was trying to create a distraction to help Susan. But no. “Something pinched me,” says Lucy. “Hey! Stop pulling,” says Peter, rising to his feet. “I’m not touching you,” Edmund replies. As a train rattles past them, he and Susan feel the pull too and get to their feet. As a book fan, I’m tickled to report that the order in which the characters feel the mysterious sensation is the same as in the text.

Susan: What is that?!
Lucy: It feels like magic.
Susan: Quick, everyone holds hands.
Edmund: I’m not holding your hand!

Nevertheless, the Pevensies’ do grab each other’s hands.^[6]Ironically, in the book, Edmund got the line about the experience having the feel of magic and the suggestion that everyone hold hands. The walls of the railway station appear to be sucked away bit by bit while everyone besides our heroes is oblivious to it. Suddenly, they’re standing in an empty cave. The train disappears down the railway tunnel which transforms into the cave’s mouth, leading out onto a beautiful beach. This is a great magical transition though regrettably it conveys more of the impression that the world around the characters is being pulled away when it should be they who are being pulled out of the world.

Lucy gives Susan a you-were-saying look. To her credit, Susan grins back and all four Pevensies run into the water, shedding their shoes and less comfortable school clothes, splashing each other and having a good time. In the book, they arrive in an uncomfortable thicket rather than a cave and are initially more shocked than delighted. They only happily rush into the water after they’ve picked their way out. I feel like that’s a little more believable, but I don’t mind the way the movie does the scene. I’ve described it earlier as being darker than the book or trying to be so anyway. This moment of joy is welcome, especially since it’s aided by a lovely location. We hear another old theme on the soundtrack, the one that played when all four Pevensies were in Narnia together for the first time in the last movie.

As the music fades, so does Edmund’s smile. That’s not to say he frowns; he just looks thoughtful. “Where do you suppose we are?” he asks. “Well, where do you think?” says Peter. “Well, I don’t remember any ruins in Narnia,” Edmund says. All four children grow silent as they stare up at the ancient remains of a castle on the cliffs above them. Then we see them exploring the site. Lucy eats an apple from an overgrown orchard. In the book, it takes the characters a long time to find this ruin and it’s stressed how grateful they are to find a source of food in the orchard as well as how sick they get before long of having nothing to eat but apples. I think I’m glad the movie trimmed all of that and also glad it still included the apples so that viewers would still get an idea of how the Pevensies avoid starvation.

“I wonder who lived here,” Lucy says. Susan’s foot bumps against a tiny golden figurine of a centaur studded with ruby fragments. “I think we did,” she says, picking it up. “Hey, that’s mine,” says Edmund, “from my chess set.” Peter asks him which chess set. “I didn’t exactly have a solid gold chess in Finchley, did I?” says Edmund. As we’ll see, this adaptation generally tries to be more emotionally intense than its source material, so it’s interesting that this moment was actually more emotional in the book. There the chess piece belonged to Susan herself and the memories it raised nearly reduced her to tears. If the movie weren’t going to try to be more tearjerking than the book later, I would object to toning down the emotions in this scene. But since the movie does try that, I think it makes for better pacing not to get too sad too soon.

Lucy realizes something. “It can’t be,” she whispers. Then she grabs Peter by the hand and drags him to an open area that was once an interior. Susan and Edmund follow. “Don’t you see?” says Lucy. “Imagine walls and columns there and a glass roof.” The Pevensies realize that they’re standing exactly where their thrones once were. “Cair Paravel,” murmurs Peter. In the book, he was the one who figured out that the ruins were their old castle centuries after they’d left.^[7]And incidentally he did so after evening had fallen. Giving that role to Lucy is typical of how the movie makes its version of Peter less heroic than C. S. Lewis’s but, to be fair, it’s one of the less annoying instances of it.

Next Week: What About All Those New Characters from the First Scene?

This blog series is going to follow the same format as the one I did for The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (2005) so you might want to go back and read the introduction to that one since it explains why I’m going to give away my overall feelings about the adaptation before I describe the first scene.

