NARNIA "Very Different" Greta Gerwig Movie(s) Wants Meryl Streep As Gender-Swap Aslan

[Paul MacLean]

And Narnia is not a typical fantasy series. It is a Christian allegory -- and any attempt to veer from that allegory is not going to go over well with the core readership of those books.

[Monterey Jack]

BARBIE was pretty much hot garbage. One of the most overpraised "zeitgeist" movies in history.

I thought it was mildly amusing (especially Ryan Gosling), but for a movie this fluffy and slight to make almost $1.5 billion and receive eight Oscar nominations(!) is absurd. Imagine critics at the end of 1994 handing that many Oscar noms to a disposable novelty of a movie like The Flintstones.

[Monterey Jack]

And Narnia is not a typical fantasy series. It is a Christian allegory -- and any attempt to veer from that allegory is not going to go over well with the core readership of those books.

All fantasy adaptations with a strong religious subtext/allegory always get that heavily subdued or stripped out entirely for the film version. Look at what Disney did to A Wrinkle In Time.

[mkaroly]

And Narnia is not a typical fantasy series. It is a Christian allegory -- and any attempt to veer from that allegory is not going to go over well with the core readership of those books.

All fantasy adaptations with a strong religious subtext/allegory always get that heavily subdued or stripped out entirely for the film version. Look at what Disney did to A Wrinkle In Time.

Maybe it is all an attmpt to deconstruct or destroy religious contextual allegory/subtext...I guess my thing is that if you want to make a movie or TV show that goes against the religious contextual grain of the source material, then leave the source material and make up your own story. It is just lazy and brazenly arrogant to do what we're thinking they are going to do with the books to some degree.

I love CS Lewis...have made it a goal of mine to read all his books before I die. The Narnia series was great...it isn't the "sacred cow" for me that it may be to some, but I would hate to see the stories bastardized because of some anti-Christian agenda somewhere. If one doesn't like Christianity or reject its teachings/message, I am fine with that. If you want to infuse a movie or TV show with your beliefs and criticisms, go right ahead. But be original and do your own thing - don't take your anger or frustrations out by corrupting a book series whose context and message you don't agree with.

[Eric W.]

No thanks.

[Paul MacLean]

All fantasy adaptations with a strong religious subtext/allegory always get that heavily subdued or stripped out entirely for the film version. Look at what Disney did to A Wrinkle In Time.

And look what Disney did not do to the 2005 adaptation of The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe -- which left the allegory intact.

If you want to infuse a movie or TV show with your beliefs and criticisms, go right ahead. But be original and do your own thing - don't take your anger or frustrations out by corrupting a book series whose context and message you don't agree with.

That's the problem. It's no secret the entertainment business can be very anti-Christian. Sometimes it is because a filmmkaker has a vehemently anti-Christian viewpoint, sometimes it is because the studio or filmmakers want to avoid "offending" audiences. I recall that Steven Spielberg wanted to do an adaptation of "This Present Darkness" -- but strip-out the explicitly Christian references. The author said no, and that was the end of that.

On the other hand I was (and remain) amazed by X-Men II, which depicted Nightcrawler quoting scripture and sharing his faith with Storm.

[AndyDursin]

That was entirely from the comic books too. At least Singer carried it over but that was a key element of the character as depicted originally in the source material.

[TaranofPrydain]

BARBIE was pretty much hot garbage. One of the most overpraised "zeitgeist" movies in history.

I thought it was mildly amusing (especially Ryan Gosling), but for a movie this fluffy and slight to make almost $1.5 billion and receive eight Oscar nominations(!) is absurd. Imagine critics at the end of 1994 handing that many Oscar noms to a disposable novelty of a movie like The Flintstones.

The thing was though that in 1994, The Flintstones was never taken seriously. In fact, at the time, critics took the film as an affront and gave it some of the year's worst notices. Personally speaking, it was a minor diversion, but not horrible, and Liz Taylor's cameo was a hoot.

Babie unfortunately was taken seriously in 2023 and watching it was a horrible experience, as something that already seemed like a bad idea before seeing the film turned out even worse than could ever be imagined

[AndyDursin]

Phenomenal point right there!

Yes, back in 1994 THE FLINSTONES wasn't nominated for 8 ACADEMY AWARDS. If that's not a sign that cinema has "devolved" I'm not sure what is.

Years back we had a guy who posted here and worked in the TV industry, he was on the set of 24 and some other shows, and we would get into arguments that "things just aren't the same at the movies." He would try to convince us that "everything's the same as it used to be, this is what all generations say as they get older!" Clearly he was not on the right side of that discussion.

[Paul MacLean]

Years back we had a guy who posted here and worked in the TV industry, he was on the set of 24 and some other shows, and we would get into arguments that "things just aren't the same at the movies." He would try to convince us that "everything's the same as it used to be, this is what all generations say as they get older!" Clearly he was not on the right side of that discussion.

Careful, he may still lurk here!

We miss you, David Banner! (Seriously!)

[AndyDursin]

Exactly, I'd be all in on David posting again, we appreciated his insights. It was his choice to leave.

[TaranofPrydain]

It is hard not to see that Hollywood is at the lowest point of its history, right above complete oblivion. People have given some periods in the past a hard time, such as the early 1960s and the 1980s, but there was no other period with such a lack of originality, with so many arrogant, self-important titles, with a lack of new stars, with no idea on how to make a good, modest-scaled audience pleaser, and with the whole industry on the verge of collapse. Box office wise, less that 20 films have to pick up the slack for everything else, and Oscar wise, it has gotten so bad that only about 12 or 13 films are vying for one of the 10 Best Picture slots, making it more a game of musical chairs rather than a standard of excellence. The films anymore aren't built to last. In fact, very few films from the last 10 years have remained beloved afterwards by the public.

Getting back to Narnia and Gerwig and this horrible idea of removing all religious context from the books and replacing it with rock music, I am on one level outraged because it removes the entire point of the books and removes its soul, and on another level, I am deeply depressed because Gerwig once, before the abysmal, hateful Barbie, did have talent (actingwise and I did admire one of her earlier two directorial efforts), but she keeps making one horrible, nihilistic move after another.

[Monterey Jack]

Wow, 1,000 screens...200 more than Glass Onion got in 2022!

[Paul MacLean]

^^ I reckon this with be the biggest hit with the evangelical community since The Last Temptation of Christ.

[AndyDursin]

Yay! I won't be going.