Greatest Mistake in Narnia

[jewel]

I was wondering what do you guys/girls think was the worst error in the Narnia films? This includes the making also of the films.

[Skilletdude]

I don't know about worst, but in Dawn Treader when Caspian introduces Edmund and Lucy to his crew, he calls them High King and High Queen. As far as I've always understood it, High King is a title that will only ever belong to Peter. Why the filmmakers didn't recognize it (or respect it), I don't know. But it bothered me every time I heard that line.

[jewel]

That's true. I never thought about that one before. Edmund was never high, and Lucy never high queen.

[EmpressJadis]

Well, Susan and Peter can't return to Narnia anymore, so their titles go to Edmund and Lucy I expect. I did pick up on that though. I'm literally watching that scene now!

[CaptainM]

I think that they changed the Dawn Treader to much. I liked the move and it was a good movie but I just think they changed it to much from the book.

[Ryadian]

In my opinion, the greatest mistake in the Narnia films was a combination of the marketing and how they made them. While the first movie itself didn't feel this way (aside from the ending, but that's forgivable), the marketing made it look a lot more like an action movie than it really was--and certainly more so than the book. (I remember at the time, one of my friends called the movie a "Lord of the Rings rip-off" because of all the action scenes in the trailer.) After that, the pressure was on for all the others movies to be marketed on what they believed had drawn in the first crowds, which probably contributed to the "action-izing" of the other two movies (in addition to the other typical Hollywood reasons).

While I think LWW did a good job--in the first part of the movie, anyways--of staying true to the adventurous spirit from the book, by the time VDT came out, they'd already branded the franchise as a fantasy action series. Having an adventure story about sailing across the world and discovering new places, all on a quest that didn't involve saving the world? Heaven forbid! They saved Narnia in the previous movies, so now we have to show them doing it again!

Whether or not the actions scenes belonged in the movie is another discussion altogether, but I do think it was a mistake to focus so strongly on it (especially in the trailers) to the point where they really made it difficult for the later movies to be anything else. I also really don't think it helped that the marketing looked like it was trying to be something between Lord of the Rings and [i]Harry Potter[/i\, but I think I've gone on long enough about that.

[EmpressJadis]

Fair point. But it's also kind of inevitable. I mean, I think the romanticisation of Susan and Caspian was the biggest mistake, but it's Hollywood after all.

[The Rose-Tree Dryad]

In terms of errors, I'd agree with Skilletdude on announcing Edmund and Lucy as "High King and High Queen of Narnia" in VDT. It's especially odd because they'd already made a point of noting the hierarchy in the Prince Caspian movie when Edmund is explaining that he's just king while Peter is High King.

In terms of where they went wrong with the general making of the films, I ditto a lot of what Ryadian said. I also think that they cut out too much of the fun and creative stuff in an attempt to turn the Narnia stories into epic fantasy action movies. For instance, they completely cut out the romp in Prince Caspian, and that film badly needed some joy.

Given my username, I may be a bit biased, but I think they also dropped the ball when they turned the dryads, naiads, wood gods and river gods into glitzy special effects. (Dryads/wood gods being distinct from hamadryads, which are tree spirits that are unable to leave the physical tree.)

You can't really cosplay as a bunch of petals or leaves on the wind, and it's not very easy to personally identify with them, either. I don't think many people are going to dream about living in Narnia as the special effects dryads/naiads that appear in the films. And speaking of errors, there's also the problem of having incorporeal dryads/naiads/wood gods/river gods when we know for a fact that King Frank's sons and daughters married them.

In many ways, I think the first order of business when making these films should have been making audiences fall in love with the character of Aslan and the world of Narnia, because those two elements are really the only common thread running through all seven books. A large part of bringing Narnia to life entails embracing all of its wonderful and unique elements, and that includes having forests that are full of talking trees and divine waters.

[Ryadian]

Oh yes, I definitely missed the creativity. One of the joys of the Narnia books for me was the exploration of this other world--the creatures, the places, the history! Even after seven books, there are all kinds of places and things I still want to explore and know about. When you reduce all of the magic to "the means to fighting off evil and rescuing Narnia", you lose most of the point of traveling to Narnia at all.

