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I watched
The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
this morning on DVD—it represents that rare mega-Blockbuster
that I missed during its run in theatres, likely because I spent
hours upon hours shoveling popcorn and sweeping up auditoriums
over the holiday-season in which it was released—and found
myself genuinely captivated by the movie’s simple command of
fantasy. Nevertheless, despite my strong engagement in The
Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, I never forgot that I was
watching it in preparation for its sequel: Prince Caspian.
And, keeping that fact in mind, I began to contemplate just what
director Andrew Adamson would be able to do with the second film
in the series. I had never gotten around to reading C.S. Lewis’
Prince Caspian during my seven years in elementary
school, and its existence left me genuinely perplexed as I
considered its potential. After all, its predecessor features a
pretty concrete plot: kids find fantasy realm called Narnia,
kids save Narnia from destruction by White Witch, kids go back
to the real world. What more to the story could there be?
As it would
turn out, Prince Caspian is a complete retread of the
first entry in the Chronicles of Narnia series. The only
real change made is that the villain now comes in the form of
King Miraz (Sergio Castellitto), who has taken over Narnia
during the hundreds of Narnia-years in which the hero Pevensie
children (William Mosely, Anna Popplewell, Skandar Keynes, and
Georgie Henley) have been whittling away their time on Earth
without a clear route back to the fantasy-realm. When the
quartet does return, however, it finds itself paired alongside
Miraz’ threatened nemesis nephew, Prince Caspian (Ben Barnes),
in attempts to restore the Kingdom to the state that they left
it in. Bringing “extinct” Narnians out of hiding to fight Miraz’
dominant army and searching for Aslan, their powerful lion
companion from White Witch days, the Pevensies once again find
themselves partaking in an epic struggle. Numerous CGI-driven
battles ensue.
Once one
realizes that Prince Caspian is, indeed, a
near-carbon-copy of its predecessor, the exercise wears thin in
no time. Given that the Pevensie children will clearly survive
all of the harm that they encounter in Narnia, there is no
reason for the viewer to care about the details of their second
adventure. Yes, the detailed special effects and sweeping
landscapes featured are quite beautiful to stare at and the four
young actors once again craft a sympathetic team of heroes. But
there remains no substantive reason for Prince Caspian to
exist other than studio Disney’s need to sustain high box-office
revenues. That the movie runs for a whopping 144-minutes makes
it seem all the more unnecessary. However, given that future
trips to Narnia are on their way no matter what this film’s
final financial take is—the third entry in the series has
already begun production with accomplished director Michael
Apted at the reigns—I can now only hope that Prince Caspian
will simply come to represent a small bump in the road for a
better series on the whole. Common consensus is that Lewis’
third novel, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, offers a
much more involving story that Apted should have no problem
being successfully adapted to the silver-screen. While we
filmgoers wait for that motion-picture to surface in 2010, the
Pevensie’s current trip to Narnia is best left ignored.
-Danny Baldwin,
Bucket Reviews
Review Published
on: 5.17.2008
Screened on:
5.17.2008 at the Edwards San Marcos 18 in San Marcos, CA.
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince
Caspian is rated PG and runs 140 minutes.
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