After The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe was a huge financial hit, the Walt Disney Company had high hopes for its sequel, Prince Caspian, and gave it a corresponding budget. They were disappointed. One of the reasons for that may have been the decision to make that sequel a summer action movie rather than marketing it as a film for families to watch together over the holiday season as they’d done with The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Another reason may have been returning director Andrew Adamson’s goal of making the sequel (relatively) darker and edgier and aimed more at teenagers, the age group least likely to gravitate toward Narnia. (The books are more for children and nostalgic adults.) But the main reason for the studio’s disappointment was probably that they forget that while the book, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, is a well-known and beloved classic of children’s literature, this is less true of the other books in the Narnia series. They’re beloved by people too, but not by the public in general and even among the fandom, Prince Caspian is widely considered the weakest installment.

Because they were adapting the least beloved Narnia book, Adamson and his returning collaborators, screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely^[1]Ann Peacock did not return, leading me to imagine her contributions to the first movie were minimal., probably felt that they had some leeway in adapting the book. This sequel takes far more artistic license with its source material than its predecessor and it should be noted that many critics praised it as the better of the two movies. Some would even call it better than the original book. But many Narnia fans were angered and disappointed by the liberties taken with the text, which I think is a heartwarming tribute to the book, showing how much fans love even the least favorite Narnia book. Or maybe the movie made people realize the book’s greatness.

Where do I stand? Well, I don’t consider the 2008 Prince Caspian movie better than the first Narnia movie on the whole. But neither do I consider it worse than it on the whole. They each have their pros and cons and for me, if no one else, it all balances out in the end. Now do I think the movie is better than the book? Well, I can understand that opinion-at a first glance. The adaptation removes some of its source material’s structural issues. It brings the title character into contact with the other four protagonists much sooner, allowing it to develop relationships between them, and trims the lengthy central section of the characters being lost in the wood.^[2]Theoretically, there’s no reason why stories about people trying to find their way out of woods can’t be great. After all, the first really popular novel was Robinson Crusoe, which was … Continue reading But unfortunately, this adaptation also cuts some of the most emotionally potent themes and interesting ideas from the book, making for a movie that feels less specifically Narnian and much more like a generic fantasy action movie.

But, hey, sometimes a generic fantasy action movie, assuming it’s well made, is exactly what I feel like watching. Actually, it’s kind of amazing how much I enjoy the Prince Caspian movie considering how many strikes it has against it from my point of view. As I mentioned before, of the three Narnia movies, this is the one most trying to appeal to teenagers, and I think that’s a mistake if fidelity to the books’ spirit is a goal. And while I don’t necessarily mind the idea of a Narnia movie being dark per se, there being plenty of dark material in the books, to suggest that Prince Caspian is an edgier story than The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is ridiculous. If anything, you could argue it’s the least intense Narnia story.^[3]Well, literary critic Doris T. Meyers made a good argument that Prince Caspian is a more mature and adult book than its predecessor but in a comparatively subtle way. I feel like the filmmakers just went that direction because it’s Hollywood convention to make the second movie in a series be darker than the first one. C. S. Lewis, by contrast, made the seventh and last Narnia book, The Last Battle, the darkest by a long shot. Making Prince Caspian edgier arguably would have undermined that if Walden Media had been able to adapt the whole series. (It really should be noted though that this movie is dark compared to the 2005 The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe but hardly the darkest movie ever. Likewise, it’s aimed more at teenagers but can still be enjoyed by kids. Not every kid maybe but some.) Also, this is the Narnia movies that’s an action movie the most and, truth be told, while I enjoy a good action scene, modern action movies tend to give me headaches.

Yet, for all that, I get a big kick out of this movie. Why? Well, let’s start the deep dive.

We open with a nifty transition from the Walden Media logo to two planets crossing each other in the Narnian night sky.

Those familiar with the book will realize that these are Tarva and Alambil.^[4]Which were described as stars there, not planets, but never mind. They will also recognize that the adaptation is playing around with the original story’s chronology. The camera pans down to reveal a clifftop castle. It’s a great set-too great even. You see, it’s the castle of the Telmarines, this story’s villains and C. S. Lewis deliberately made them boring compared to the more colorful Narnians. This castle is just a little too cool in its creepy looking way to be boring. But in the movie’s defense, it can be tricky to make something look boring in a movie without the viewers just getting the impression the designers were simply untalented.

Fans of the book instantly learn that the adaptation is taking even more liberties with the chronology than they originally supposed^[5]That is if they didn’t do any research before watching the thing. as a woman’s scream is heard and the camera zooms in on one particular room in the castle where a noblewoman (Alicia Borrachero), surrounded by midwives, is giving birth to a son.

