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All three of them rolled over together in a happy laughing heap of fur and arms and legs.

The Essence of Narnia
By Fantasia Kitty

“The only thing that I find a little bit daunting is that I want this film to remain true to the essence of C. S. Lewis’s work.”
– Joe Johnston, The Silver Chair Director

What is it about The Chronicles of Narnia that drives children to go digging through their closets and wardrobes looking for Narnia? I know when I was little and my mom read The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe to us, my dad pointed out in the back of one of our closets that there was a small door looking thing. Of course we were all excited thinking that if we could just get it open, it might lead into Narnia, but come to find out at a much older age, I learned it was nothing more than the access panel to our bathroom plumbing.

But this question popped into my head when Joe Johnston talked about keeping the “essence” of The Silver Chair in the movie. What does that really even mean? Or perhaps, as I thought to myself, what is it that sets Narnia apart from other popular fantasy novels? Why do readers check the backs of their closets and wardrobes, just in case….?

While others may disagree with my opinion (and that’s fine if you do), none of Walden Media’s three Narnia movies refueled that desire in me to go visit Narnia. Even The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, which is arguably the best of the three, didn’t quite capture that feeling for me. Movie Narnia wasn’t a place that I was inclined to visit. Why was that? The movies weren’t any more dark or dangerous than the books. Bad things happened to the characters in the books, bad things happened to the characters in the movies. And there was Aslan! Perhaps there wasn’t as much Aslan as I would have liked, but he was there and I loved the majority of the scenes he was in.

Joy

The movies emphasized battle scenes

After thinking about it for a while, I came to the conclusion what the movies majorly missed out on was the counter to darkness: joy! C.S. Lewis wrote many, many scenes that were so joyful and happy and fun.

Even The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe movie, which was the closest in terms of adaptation, cut almost everything wondrous that was in the book, with the exception of when Lucy first walks in through the wardrobe. Lewis spends several pages describing the melting snow, but the movie did it in a single cut. Aslan and the girls playing tag and joyfully celebrating his resurrection is not in the movie. And my favorite scene where Aslan brings all of the statues to life, which takes an entire chapter in the book, was cut down to a brief tear-jerking moment to make room for extended battle scenes. I found it so frustrating as I know they filmed scenes like Susan making snow angels and the coronation dance only to leave them out of the final release.

Laughing, though she didn’t know why, Lucy scrambled over it to reach him. Aslan leaped again. A mad chase began. Round and round the hilltop he led them, now hopelessly out of their reach, now letting them almost catch his tail, now diving between them, now tossing them in the air with his huge and beautifully velveted paws and catching them again, and now stopping unexpectedly so that all three of them rolled over together in a happy laughing heap of fur and arms and legs.
– The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, Ch. 15

The trend continued in the Prince Caspian movie. The wonder Caspian and the Old Narnians feel when meeting the Pevensies? Gone. The romp with the Greek Gods? Gone. Aslan and the girls freeing the Telmarine villagers? Gone.

At every farm, animals came out to join them. Sad old donkeys who had never known joy grew suddenly young again, chained dogs broke their chains, horses kicked their carts to pieces and came trotting along with them—clop-clop—kicking up the mud and whinnying.
– Prince Caspian, Ch. 14

The movie added tension between Prince Caspian and High King Peter

I understand the concern of the filmmakers that adding a party while other characters are in a battle or not having a solid single storyline was perhaps not something that would work on screen, but the tradeoff of more battles cost the movies their Narnian feel and reduced them to standard Hollywood fantasy fare.

Hope for The Silver Chair

Moving onto my point, I feel like after Aslan and the wonder and joy of Narnia is its essence. Admittedly, The Silver Chair doesn’t have a lot of it, maybe that’s why people consider it one of the darkest books. But there is a scene at the end, do you remember it?

This is called the Great Snow Dance and is done every year in Narnia on the first moonlit night when there is snow on the ground. Of course it is a kind of game as well as a dance, because every now and then some dancer will be the least little bit wrong and get a snowball in the face, and then everyone laughs. But a good team of dancers, Dwarfs, and musicians will keep it up for hours without a single hit. On fine nights when the cold and the drum-taps, and the hooting of the owls, and the moonlight, have got into their wild, woodland blood and made it even wilder, they will dance till daybreak. I wish you could see it for yourselves.
The Silver Chair, Ch. 15

I start grinning just thinking about the possibilities of that scene. No other fantasy movie has a great snow dance, no other fantasy movie will have a great snow dance. The stereotypical Hollywood scenario is to make this a battle scene between the Underworlders and the Narnians as opposed to a happy, joyful, dance with fauns and dryads and dwarfs in the snow.

