Very, very lightweight.

Rating: 4/10 (19 April 2006)

Well, this kind of light weight fantasy adventure is gonna become more and more common now. It's really a shame. Could someone, at least once, create a fantasy epic with raw brutality, pitch black story and with no concern for the budget (aka. "we need to make it for a larger focus group, hence the mild violence and language and easy-to-melt-characters").
I hate (yes HATE) the kids. The actors who plays them really suck, and I am usually very, very tolerant (always looking for positive upsides to a performance), but this just is to much crap. The director does not make any kind of statement in his "work", and is pretty much non-present throughout the entire film. The Oscar-nominated special effects is not really that good, not "A-Sound-of-Thunder-bad" but not very special at all, with the small exception of Aslan who actually looks like a real lion whenever he does not speak. The voice of Aslan by Liam Neeson is not good (Liam is a great actor, but the voice does not fit... or maybe the audio-mix is just crappy). The one thing that makes it worth watching is Tilda Swinton as the Queen, and also some the set-designs.
All in all, two and a half hours of: "When is the suspense ever gonna start!?", and; "When will the four disturbing children die already!"