In another room-it’s a great set by the way-a burly, grizzled soldier (Pierfrancesco Favino) enters to find a nobleman (Sergio Castellitto) staring up at the sky through a window. These two are the only ones there.

“Lord Miraz,” says the soldier, “you have a son.” In the book at this point, Miraz is already a king. The movie is going to show his rise to the throne which was summarized in one speech by a character in the book. “The heavens have blessed us,” Miraz says, still looking at the planetary phenomenon. “You know your orders.” The soldier hesitates, evidently not completely comfortable with these orders. Miraz turns his head slightly. “General Glozelle?” he says. “Yes, my lord,” the man replies. In the book, Glozelle is only really introduced before the climax of the story^[6]The aforementioned speech summarizing Miraz’s political career mentions that “his flatterers (as he had instructed them) begged him to become king” and it’s eventually implied … Continue reading and incidentally is a lord, not a general. He’s also completely a villain in the book with no apparent conscience. I think it makes sense to give him more screentime since he’s something of a deus ex machina in the source material. I generally dislike the idea of redeeming characters from the books who weren’t redeemed there but adding some sympathetic aspects to Glozelle’s character is going to allow this movie to keep an interesting little moment from the book that would otherwise have probably been cut. Anyway, on its own terms, this scene is great, especially the tension between Castellitto and Favino.

Meanwhile, a cloaked and hooded figure sneaks through the moonlit castle hallway, avoiding a sentry. He slips inside a royal bedchamber, draws open the bedcurtains and places a hand over the mouth of our hero, Prince Caspian (Ben Barnes.) I should say a word hear about the casting here. Many fans object to Barnes, who was in his early twenties at the time, playing this character who is a boy in the book. However, the only thing the book specifically says about Caspian’s age is that he was about as old as Peter and the previous movie had already cast a teenager as that character, a teenager who was even older when this sequel was filmed and yet nobody complained then. To me, the important thing is that Caspian looks like he could be Peter’s peer and Barnes does a great job making the character seem youthful and naive. I think the reason fans insist on seeing Caspian as really young in the book is that C. S. Lewis stresses that he was a very little boy in the first chapter depicting him and fans forget that years take place between that chapter and the main body of the story. The movie entirely cuts the section of the story about Caspian’s childhood, and I have strong opinions about that but let’s put the subject on the back burner for now, shall we? Caspian’s eyes pop open in fear but he relaxes when he sees that he’s being awakened by his twinkly eyed gray bearded tutor, Doctor Cornelius (Vincent Grass who’s great in the role.) Actually, they never say Cornelius’s name in the movie; everyone just addresses him as “doctor” or “professor.” It’s in the credits though and I’m going to use it on this blog.

“Five more minutes,” Caspian says, rolling over. “You won’t be watching the stars tonight, my prince,” says Cornelius. This is a reference to the book in which he sometimes takes Caspian up on the castle battlements at night for astronomy lessons. In fact, during one such lesson, he revealed to Caspian the true history of Narnia about which everybody is forbidden to speak. It was a wonderfully atmospheric scene in the book that has been barbarically scrapped by this movie. (Remember what I mentioned about Caspian’s childhood?) “Come,” says Cornelius, “we must hurry.” He drags Caspian over to his wardrobe. “Professor, what’s going on?” he asks. “Your aunt has given birth to a son,” says Cornelius. There’s a great moment of silence as the implications of this, not yet clear to the viewers, sink in for Caspian. Cornelius reveals a secret passage in the back of the wardrobe and bustles the prince inside. They close the door behind them, but Caspian lingers to peer through the crack and see what happens in his absence. Glozelle leads a group of bowmen into the room. They surround Caspian’s bed and fire arrows at it, only to find the bed empty.

Cornelius hastily helps Caspian dress and arm himself. “You must make for the woods,” he instructs the prince as he mounts a horse in the stables, “they won’t follow you there.” In the book, Dr. Cornelius^[7]Lewis always calls him Doctor Cornelius but I’m going to call him Dr. to save typing. also tells Caspian to seek sanctuary in the court of King Nain of Archenland. That is a much more intelligent plan than just hiding in the woods, but I don’t blame the movie for cutting it since neither King Nain nor Archenland are ever going to appear in this story. Then Cornelius hands Caspian an object wrapped in cloth. “It has taken me many years to find this,” he says. “Do not use it except at your greatest need.” “Will I ever see you again?” asks Caspian. Don’t ask me why he would ask that instead of “what is this mysterious object and why must I use it at my greatest need?” Well, because this movie wants to retain a mystery in the book’s plot while avoiding the nonlinear storytelling that allowed it to be a mystery. “I dearly hope so, my prince,” says Cornelius. “There is so much more I meant to tell you. Everything you know is about to change.” They hear a voice outside calling for the drawbridge to be closed so naturally Caspian has to hightail it out of there, leaving Cornelius feeling like a fool for saying, “everything you know is about to change,” a line obviously written so it could be used in the movie’s trailer, instead of taking the time to tell Caspian just what the mysterious artifact is to be used as a last resort.

