"Better a fallen rocket than never a burst of light."
~ Tom Stoppard, The Invention of Love

Thursday, May 25, 2017

The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian (2008, PG)

Continuing my ongoing tug-of-war with the Chronicles of Narnia films.  Although, on the whole, I’d say Prince Caspian is a more uneven film than The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and mostly lacks the best elements from that movie, the script explores themes that make it a much richer film for me, which helps me forgive some of its deficits.

A year after the events of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy are called back to Narnia.  They find themselves in a Narnia that’s nearly foreign to the land they knew – centuries have passed, and their time as kings and queens there now falls somewhere between history and legend.  They’ve been called by the young Prince Caspian, who is on the run from his usurper uncle with an eye for Caspian’s blood.  The four children do what they can to aid Caspian, and the Narnians who’ve rallied behind him, in ridding Narnia of the cruel ruler and proving that the old magic, and Aslan, is still with them.

Far and away, my favorite part of this film is the way it examines what it’s like for the children, both being back in our world after having been in Narnia and returning after such a long absence.  I love the meditations on how they can never be normal English schoolchildren again, that even though they’re kids once more, they can’t forget what it was like to be monarchs.  This theme is especially evident in Peter’s storyline; back in Narnia, he chafes at being dismissed as a “mere boy” and fights hard to show the Narnians and Caspian that, despite his youth, he is still the high king of old.  I also like the slowly-dawning realization for the children that hundreds of years have passed in Narnia since they were last there.  It’s a melancholy reveal that has no solution, and even though they’re able to move past it and press on, the film gives them time to face up to the understanding that everyone they knew there is long dead, that this isn’t the Narnia they remember.  And even after they make up their minds to move forward, reminders keep creeping up in subtle ways, like when Peter’s navigation attempts are marred by how the river has eroded the land over the centuries.  Just as they can’t go back to their naïve childhood before Narnia, they can’t go back to Narnia as they once knew it, either (these are the kinds of things that happen, I suspect, when screenwriters Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely are allowed freer reign of the script, and I feel it really pays off.)

But while these themes are fascinating and well-explored, the story itself doesn’t really measure up to The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.  I appreciate little touches here and there, like Edmund mixing 20th-century English technology with a Narnian battle and a few nods to the imperialist weirdness of Narnians always being ruled by humans instead of one of their own, but there’s just not as much “there” there from a straight plot perspective.  Miraz, Caspian’s uncle, is no White Witch as far as baddies go, and although Peter Dinkalge and Eddie Izzard both do a fine job with their characters – Trumpkin the dwarf and Reepicheep the mouse, respectively – I can’t help wishing I could trade either of them for Mr. Tumnus.  Now, these are issues with the book itself, which the movie can’t really be blamed for.  Still, it keeps Prince Caspian from being the excellent movie that it hints at when it delves into its more complex themes.

Warnings

Scary moments for kids, thematic elements, and Disney violence.

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