The Strict Judgment on Prince Caspian

by Hugh Duncan

Few people should become teachers, says the apostle James. Those who do will "be judged with greater strictness." The same could be said of those who make movies based on The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis. Fans of these books have high expectations, expecting solid filmmaking and faithfulness to Lewis's important themes.

You might think longtime C.S. Lewis fans would be happy that the film Prince Caspian has been made with a decent budget, generous marketing and distribution and the latest in computer technology. But when "greater strictness" is applied, the film is lacking in several ways.

Fans entering the movie theater already know to expect changes. Caspian is the most challenging of all the Chronicles to adapt to film, at least of the Hollywood summer blockbuster type. As expected, filmmakers have changed the book's structure, speeding up the action and eliminating a long flashback. They've also cast older actors in children's roles and created extended battle sequences never described in the book. The result is an exciting action—adventure movie that will keep audiences' attention (and scare younger children who attend this rated PG movie.)

Changes are inevitable when adapting book to film. For Narnia fans, details can change but themes cannot. The problem with this movie is that Lewis' themes are not treated well.
The book Prince Caspian shows what happens when a group of cold, rational, orderly people are confronted with the wild beauty of nature. It is about the supernatural reality that nature reveals. It is about the belief required when confronted with the supernatural.

These themes occasionally appear in the film Prince Caspian. For instance, the villains dismiss stories of talking animals and dwarves as fairy tales before being confronted with their existence. They are confronted with some moving trees and a river god. But this theme is underdeveloped so more screen time can be devoted to battles. The trees slightly sway but they do not dance as they do in the book. A river god appears, but Bacchus and Silenus—redeemed mythological figures important to the book—do not.

What would have happened if the budget and talent devoted to long battle scenes had been re-deployed? What if they had brought to the screen images of Aslan and Bacchus liberating the town of Beruna, healing the sick, giving justice to the oppressed and inviting all the people to experience joy? It would be a different story—the story C.S. Lewis told.

More frustrating than leaving important themes undeveloped is the filmmakers' insistence on imposing new themes that run counter to the spirit of Lewis' books. Devin Brown, author of Inside Prince Caspian has shown how visiting Narnia makes the Pevensies appreciate the beauty of our world when they return to England. This is especially true in the novel Prince Caspian. Filmmakers present the opposite.

At the beginning of the movie, Peter, frustrated over his demotion from king to English schoolboy, is a sullen adolescent eager for a fight. He takes his anger to Narnia where he acts as a rash, unwise high king. This leads to conflict between him and Caspian. Lewis described the Prince's first encounter with the high king this way: "He was liking Peter very much, but was rather tongue-tied." In contrast, the movie characters meet while sword fighting. Susan's psychology is also explored, leading to a clichéd romantic subplot that is painfully embarrassing to watch.

The way filmmakers downplay Lewis's themes and impose new ones will leave fans doubting whether director Andrew Adamson and his team understand this story at all. Adamson is on board as a producer for the next installment of the Narnia series, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, but is taking a break from directing. Because the first two movies represent an admirable execution of flawed scripts, we can hope he will not be involved in writing. For many fans, Lewis's third book is far more beloved than Prince Caspian. They will judge with an even greater "greater strictness" when Dawn Treader appears on screens in two years.

(Hugh Duncan produces the podcast, Nuclearity, where he has explored in depth many of the Narnia themes. Visit them at the Narnia from A to Z blog.)