Given my username, I may be a bit biased, but I think they also dropped the ball when they turned the dryads, naiads, wood gods and river gods into glitzy special effects. (Dryads/wood gods being distinct from hamadryads, which are tree spirits that are unable to leave the physical tree.)

Oh, yes! Dryads were one of my favorite Narnian creatures (actually, my username also comes from dryads, sort of--think "Dryadian" as an adjective ), and I was very, very disappointed by them in the movie. (I think the effect of the petals floating by worked in Prince Caspian when Lucy was walking by the awakening trees, but only because it was a nice hint at the ideas that the trees were waking up.) Admittedly, I wouldn't call that the greatest mistake (in my mind), but I certainly sympathize.

Talking more about a specific error (I got a bit carried away last time, sorry )... one of my least favorite lines from The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe is when Aslan is telling Peter about the Deep Magic, and he describes it as ruling over all of Narnia, "governing all our destinies, yours... and mine." While that's hardly the most extensive change made to the stories and characters, it really bothered me. It undermined Aslan's authority in the world of Narnia; it made him seem more like just one of the wisest of Narnia's creatures, rather than its creator. (Every time I watch that scene, I mutter under my breath, "You're not playing a Jedi anymore, you don't have to talk like one." )

[Narnian_Badger]

Trying to make a plot-point adaptations instead of making theme-based adaptations.

LWW made it out okay with this kind of thinking because the themes are pretty intrinsically tied to the events; you can't really have one without the other. Some things were missed here and there, but as a whole, most people tend to agree that it was the most faithful adaptation. PC was... an interesting case. Nearly all of the plot points in the book are touched on (with the exception of the joyous parade with Aslan, Lucy, and Susan), but the overall theme and feel of the story was very different. As for VDT? Sure, all the islands got featured in some way, and there were several scenes that followed the book quote-for-quote. But because they didn't try to capture the feel of the book, the movie wound up being both a shoddy adaptation and a shoddy film.

Quoting the source material does not make a good adaptation. The movies focused too much on getting one or two scenes perfect. The story is greater than its parts; one perfectly transposed scene makes little impact if it has nothing to do with the rest of the story.

Focus. on. The feel.

[Ryadian]

Trying to make a plot-point adaptations instead of making theme-based adaptations.

This is an excellent point. Actually, the last time I watched Prince Caspian (which happened to be with other NarniaWebbers ), we mentioned how PC actually had more from-the-book dialogue, but still managed to be farther from the tone of the book. At the same time, there are movies like The Wizard of Oz and Captain America: The Winter Soldier which, plot point by plot point, are actually very loose adaptations of the story--but are still faithful to the intent of the source material.

It's also telling to me that, even though PC did have a lot of "plot point by plot point" adaptation going on, they did skip the romp entirely, despite how much of the book that was. The tone was so far off from that of the book that the joyful celebration just wouldn't fit in their version of the story. (Let's not even get started on VDT's take on most of the islands!)

[aileth]

In terms of errors, I'd agree with Skilletdude on announcing Edmund and Lucy as "High King and High Queen of Narnia" in VDT. It's especially odd because they'd already made a point of noting the hierarchy in the Prince Caspian movie when Edmund is explaining that he's just king while Peter is High King.

There was a correct version--in a trailer or somewhere--where Caspian said just king and queen. I think that it must have been a slip up in the editing or something of that nature. Whether deliberate or not, it certainly is jarring.

While not the biggest mistake by any means, the one thing that bothered me a lot was in VDT (poor, picked-on VDT). In the book, Coriakin was a daunting thought before Lucy entered the house. Once she met him, everything changed. In the movie, he is a stern doom-and-gloom character, warning them of the awful things they would have to face. No humour, no gentle mockery of the follies of his charges, no hospitality to Lucy and the others. And worst of all, no indication that he knew or cared for Aslan. (They also left out any backstory, including the fact that he was a star. No blue glow, you see.)

There were many worse problems plot-wise, but that was what grieved me most.

[jewel]

Good points. I felt VDT should have been longer. Still I like them all. I am a huge Narnia fan.

Still for all it's mistakes I don't understand people who don't like them.