Saturday, May 17, 2008
The Chronicles of Narnia, Prince Caspian
Prince Caspian opened in movie theaters this weekend. It adapts for the big screen the fourth in a series of seven Narnia novels by C.S. Lewis.
The film includes all the special effects you would want: incredibly realistic talking animals, "living" creatures of all types (trees, water, etc.) . The ingenuity and creativity are simply amazing. Taking an author's words, in this case, those of C.S. Lewis, and making them come alive is a skill and talent we just assume is the norm - it's not.
The basic storyline is straightforward: Prince Caspian, the 10th in a line of Caspians, learns that his father was murdered by his uncle, the evil prince, Miraz. His tutor saves his life by helping Caspian escape from his uncle. As Caspian flees to the magic woods of Narnia, he gets hurt, uses a magic horn and unknowingly summons the four English children back to Narnia to fight the good fight because Caspian's people now have a chance to be set free from their oppressors.
This "war" movie like the blockbuster "Lord of the Rings" trilogy recognizes that it can be right to fight for truth, decency and to remove a tyrannical ruler. One hears the movie's characters debating whether or not they should make the fight; they conclude a chance for freedom is worth the risk. This movie's approach contrasts with the latest attempts by Hollywood to portray war as always wrong, especially with American civilians and soldiers as villains. These films have done very poorly at the box office. Perhaps this is because Hollywood does not understand that there are good fights and freedom must be defended, not taken for granted. Hollywood's bias showing Americans as bad guys simply doesn't go down well with us. Disney understands people will see war movies, even if fiction, when the good guys win.
C.S. Lewis, a WWI wounded soldier, truly understood the horrors of war but he also understood that tyranny was worse.
Update - May 18
First comment by someone on the left: "Comparing Caspian to an illegal invasion of Iraq. Good one!"
This is typical of people on the left. If you read the above post, there is no mention of Iraq, Afghanistan, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, WWI, etc. yet the commenter immediately jumped from "some wars" to concluding I'm talking about Iraq. This is the same way Democrat Presidential candidate, Obama responded when he automatically assumed Bush's comments about appease-
ment were directed at Obama. Frankly, one might conclude Obama really is an appeaser or he would not have reacted so strongly or quickly. Hmmmm
The comment author also has a unique definition of "illegal" war. The US Senate, including a majority of Democrats and Senator Clinton voted to support the Iraq invasion. Subsequent reports have also documented Iraq's ties with Al Qaeda and its role in training suicide murderers. In addition the US had the support of 43 coalition nations. We may disagree about the Iraq war but there was nothing illegal about it. Just because the Democrats want to find a way to trash our president, does not make denying reality ok.
The film includes all the special effects you would want: incredibly realistic talking animals, "living" creatures of all types (trees, water, etc.) . The ingenuity and creativity are simply amazing. Taking an author's words, in this case, those of C.S. Lewis, and making them come alive is a skill and talent we just assume is the norm - it's not.
The basic storyline is straightforward: Prince Caspian, the 10th in a line of Caspians, learns that his father was murdered by his uncle, the evil prince, Miraz. His tutor saves his life by helping Caspian escape from his uncle. As Caspian flees to the magic woods of Narnia, he gets hurt, uses a magic horn and unknowingly summons the four English children back to Narnia to fight the good fight because Caspian's people now have a chance to be set free from their oppressors.
This "war" movie like the blockbuster "Lord of the Rings" trilogy recognizes that it can be right to fight for truth, decency and to remove a tyrannical ruler. One hears the movie's characters debating whether or not they should make the fight; they conclude a chance for freedom is worth the risk. This movie's approach contrasts with the latest attempts by Hollywood to portray war as always wrong, especially with American civilians and soldiers as villains. These films have done very poorly at the box office. Perhaps this is because Hollywood does not understand that there are good fights and freedom must be defended, not taken for granted. Hollywood's bias showing Americans as bad guys simply doesn't go down well with us. Disney understands people will see war movies, even if fiction, when the good guys win.
C.S. Lewis, a WWI wounded soldier, truly understood the horrors of war but he also understood that tyranny was worse.
Update - May 18
First comment by someone on the left: "Comparing Caspian to an illegal invasion of Iraq. Good one!"
This is typical of people on the left. If you read the above post, there is no mention of Iraq, Afghanistan, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, WWI, etc. yet the commenter immediately jumped from "some wars" to concluding I'm talking about Iraq. This is the same way Democrat Presidential candidate, Obama responded when he automatically assumed Bush's comments about appease-
ment were directed at Obama. Frankly, one might conclude Obama really is an appeaser or he would not have reacted so strongly or quickly. Hmmmm
The comment author also has a unique definition of "illegal" war. The US Senate, including a majority of Democrats and Senator Clinton voted to support the Iraq invasion. Subsequent reports have also documented Iraq's ties with Al Qaeda and its role in training suicide murderers. In addition the US had the support of 43 coalition nations. We may disagree about the Iraq war but there was nothing illegal about it. Just because the Democrats want to find a way to trash our president, does not make denying reality ok.
Labels: Heroes