Caspian rides across the courtyard. Two sentries try to stop him, but he knocks aside their pikes, taking one of them. He gallops across the stone drawbridge on his horse as celebratory fireworks go off in the background. (In case that sentence was confusing, they’re celebrating the baby’s birth, not Caspian’s escape.) A town crier (Douglas Gresham, one of the movie’s producers and the head of C. S. Lewis’s literary estate) is heard proclaiming that “Lady Prunaprismia has this night given Lord Miraz a son.” Glozelle and his soldiers chase Caspian on horseback through the town and into the countryside. I may be alone here, but this is an iconic opening for me.

Like the last movie, this has a great opening credits scene albeit one with a very different feel. Caspian enters the woods, and his pursuers initially hang back in fear with the exception of Glozelle. “Which of you superstitious old women wants to spend the night in a cell?” he demands. Reluctantly, they follow him. In the book, the Telmarines fear the woods because of their people’s past inhumanity to trees and imagine them to be full of ghosts. As a fan, I’m glad that this was kept but it’s unfortunate that the movie never explains it. We can deduce that they believe these particular woods are haunted but not necessarily why. Oh well. We do get to see some lovely scenery in this chase scene and listen to some great tense chase music by composer Harry Gregson-Williams.

At one point, Caspian has to ride across a ford. (This is the ford of Beruna which was supposed to be the location of the battle in The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.) The obstacle relieves him of some of his pursuers but not all of them. He does put enough space between himself and them to give him hope. Hilariously (and intentionally), the dramatic mood is shattered when he looks behind him, then turns back only to get hit in the head by a low hanging branch, knocked off his horse and dragged around for a while before finally managing to get his foot out of the stirrup. Caspian lies there on the ground while his steed runs off. (In the book, by the way, something like this didn’t happen until he’d been riding for a whole day and into another night. The Telmarine castle is much closer to the woods in the movie.) The silence grows ominous.

Caspian painfully raises himself and is shocked to see two dwarfs, one with a red beard (Peter Dinklage) and one with a black beard (Warwick Davis who also played a couple of roles in the BBC’s Narnia miniseries from the late 80s and early 90s), emerge from under the roots of a tree. There’s also light coming from under the roots and if you have sharp eyes you can see a talking badger behind them.

“He’s seen us,” says the black bearded dwarf. Both of them carry swords. Caspian’s lies out of reach. The red bearded dwarf, blade drawn, runs up to Caspian but stops when he sees that the bundle Dr. Cornelius gave the prince has unfurled, revealing an ivory horn that should look familiar to viewers though the camera probably doesn’t linger on it long enough for it be recognizable. The dwarf recognizes it though. Apparently, so do the other one and the badger though they should be standing too far away to see it in the dark. One of the Telmarine soldiers appears on the horizon. “Take care of him” the red dwarf tells the other and runs to distract the newcomer. It eventually becomes clear that the sight of the horn has earned Caspian these dwarfs’ loyalty and that he means “take care of him” in a friendly sense. Why this is so won’t be abundantly clear, I’m sorry to say, but it’s too early to start criticizing that. Caspian understandably interprets the red dwarf’s words in a threatening way and when the black dwarf heads his way, he grabs the horn in desperation, raises it to his lips and blows before the dwarf knocks him out. I’d roll my eyes at Caspian blowing the horn seemingly hours after being told to only do so in his greatest need-if it took that long. But I understand why the filmmakers had him do so. And all quibbles aside, I really do love this opening scene. Some viewers may not like how it features none of the characters from the first movie and doesn’t even explain very much about the new ones it introduces but I don’t mind. If anything, I enjoy the mysteriousness of it all.

Well, this feels like a good place for a cliffhanger.

Next Week: How Have the Four Pevensies Been Doing Since the Last Movie?