Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (2005)

  Wednesday night I had to do a lot of baking.  I tried to just put this movie on as background because I'd seen it before but I realized just after the opening credits that wasn't going to work.  I hadn't seen it since maybe the year after it first came out in theaters and, while I do have some issues with it, it deserves to actually be watched.  So I turned it off, baked my cookies, and picked it up again on Thursday.

I remember thinking this movie wasn't all that great when I first saw it.  I think battle scenes without blood are silly and I found the story to be badly dated. Those things are still true with the second viewing but I minded them less.  Maybe it was finally seeing them on blu-ray.  The colors looked amazing and the detail was good without being oh-my-God-I-can-see-every-pore-on-their-faces. 

The four Pevensie children are sent out to the country to avoid the London Blitz attacks.  Lucy (Georgie Hensley), the youngest, discovers a magical portal through the back of a disused wardrobe into the world of Narnia.  She tries to tell her siblings but they don't believe her until her next oldest brother Edmund (Skander Keynes) follows her because he's a snot.  Once in Narnia, Edmund falls into the hands of the White Witch (Tilda Swinton) who preys upon his snottiness by promising him the ability to rule over his brother and sisters if he will lure them to her castle. 

Eventually, the two oldest children make it through the wardrobe and into Narnia.  Edmund bails as fast as he can to the Witch's castle while Lucy and the other two meet Beaver (voiced by Ray Winstone) and his wife (voiced by Dawn French) who tell them of a prophecy that the four children will one day become the kings and queens of this land and winter will be banished.  The great lion Aslan (voiced by Liam Neeson) is waiting for them with an army.  Peter (William Moseley) wants to stay and fight but is torn by the duty of keeping his little sisters and brother safe.  Susan (Anna Popplewell) is a wet blanket.  She doesn't really do much of anything except bitch.

The source books were essentially Christian dogma for children and the symbolism gets a bit heavy-handed but that shouldn't necessarily put you off from seeing this film if you're not Christian.  I will say that the age window for really enjoying this film is quite small, maybe 10-14.  I can't imagine anyone younger than that caring about the plot or anyone older being satisfied by the action.  Still, it's a very pretty movie and shouldn't simply be dismissed out of hand.