New Movie Surfers Narnia Clip

Disney Movie Surfers has released a new segment with a Richard Taylor interview and film footage from The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. They examine the armour and props and have a fighting demonstration. You can see the clip here at Movie Surfers, available in Quicktime or Windows Media.

Click on the Thumbnails below to view the screencaps.

Thanks to Gymfan for this transcript of the segment:

Movie Surfer Opening

Narration over clips: “In the Chronicles of Narnia, the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, four kids fight to save Narnia from the White Witch, with the help of some mythical creatures.

(Clips: Peter looks at a griffin (I think) flying before the battle, Peter points his sword to the ground in preparation to be knighted; Aslan knights Peter with his paw; the four Pevensies look at each other outside of Tumnus house; the children overlook Narnia; a shot of the White Witch; Tumnus and Lucy running through the forest; the army running, and Edmund directing the air attack on the WW’s army.)

Narration: And I got to visit the company that designed them all, called WETA, where I met up with Richard Taylor, the creature and visual concept designer for the film.

(Shots of people at WETA working on various armor, and a Centaur trying out his sword.)

Josh: “Well, would you mind giving me a tour?”
Richard: “Ah, well lets go off, eh?”

(Shots of Richard Taylor showing Josh around WETA)

Josh narrating: Surfers, I discovered WETA is like a maze, and I got to walk my way through each room.

Richard: Here we’ve got a few of the suits that are complete now, and hanging on racks.
Josh: So what armor is this, and who wears it?
Richard: Well these are some of the Minotaur armor, we’ve made them of a combination of different materials, this is actually skateboard wheel rubber, of all things.

(Shots of General Otmin on battlefield and roaring.)

Josh: In total, how many pieces of armor are you going to make?
Richard: I think over 400 suits of armor, we’re making about over 1400 weapons. There’s a lot of different cultures and creatures, so we need a variety for all of them.

(Various shots of Narnian creatures including General Otmin, a Cyclops, some random baddies)

Josh: How many creatures are there on this film?
Richard: Well there’s about 50 different breeds or species of creatures.

(Shot of Jadis on the Stone Table.)

“Tomorrow, we will take Narnia, Forever!”

(Baddies cheering)

Josh: The details are just insane, and these are all hand-made?
Richard: They’re all completely handmade, we have about 100 people now working on the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.
Well, come on down here and we’ll look at some more stuff.

(Shots of Narnians in Aslan’s camp; we see fauns, creatures around the four Pevensies, and fauns and centaurs looking at the Pevensies.)

Susan: “Why are they all staring at us?”
Lucy: “Maybe they think you look funny.”

Richard: Well, we’re with (artist’s name I couldn’t catch) and Johnny, painting Peter’s shield. They’re quite a beautiful prop, they’ve got a combination of a steel front, then the back, this is all simulated timber, and a leather strap, so Peter will carry it across his arm, or slung across his back.

(Shot of Peter running on rocks by the battlefield, and Peter directing his troops.)

Peter: “Drive them to the rocks!”

(Peter running, Peter saluting General Orieus.)

Peter: “We have come to see Aslan.”

Josh: Next, Richard and I went to check out some other props used in the film.
Richard: These are some big double-headed Minotaur axes; they’d give you one headache, as you can imagine.

(Shot of General Otmin roaring)

Richard: These are called flails, and although they look like they’re in heavy steel, they’re actually very, very light, ’cause they’re just soft tips.

(Shots of Peter and his army charging)

Richard: These are jousting spears carried by the Centaurs, very beautifully balanced, this is actually piece of wooden surf mass (?).

(Centaurs lowering spears, Peter draws out his sword; Centaurs drawing out swords, army cheering.)

Peter: For Narnia!

Richard: They’re so many different swords.

(Shot of Peter putting his sword back into his sheath.)

Josh: They’re beautiful.
Richard: They’re great fun to make, as you can imagine.

Josh: But Surfers, Richard had a surprise for me.
Richard: You know what would be cool, is to actually put you into a suit of armor, faun armor.

(Shot of armored fauns.)

(Shots of Richard and a few others putting the armor on Josh.)

Josh narrating: After visiting WETA and seeing all the props, I wanted to give them a try. So I met up with Allan, one of the stunt coordinators for the movie.

Josh: Now, although all this stuff is fake, are there certain precautions you take with the actors?
Allan: For sure. One thing is rehearsals obviously, to teach the actors as much as you can.

(Shots of Skandar (Edmund) and Allen Poppleton doing sword training)

Josh: And after some safety tips of my own, Allan agreed to teach me a couple of the moves from the movie, using the props.
Even though these movie swords are still props, they’re still dangerous, and I only try these things with a trained professional.

(Shots of Allan teaching Josh a sword move.)

Josh narrating: WETA’s creatures and props can be seen in the movie the Chronicles of Narnia, the Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, opening in theaters soon.

(Clips from trailer, and a few new ones.a Griffin flying, three giants in the White Witch’s army, Peter putting his visor down, and Peter’s army charging.)

End Clip.