The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian just opened in theaters and is a very good movie. There are at least four good reasons you should go and see it, but before we get to those, some brief background about the story might be appropriate.
Prince Caspian is the second book in C. S. Lewis’s The Narnia Chronicles. The first film in the series, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, opened at the end of 2005 and was a big hit both with Christian and secular audiences. In Prince Caspian, the Pevensie children, whom we got to know in the first installment, have spent a year back in England and have been longing to return to Narnia, where they were once high kings and queens. This happens, not surprisingly, while they are waiting on a tube (= subway) platform to return to school for the coming year and are suddenly transported to Narnia. As they soon discover, though, the time is 1300 years later, and nearly everything they knew has fallen into ruin. The Telmarines, a human group, have occupied Narnia and have driven the Narnian inhabitants into the forest and mistakenly believe them to have become extinct. Many of the Telmarines are bad, though not all. Caspian, the son of the rightful king of the Telmarines, has been born and is now nearing manhood. Unfortunately, his uncle Miraz managed to usurp the throne by killing Caspian’s father and has so far tolerated Caspian’s existence, since he had no heir. Now, however, as the story opens, Miraz’s wife has given birth to a son, so it is incumbent upon Miraz to get rid of Caspian. The boy learns of this and manages to escape his uncle’s clutches, only to be linked up with the real Narnians (dwarfs, centaurs, fauns, heroic mice, badgers, and the like) and eventually with the Pevensie children. There ensues a battle royal for the soul and possession of Narnia.
Now to the reasons why you should see Prince Caspian:
1. Acting: It’s strong throughout. The same young people who played the Pevensie kids in the first movie reprise their roles, but they’re two or three years older. Liam Neeson is again the mellifluous voice of Aslan. Peter Dinklage and Warwick Davis play the roles of two key dwarfs with verve. Sergio Castelitto is abundantly evil in his role as the evil King Miraz. And British actor Ben Barnes does a fine job in the role of Caspian. Interestingly, Barnes says he modeled his quasi-Spanish accent after Mandy Pantinkin’s Inigo Montoya in The Princess Bride. Pretty convincing.
2. Special effects: Normally I’m not a big fan of special effects, but they’re spectacular here. The CGIs (computer-generated images) look very realistic, and they’re certainly appropriate for a story from the world of C.S. Lewis.
3. Moral dimension and emotional level: The picture is filled with instances where the principals have to make difficult moral choices and learn from them. There are lots of goose-bump moments. Lucy chooses to follow the crowd and disregard Aslan’s advice, to everyone’s detriment. Caspian comes very close to selling out to the dark side but manages to avoid it.
4. Underlying Christian viewpoint: Make no mistake about it: The Narnia books are Christian books, and this is a Christian movie. The key theme expounded is the temptation to stray from belief. The Pevensie children (even Lucy to a degree) are tempted to move away from a belief in Aslan the Lion (who, it is clear, is a Christ figure). Similarly, the Telmarines have been taught that the stories of Narnia and Aslan are just fairy tales. Doesn’t this sound like what’s happening in our world today?
Douglas Gresham, C.S. Lewis’s stepson and co-producer of the film, was recently interviewed on Focus on the Family. Among other things, he said that, while The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe is probably a better story, Prince Caspian is a better movie. I have to concur. Wardrobe was quite good, but Caspian is even more impressive.
Film Rating: PG
My Rating: 3 1/4 stars
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