Overview

Best Buy The Chronicles of Narnia – The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (Widescreen Edition) High quality
Prepare to enter another world when Walt Disney Pictures and Walden Media present C.S. Lewis’ timeless and beloved adventure. With the stunningly realistic special effects, you’ll experience the exploits of Lucy, Edmund, Susan, and Peter, four siblings who find the world of Narnia through a magical wardrobe while playing a game of “hide-and-seek” at the country estate of a mysterious professor. Once there, the children discover a charming, once peaceful land inhabited by talking beasts, dwarfs, fauns, centaurs, and giants that has been turned into a world of eternal winter by the evil White Witch, Jadis. Aided by the wise and magnificent lion Aslan, the children lead Narnia into a spectacular climactic battle to be free of the Witch’s glacial powers forever! The Chronicles of Narnia, Narnia, and all other book titles, characters and locales original thereto are trademarks of C.S. Lewis Pte Ltd. and are used with permission. © Disney/Walden

The Chronicles of Narnia – The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (Widescreen Edition)

Comment with The Chronicles of Narnia – The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (Widescreen Edition)
The Chronicles of Narnia: the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.

Four children with just their mother in an English town, dodging Nazi bombs, are being sent out to the country for their own safety. The director starts the movie strong with bombs bursting in air, with one of the kids (Edmond) saving a picture of his father as the bombs are dropping.

Their eldest brother Peter takes being the oldest seriously but he is very harsh on his brother Ed as are his two sisters. Susan is the serious, brainy one. And little Lucy is the brightest one.

With this tense family backdrop, I could relate. One brother wanting to lead but not willing to take control; a brainy, serious sister lacking imagination; a willful, argumentative brother who takes personal advantage of things despite its consequences; and little Lucy, who is bright with imagination and energy in the face of losing her mother and all four moving in with “The Professor.”

The bombing scene was a bit fake to me, all CGI. And the relation with the father is not totally explained. The family situation with the professor and who he is was unsatisfactorily explained to the viewer (me) as well. So the beginning gets off the a stuttered start.

During a game of hide & seek as they are bored to death in a large house where they’re not allowed to run or play (i.e., be kids), Lucy runs into a large wardrobe and off we go.

The story moves at a steady pace, has the typical, light Disney magic. It also has its dark side: betrayal, death, greed, and the use of power to further their own ends.

The White Witch is an interesting sort. Not sure how she became the queen or why winter fell upon Narnia. Or even why Christmas had not been celebrated there for 100 years. She brought new meaning to the term “ice princess” in my eyes!

The film is visually stunning. The mountains, the griffins and satyrs, the mermaids and lofty towers of castles. And the dark & stark white prisons, Aslan’s death by assassination — these are all pretty strong for children and thus the PG rating.

Too much is not explained to my satisfaction at the start, more of a background history of some of the characters, why they’re acting as they are, what their relationships are, are skimmed over.

However, the great acting by Georgie Henley, William Moseley, Skandar Keynes and Anna Popplewell as the four English children (my, those accents!) lift the movie to be more than the sum of its parts.

Recommended, not only for an exploration into the mind of C.S. Lewis and his brand of fantasy novels but also for the exploration of family and friend relationships, honor and majesty.

The DVD is cool as well with fascinating facts (JRR Tolkien & C.S. Lewis were contemporaries and often checked each others’ work), some bloopers, and two sets of commentaries by the stars and by the director. It was also fun to see that Industrial Light and Magic in the San Francisco area had a part in the production of this film. To see the credits, New Zealand, England, Czech Republic, man these guys have been all over! But I digress.

I well-made piece of entertainment.

Can’t wait to explore the next film, Prince Caspian, as well as a heightened interest in C.S. Lewis’ novels.

Films!:

The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (Three-Disc Collector’s Edition+ Digital Copy and BD Live) [Blu-ray]
The Chronicles of Narnia – The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (Widescreen Edition)

Books!:

The Chronicles of Narnia (7-Book Box Set includes “The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,” “Prince Caspian,” “The Voyage of the Dawn Treader,” “The Silver Chair,” “The Magician’s Nephew,” ” The Horse and His Boy” and “The Last Battle”)

Radio Theater of Narnia:

The Chronicles of Narnia: Never Has the Magic Been So Real (Radio Theatre) [Full Cast Drama]

The BBC Version:

The Chronicles of Narnia 3 Pack DVD Set – BBC Version

Other C.S. Lewis Books:

A Year with C. S. Lewis: Daily Readings from His Classic Works
The Complete C.S. Lewis Signature Classics
C. S. Lewis Signature Classics: Mere Christianity, The Screwtape Letters, A Grief Observed, The Problem of Pain, Miracles, and The Great Divorce (Boxed Set)