Great Effort. Bring on the sequels!

Rating: 9/10 (27 December 2005)

Overall I thought this movie adaptation was fantastic and it's only recently that the computer technology could catch up with the imagination of CS Lewis. I would heed the warning that young children might find some of the scenes dealing with death a bit disturbing but rest assure there is a happy ending.
Not having read the books, my main introduction to the world of Narnia was actually from the BBC TV series that I enjoyed watching as a kid. What I remembered from it was the gentle, majestic score at the beginning and end of each segment. The BBC did set the bar high for this and while for the most part the score in this Disney movie is competent I don't understand why in certain scene there were synthesised drum machines. It just gave those scenes as extremely cheap, tacky feel to it. The Lord of the Rings managed to avoid this, how hard could it have been.
The little girl who plays Lucy is just brilliant, I was absolutely enchanted by her. The older children's acting was slightly wooden in the beginning of the movie but as it progressed they manage to pull off a good effort.
I thought the casting of the white witch was great as well. It reminded me a lot of the demonic figure in Passion of the Chirst where evil has a tempting look. It's actually weird that as a kid watching the BBC TV series I never cottoned onto the fact the story had Christian overtones to it apart from the reference to the Sons and Daughters of Adam and Eve.