Narnia: Just read the books.
Just came back from seeing Prince Caspian. Eyeris might not have wanted to scream at the screen and kill the scriptwriters, but I certainly did!!
Of course, it probably didn't help that I re-read the book a week before seeing the movie. What was I thinking?! But then, Eyeris had also said that the movie was fairly faithful to the book. And to think I trusted his blog post! Pfffft. I must have been high on Pepsi or something, to believe that!
Right, so let me warn you, it is CHEESY. It is super cheesy and has the most lamest lines. (Yes, I know there is no such thing as 'most lamest'! Give me a break!) And certain scenes were a farce and a waste of film. Some of you, my readers, no doubt don't like spoilers, so I will restrain myself from regaling you with descriptions and lengthy rants -- also because if I were to start, I might not be able to stop.
The only redeeming feature of this movie is Reepicheep the Talking Mouse. Reepicheep is, in Eyeris's words, AWESOME. But apart from that, so many things about this movie made me cringe. A lot. A friend who saw it together with me said, "Right, I'm not going to bother seeing the next one!" Yes, it was that bad.
On second thoughts, maybe it wasn't. If you've never read the book, or if you last read the book yonks ago and can hardly remember anything of it, you'll probably find the movie pretty decent. But nothing is going to save it from the cheesiness. OMG, the cheesiness! I know I said that already, but I can't get over it, okay?! And don't even get me started on that completely unnecessary little subplot between Susan and Prince Caspian! Arrrrgh!
Moreover, Aslan is vastly underutilised. He's more like an afterthought than anything else, like, "Oh, we can't figure out how to make them win... oh that's right, we're supposed to have Aslan, aren't we? Forgot about him. Gotta give him at least 5 minutes of air time, I suppose. Ah, he'll come in useful here! He can be the one to save the day!" Sheeeeeesh.
Okay okay, I'll stop now, while I still sound like a slightly sane human being and haven't started raving as if I've lost my mind. What's that? Too late, you say? Darn, I always knew you guys were sharper than I thought you were...