Golden Compass
On Wednesday night I drove through the snow into Santa Fe to see The Golden Compass with Ian. It looked fantastic. Amazing visuals, particularly the architecture. I thought the costuming was terrific, and the young girl playing Lyra was splendid. Now the bad news. They were trying so hard not to offend anyone with Pullman’s themes that they ended up making a movie that wasn’t about anything.
Frequently I complain that a movie is too damn long. This movie wasn’t long enough. It felt breathless it was so rushed, and they committed a nearly unforgivable sin (at least for me). We had a “once out of the well moment” that I think was the result of not having enough time to let the story unfold. They also cost themselves precious time by repeating information.
When Lyra first meets the armored bear he gives us his entire tragic story that will explain why he is a drunk. Then we get to the climactic battle between the bears and we hear again everything that we heard earlier. They could have held the reveals until the moment Iorek challenges the king. I also think the studio made a terrible mistake using Ian McClellan as the voice Iorek. Every time he talked it pulled me right out of the movie, and I found myself looking around for Gandalf.
I did love the daemons and I want one. Of course mine would probably be a horse, and it would be hard to get it into buildings. Still that was wonderfully realized. I haven’t checked to see how this film is doing at the box office. I suppose as a S.F./Fantasy writer I want it to do well, but I hate it when they gut something and leave us with nothing but skim milk.
Melinda
December 18th, 2007 at 7:47 pm
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.
December 18th, 2007 at 7:48 pm
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.
December 19th, 2007 at 10:03 am
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.