Golden Compass (movie)

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Who's seen it?

Saw it last night. I count myself a fan of the books, and I found the movie disappointing. Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous to look at -- I could have looked at it all night. Well-acted, unsurprisingly.

But that had to have been one of the worst screenplays I've ever seen for a film of this scale and cost (it wrests that title fro the first Harry Potter, with which it shares a number of flaws). I'll leave aside the gutting of the books' attack on organized religion; I get why that was necessary. But at least one sequence made absolutely no sense unless you had read the books, and much of the dialogue might as well have been accommpanied by a flashing subtitle reading "Exposition!" Screenwritting 101, folks: When a character we haven't seen before enters a scene in a dramatic and improbable fashion, dressed exotically and holding a weapon, the first words out of the protagonist's mouth should never, ever, ever be "who are you?"

Shame, really.

[DanS]

I wonder why they made a movie targeted at a mass audience that was against organized religion. Doesn't strike me as a good business move.

[snoopy369]

Oh, it's not against organized religion. It's against one particular organized religion

I'm curious to see it myself, I just read the books and considered them good but not amazing (largely due to their preachiness). Some writers (Tepper, ie) can be preachy without it being noticeable except when you think about it specifically, but not Pullman.

[DinoDoc]

Is it really just an atheist Chronicles of Narnia?

[Elok]

I enjoyed Stephen Hunter's gutting of it in the WaPo yesterday. His objections were to the directionless-ness of it, but also to:

"The movie is set in Pullman's idea of a parallel world, which apparently means it's always 1937 and nobody bothered to invent the airplane."
"I saw this girl riding a polar bear over the arctic wasteland and, for some reason, was reminded of Dukakis in that tank. I thought, 'what's wrong with this picture?'"
"The polar bear looks like he escaped from a Coca-Cola commercial."
"Pullman's extreme anti-religious sentiments will fly right over the heads of most children. To adults, they will seem both obvious and boring."
"Their plan involves electronically separating children from these daemons. Adults, if this sounds silly, it is."

And so on, and so on. I mean, he isn't known for generous reviews of films he didn't enjoy, but he positively REAMED it. And of course I enjoyed every word of it.

[Jon Miller]

I like Tepper.

JM

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by Elok
I enjoyed Stephen Hunter's gutting of it in the WaPo yesterday. His objections were to the directionless-ness of it, but also to:

"The movie is set in Pullman's idea of a parallel world, which apparently means it's always 1937 and nobody bothered to invent the airplane."

That makes it clear that the writer of that post is a moron. It's an alternate world that had a different development path (due to the church), so indeed they didn't invent the airplane. Wait until the second ...

"I saw this girl riding a polar bear over the arctic wasteland and, for some reason, was reminded of Dukakis in that tank. I thought, 'what's wrong with this picture?'"
"The polar bear looks like he escaped from a Coca-Cola commercial."
"Pullman's extreme anti-religious sentiments will fly right over the heads of most children. To adults, they will seem both obvious and boring."

To the target audience - 10-15 - they are appropriate, although he is certainly over the top.

"Their plan involves electronically separating children from these daemons. Adults, if this sounds silly, it is."

Hmm? Maybe he doesn't understand how this world works... oh yeah, most of his comments are 'this sounds silly', which are not particularly informative and often simply indicate his lack of understanding of the movie/book...

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
Is it really just an atheist Chronicles of Narnia?

Sort of, I wouldn't simplify it that much but it is a children's fantasy that is heavily anti-Catholic.

[DaShi]

Originally posted by snoopy369

That makes it clear that the writer of that post is a moron. It's an alternate world that had a different development path (due to the church), so indeed they didn't invent the airplane. Wait until the second ...

Urh. . .I hope they don't make a second. The 2nd book is horrible and the ending is extremely unsatisfying. Then you get to the third, and it's worse! That said, the first book was fairly decent. I'd imagine that children would enjoy it immensely.

[Jon Miller]

It was the second that made me not want to read the third.

JM

[Bkeela]

Re: Golden Compass (movie)

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly But that had to have been one of the worst screenplays I've ever seen for a film of this scale and cost (it wrests that title fro the first Harry Potter, with which it shares a number of flaws)

This is why I wonder how there can be a writer's strike in America. I didn't think there were any writers employed in America. Surely for the past decade or so they've just been getting the janitor to pen screenplays?

I think I'll just read the books which I had never heard of before.

[DanS]

Originally posted by snoopy369
Oh, it's not against organized religion. It's against one particular organized religion

OK, well then, why trash the religion of the core audience of The Lord of the Rings and Narnia?

[snoopy369]

Perhaps because he has a different core audience? I think there are starting to be enough anti-religion folks out there to sell a movie that's anti-religion... if it's good, anyhow.

[DanS]

Re: Re: Golden Compass (movie)

Originally posted by Bkeela Surely for the past decade or so they've just been getting the janitor to pen screenplays?

One of the unfortunate side effects of the widespread availability of blow.

[snoopy369]

Maybe we can convince Chavez to attack Colombia and end that availability? Or is Colombia secretly acting at Chavez' request to try to destroy America's cultural superiority?