I’m praying the filmmakers take the risk and keep this scene in the movie! That would feel like a true moment of Narnian essence.

Fantasia Kitty is the Discussion Forum Administrator. She has been with NarniaWeb since 2004.
Thoughts? Please post a comment below.

If you’ve jumped on the coloring book bandwagon like I have, then you will be thrilled to learn that Harper Collins has released ‘The Chronicles of Narnia Official Colouring Book.’ According to Harper Collins’ website, the 96 page book features the original art by Pauline Baynes, maps, favorite quotes, and more.

Order your copy on Harper Collins’ website here.

UPDATE: Here’s a video review from Glumpuddle’s personal channel.

November 22nd marks the 50th anniversary of a very famous man’s death. If you’re like me, you haven’t been able to flip on the TV, open a newspaper, or visit a news website this past week without missing the coverage of the anniversary of John F. Kennedy’s assassination; but that’s not the famous man I’m referring to. No, I’m talking about C. S. Lewis, who just happened to quietly pass away on the same day as J. F. Kennedy. Unlike Kennedy, Lewis’s death was not highly publicized, and for the most part it went unnoticed by the world at the time. But Lewis’s life has had an incredible impact on my own life and so today I’m remembering him.

I’m no historian, or professor, and quite frankly have no authority speaking on the life of C. S. Lewis. But what I am is a mad fan of The Chronicles of Narnia, seven of the greatest children’s books of all time in my not-so-humble opinion, and I can tell you my story. I don’t remember my first introduction to the books because I was too little, but I do know that my mom read them to me, several times in fact. They were favorite bed-time stories and a great way to pass the time on a long road trip. I, like so many others, remember peeking into closets, just in case there was a way into Narnia. I so wanted to have tea with Tumnus, or bury my face in Aslan’s mane.

Moving onto high school, I still remember hearing the news that some random guy named Peter Jackson was taking on The Lord of the Rings, another favorite fantasy series of mine, and I knew that Narnia would not be far behind making it to the big screen. I remember thinking that if I had missed out on being a part of the Rings movies, I certainly was going to do everything in my power to be involved with the Narnia movies in some way, whatever that was.

Sure enough, only a few years later when I was in college, I read the online news that Walden Media had purchased the rights to the Narnia films and The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe would be made into a movie. I think I audibly squealed. Not long after that, I stumbled across a fansite; this fansite in fact. My fate in the world of Narnia movies was sealed, though I didn’t know it at the time. It was here that I discovered “my tribe” so to speak. I had certainly known other fans of the books before, but not quite with the same devotion as me, or that had a shared interest in following movie news. Here, there were lots of fans of the Narnia series, and like me, that would go crazy over the tiniest bit of news that trickled in. And not only that, but many of them shared my same interests, the same core Christian beliefs, and the same personality traits that I did. No where, in my real life, had I met so many people like myself that I could connect with. I was hooked, and to this day, I can safely say that the majority of my closest, dearest friends, I’ve met here on this site.

The past ten years have been a roller coaster ride of emotions as we all saw three of the beloved Narnia stories come and go on the big screen. And many of us look forward to following the news with great enthusiasm as The Silver Chair goes into production as well. I think I can speak for a good many of us here on NarniaWeb when I say that we don’t believe any movie will ever be as good as the books, but we absolutely love the journey we all take together following the news as it’s made. We’re giddy together over casting news and pictures, angry over a change to the storyline, and then there’s the big ‘well, what now?’ when a movie debuts in theaters and we have to wait for the next one to start the ride all over again.

But even after the movies are over and there’s little left on this site other than chatting with people about how much fun we had while our time here lasted, my own story with Narnia will be far from over. I have a son now, he’s just over one year old, and I cannot wait to introduce Lewis’s The Chronicles of Narnia to him.

And so there you have it. My own life, as impacted by C. S. Lewis in a nutshell. But I know that I’m not the only one out there. So as a tribute to C. S. Lewis, we would love it if you’d share your story with us as well. You can do it here on our forum, in our comments section below, or on our Facebook page as well.

A couple months ago, Will Moseley was cast in the TV adaptation of ‘The Selection,’ based on the book of the same name by Kiera Cass.

Yesterday, Gymfan15 sent me some pictures she found online of Will hanging out on set. To say we almost didn’t recognize him would be an exaggeration, but Will has grown up a good deal since his Narnia days. Check out the pictures on Zimbio here.

Thanks Gymfan15!

We have been contacted by someone close to the production who claims that Walden Media has pulled out of making any further Narnia movies.

We are trying to confirm this news as quickly as possible. And should this indeed be the case, we have no idea what will become of the series from this point on.

