Well... nice CGI

Rating: 4/10 (3 January 2006)

What to say? I truly expected more. Trying to please both adult and children audiences, I am afraid that Disney fell flat in between.
Well, actually I cannot speak for the six-years-olds: They might love it and I wouldn't know, but then again the whole movie is so slowly paced that your average hyperactive kid is bound to loose track between two cuts. That's Narnia's biggest problem: It's plain boring. You just never get involved.
I appreciate the effort Disney made to give more depth to the story: Peter's got more doubts about doing the right thing, Edmund is more of a rebel but simply a spoiled kid. Problem is though: kids (for whom Lewis wrote his book) won't know the difference while adults, who (like me) might appreciate a little more character development, may find many issues unresolved. There are movies that appeal to both young and old, but Narnia certainly does not join the fray.
One more thing: "Nice CGI" refers to the animals, whose animation is sometimes short of outstanding. On the other hand there are just too many obvious computer graphics. Every other minute you get the impression of watching a video game. This might be due to somebody thinking that an impressive lion's fur carries a movie farther than a realistic scenery. Well, you can't spend one buck twice...
All in all, I don't know for whom this film was made (certainly not for me) and I can find no excuse to recommend it.