Comments on: Golden Compass

By: Steve Stirling

Steve Stirling — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 02:47:56 +0000

I agree the film was rushed. The first half in particular was full of exposition.

As for toning down the ‘message’, in terms of the numbers you need for a film audience with a ‘big’, expensive film, there just aren’t enough atheist asses to put on seats to make such a film worthwhile commercially.

You could get away with it in a small, cheap film that didn’t need a huge draw, but not with a big-budget SF/F epic.

I find attacks on religion of Pullman’s type boring at best and often borderline offensive myself, and I’m not even a believer; I’m not interested in going on jihad for unbelief. I just don’t care much. Count in the solid majority who _are_ believers, and it would be financial suicide.

As is, GOLDEN COMPASS took a whopping 65% drop from first to second weekend.

The ideological stuff is the most tiresome part of Pullman’s (otherwise very competent) work, anyway. I lost all respect for the man when he called C.S. Lewis and Tolkien “racist”. This is just so totally dumb — and so typical of bien-pensant intello intolerance, arrogance and hubris — that I lost all respect for the man.

Tolkien and Lewis will be classics and popular and beloved a century from now, when Pullman is a footnote who nobody but specialists has ever heard of, and serve him right. Same for Moorcock, who said some of the same dumb stuff.

By: Steve Stirling

Steve Stirling — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 02:48:38 +0000

The architecture and flying ships were marvelous. I wish we had those buildings; they’re vastly preferrable to 9/10ths of what we’ve got.

By: Melinda

Melinda — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 17:03:48 +0000

You made an assumption that wasn’t in my words. I was not recommending that the producers and screenwriter make a movie that’s an ode to atheism. I was recommending that they look at the underlying themes of his books which are all about free will and people making choices for themselves, and to defy and question authority. They didn’t go there. They tried to rely on beautiful design and special effects and forgot story. Another argument why the studios are being so stupid with this strike. It really does start with the writer.

I read a very, very long article and interview with Pullman in the Atlantic, and he never attacked Tolkien there. He did go after Lewis, and for my part, I’m glad. Tolkien was a man of his time. When I reread the books there are moments where I cringe a bit, but he was raised in a different era.

I will not give Lewis that pass. I found his work to be hateful and distasteful. I couldn’t read the Narnia books because my first exposure was his science fiction set, OUT OF THE SILENT PLANET, etc. I was only fifteen and they had me shaking with rage. He’s not just a misogynist, he fell into active woman hating.

We have no way to know which books will endure and which will be forgotten. I’m sure there are endless papers written on this subject of why some works have legs and others don’t, but I’m not a Lit major so I can’t speak to that. My guess is that works that live on past their era do so because they have deeply humanistic themes that all human’s experience.