UPDATE: There are a number of conflicting stories about what’s going on. We’re hearing different things from different people, so until things start to settle down we really don’t know anything for sure. What we can say for sure is that the future of the franchise at present is rather murky. Negotiations may or may not be ongoing, or may have ground to a halt for a while. We’re going to just have to wait and see what shakes out. -Tirian

UPDATE 2: I did have a chance to speak with officials from Walden Media today. Walden stated emphatically that they are still pursing another Narnia film and that they are continuing discussions with the C.S. Lewis Estate to make that a reality. At the present time nothing has been confirmed. But there has not yet been a final yes, or a final no. If Walden does another Narnia film, it will almost certainly be The Magician’s Nephew.

I think it is clear that some negotiations are still taking place, though perhaps as I suggested earlier, they are stalled. It is likely that Walden’s option on the film will last for several more years so it could be quite some time before we know for sure one way or the other.

To all of you young ladies who have been emailing us begging for advice on how to audition for Polly Plummer in The Magician’s Nephew, this story is for you! Tony Nixon, who played Rynelf in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, has typed a really cool blog offering advice to aspiring actors and actresses who want to be in future Narnia films.

When a film is cast it is the job of the casting director(s) to find suitable applicants to audition. Every now and then we might see a “worldwide campaign” to find the next (insert stars name here) and thousands of young hopefuls lined up around the block to get seen. But honestly I can’t remember the last time this happened. It’s not practical and is time consuming. Usually the method is this.

1) A casting brief is sent out to Actors agents (possibly worldwide, but for smaller roles usually in the country where most of the filming will take place) this brief will contain details of the role. A Character description, Age, Gender and any physical traits etc, ethnicity.

2) The Actors agents then submit Actors they represent that they think might be suitable for the role. Occasionally an Actor may hear through the grapevine of a role and ask his/her Agent to submit them for it.

3) The casting director (s) will decide who they want to see for Auditions. The director may also be involved in seeing the selection of reduced candidates. Now they may ask to see you on a show-reel (DVD) or they may ask to audition you straight away, it varies. For overseas jobs I have sent show-reels and audition tapes.

4) IF you get an audition you may get the role or you may just go through to “Call back” auditions and have to audition again.

To read Tony’s full blog, you can check it out here.

The Christian Post caught up with Micheal Flaherty to talk to him about the future of the Narnia films. Flaherty confirmed that Walden plans to make The Magician’s Nephew as the fourth Narnia movie (which we already knew) and that they’re currently in talks with Fox and the C.S. Lewis Estate about it.

But what was interesting was one of the reasons he listed as to why they were making The Magician’s Nephew next instead of The Silver Chair.

Looking ahead, Walden Media believes The Magician’s Nephew has the potential to be a blockbuster hit like The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe because it is the second most popular book in the Narnia series.

Flaherty explained that box office performance for Narnia films appears to mimic the amount of people’s interest in the books.

“What’s interesting is that the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe over this period of time sold twice as many books as Prince Caspian and it did twice as much at the box office. Prince Caspian sold a third of the books as Dawn Treader and did a third at the box office,” he noted.

“So while it’s not always a correlation between books to film, so far with these first three films, it has been.”

The full story is available here.

From HomeMediaMagazine.com:

To promote the April 8 DVD and Blu-ray Disc release of The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Voyage Of The Dawn Treader, 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment is teaming up with Macy’s Flower Show at Herald Square in New York City.

A garden inspired by the film will be open free to the public from March 27 to April 10, and a special family day will take place April 9 at 2 p.m. Macy’s customers who make a purchase of more than $50 in the childrens section with receive a Narnia goodie bag with a copy of the newly-released The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader DVD. Family day activities include activity stations, coloring stations and readings from the book.

The full story is available here.

From The Hollywood Reporter:

20th Century Fox reported that The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader — which had been having a triumphant Japan run at the conclusion of a lengthy overseas campaign — managed to draw $1.49 million from 548 locations, with most of the business coming from southern Japan. Treader has pulled nearly $19 million out of Japan since opening there on Feb. 25. The film’s overseas cume stands at $298 million.

And with that, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader has surpassed the $400 million worldwide mark.

The current box office estimates are:
Domestic: $104mil
Foreign: $298 mil
Worldwide: $402mil

The Chronicles of Narnia are one of four British fantasy series selected for the Royal Mail’s new ‘Magical Realms’ stamp collection. The stamps feature Aslan and the White Witch from Narnia, Dumbledore and Voldemort from Harry Potter, Merlin and Morgan LeFay from Arthurian Legend, and Nanny Ogg and Rincewind from Discworld. You can check out the stamps and order them from the Royal Mail’s website here.