1. There’s no need to excuse Eustace because of his circumstances. C. S. Lewis built in some explanation, though. Remember he said Eustace hadn’t read any of the right books? And he paints his parents as progressives. I don’t think there’s a solid “original sin” explanation for Eustace’s behavior in the book.

    Consequently, I think the movie can stick closely with the book. Original sin is a hard motive to show. I’m guessing that’s why the first movie tried so hard to show why Edmond did what he did.

    Their treatment of Peter, however, was the weak point in both movies. They tried to make him flawed, which is consistent with the current trend that says good characters still must be shown as flawed and evil characters must still be shown as having something basically good. (OK, they don’t say it that way, but how else are we to interpret the “society made me do it” angle?)

    Becky

  2. I’m not sure that this movie can still be good, but I am waiting to see if it is or not. 🙁

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  4. Update: NarniaWeb has released the Voyage of the Dawn Treader soundtrack list of tracks, 30 of them that will total 72 minutes of listening time. That’s quite a substantial score, especially compared with Harry Greggson-Williams’ work on the previous two films. (However, the Prince Caspian score, sadly, seemed about half copied and barely remixed from the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe score).

    Track names? They start with these 20 (‘ware spoilers!):

    1. Opening Titles
    2. The Painting
    3. High King & Queen Of Narnia
    4. Reepi Cheep
    5. Land Ahoy
    6. The Lone Island
    7. Lord Berne
    8. The Green Mist
    9. Market Forces
    10. 1st Sword
    11. Eustace On Deck
    12. Duel
    13. The Magician’s Island
    14. Lucy & The Invisible Mansion
    15. Coraikin And The Map
    16. Temptation of Lucy
    17. Aslan Appears
    18. The Golden Cavern
    19. Temptation of Edmund
    20. Dragon’s Treasure

    That gives you some idea of the adaptation: as fans have known for a while, they will switch the islands around. The Lone Islands will still be first, but the Magician’s Island will come before Dragon Island, which will be combined with Deathwater Island; and the Dark Island, now the climax of the film, will follow the voyagers’ arrival at Ramandu’s Island. Though perhaps the writers could have found a way to connect the islands “better” (in their view), while preserving the book’s order, I remain optimistic about the soundtrack’s emphasis on each person’s temptation — which enhances that theme from the book, and does not focus on all this “green mist”/seven-swords searching stuff.

  5. […] Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, has helped me a lot. In this miniseries’ last installment, and even more so in part 1, I was more pessimistic, concerned the film had sacrificed themes of […]

What do you think?