Over-hyped! Just Okay!

Rating: 5/10 (9 December 2005)

Okay I admit, I took the bait due to all the coverage and church screenings of this movie and bought advance tickets for myself and my 12 year old son. He read the book and really didn't want to see it but I STILL got tickets. I should have listened to my son. I don't know why the Christian and church groups are really pumping this movie up. I don't get it. At any rate, here is my 2 cents worth.
First, this movie is really, really over-hyped. The clips shown make the movie appear more than it really is. I don't want to tell you any story lines but I will say this, see it at a matinée performance if you just have to see it and can't wait for HBO. But I will say this, the special effects and the animal characters are extraordinarily done. This movie should be a shoe in to receive an award for special effects. That was the best part of the movie.
Second, they hype this movie as being better than Harry Potter which I promptly paid to see for a second time after watching Narnia. There really is no comparison. Potter is far better movie and I haven't read that book either. Without having read Narnia, the plot was ALL TO PREDICTABLE from the very beginning. There really wasn't that much suspense involved. More than once I whispered to my son what was going to happen next and was right.
Last, I just wanted to say that it seems like there is going to be a tread to Potter like movies and if Narnia is indication of what is to come, then the Potter movies don't have a thing to worry about. Try to duplicate they might, but with Narnia it seems like all they did is a bad imitation. Go if you must, but don't expect very much.