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farlaAs part of being home, we've been going out to see movies. I saw the live action Death Note movie, which was a lot better than I expected. It also kept me guessing despite being familiar with the manga (largely because I didn't know there was any second movie, so I kept wondering how they'd resolve everything when they only had about two hours and Light was still fooling with apples, plus the biggest divergence from the manga plot comes right at the end). They did cheat a bit (there are a number of instances, especially the really climatic scene, where Light is not only acting for the sake of in-movie watchers but apparently acting to screw with the viewers on the other side of the screen) but by and large it's good.
We also saw Prince Caspian. (My brother didn't want to watch it because of the sexism. We're pretty sure that was just him trying to get out of watching a movie, since he's really timid about new things) I wanted to see it largely because I wanted to see how the events of the book get portrayed in the movie, namely the sexism. :) It was about as good as The Golden Compass in a lot of ways, even if I didn't get immersed in that in favor of carrying on a running conversation about Susan's character. Midway through I got distracted by the portrayal of how it's wrong to kill people (if they're kings, otherwise, slaughter 'em all without a second thought), followed by the Aslan stuff. Interestingly, the Aslan stuff works fine as long as you ignore the Jesus parallel.
Movie!Aslan can be read as a protective spirit with limitations, or who can only act if people undertake certain tasks. In this reading, he can't show up at all without the four kids, and they can't be summoned until the horn is found, and once they show up they need to be open to his appearances because he can't manifest directly yet. So Aslan's trying to help, but can't, and that's why the Narnians have been getting slaughtered for hundreds of years.
Now, if you're aware it's a metaphor for almighty Jebus, it starts to get cracky. In that reading, Aslan didn't show up because... well, we're not sure. There was one line about how Narnia only prospers with a son of Adam on the throne, which seems to be referencing the idea of God giving man dominion over nature, and how we're raised above the animals. This would mean Aslan left Narnia to rot for a few hundred years because he doesn't care about the talking animals, centaurs, fauns or dwarfs except as loyal subjects to his humans. Which, well, you can see why the dwarves keep saying "Screw this shit" and trying to defect to some other religion.
Next up, what was Aslan trying to help them (appearing and vanishing) now is a metaphor about how it's impossible to succeed without Jesus, and that also, Jesus likes to give really vague hints to see how far you'll got on blind faith.
When the kids don't properly subliminate themselves to the will of Aslan (who's busy not showing up), they get a lot of their subjects killed. (Said subjects were obeying the rulers Aslan appointed over them, making this one of those damned if you do, damned if you don't moments). Later Lucy asks Aslan why he didn't appear (because he wanted to make her come find him) and if all the death could have been avoided if she'd done what he wanted, and Aslan gives this non-answer that pretty much means "Well, yeah." Then at the end Aslan terrifies/humiliates one of the dwarves for the crime of pointing out earlier that, while the kids might have faith in Aslan showing up because he helped them out way back then, Aslan hasn't ever shown up to help while they've been slaughtered for the last few hundred years, and hasn't been seen in living memory. You may recognize the Jesus metaphor, only instead of actually addressing it, they defaulted to the "Well, when he does show up won't you all be sorry!!" argument.
Really, it's all very blame-the-victim. Lucy's the one Aslan initially appears to, so she's always the one who expects to see him, so he shows up for her. Other people are told that they just didn't want to see Aslan enough. Even when it's clear he flat out hasn't been showing up for generations even to those who have an almost cultlike trust in him despite never seeing him at all. Aslan-as-limited-spirit has the excuse he wasn't able to, and so people's trust that he wanted to help them but couldn't ends up being validated. Aslan-as-Jesus-Metaphor just begs the question of why Jesus is such a jerk to us the way Aslan is to the Narnians.
Other interesting things were that correctness at any given point can be mapped out as Susan - Peter&Edmund - Lucy. If Susan agrees, it's a terrible idea. Peter's suggestions will be good, but fail because of the lack of Jesus. Lucy will be right. (Despite the fact Lucy is always right, the other kids tend to forget. It's one of those heavy-handed metaphors that doesn't make sense if you've already changed the world so the main characters are tripping over miracles and chatting with God whenever they feel like it.) I want to see the earlier movie now because I'm really curious how they're handling Susan (especially as my pet theory is that the whole Last Battle stuff was never intended in the early books, and so Susan's characterization is supposed to be her led to Jesus, not foreshadowing her missing out on Narnian Heaven, but anyone working now is aware of the whole series of books including the end.)
Also! The gryphon's design was awesome. See, they have tufted tails, only instead of fur it's feathers they spread out like a rudder. They also made some female centaurs who looked cool, and Susan got to slaughter people with arrows even if Caspian got all the credit for taking out the last guy one time. Caspian really sucked, frankly.
We also saw Prince Caspian. (My brother didn't want to watch it because of the sexism. We're pretty sure that was just him trying to get out of watching a movie, since he's really timid about new things) I wanted to see it largely because I wanted to see how the events of the book get portrayed in the movie, namely the sexism. :) It was about as good as The Golden Compass in a lot of ways, even if I didn't get immersed in that in favor of carrying on a running conversation about Susan's character. Midway through I got distracted by the portrayal of how it's wrong to kill people (if they're kings, otherwise, slaughter 'em all without a second thought), followed by the Aslan stuff. Interestingly, the Aslan stuff works fine as long as you ignore the Jesus parallel.
Movie!Aslan can be read as a protective spirit with limitations, or who can only act if people undertake certain tasks. In this reading, he can't show up at all without the four kids, and they can't be summoned until the horn is found, and once they show up they need to be open to his appearances because he can't manifest directly yet. So Aslan's trying to help, but can't, and that's why the Narnians have been getting slaughtered for hundreds of years.
Now, if you're aware it's a metaphor for almighty Jebus, it starts to get cracky. In that reading, Aslan didn't show up because... well, we're not sure. There was one line about how Narnia only prospers with a son of Adam on the throne, which seems to be referencing the idea of God giving man dominion over nature, and how we're raised above the animals. This would mean Aslan left Narnia to rot for a few hundred years because he doesn't care about the talking animals, centaurs, fauns or dwarfs except as loyal subjects to his humans. Which, well, you can see why the dwarves keep saying "Screw this shit" and trying to defect to some other religion.
Next up, what was Aslan trying to help them (appearing and vanishing) now is a metaphor about how it's impossible to succeed without Jesus, and that also, Jesus likes to give really vague hints to see how far you'll got on blind faith.
When the kids don't properly subliminate themselves to the will of Aslan (who's busy not showing up), they get a lot of their subjects killed. (Said subjects were obeying the rulers Aslan appointed over them, making this one of those damned if you do, damned if you don't moments). Later Lucy asks Aslan why he didn't appear (because he wanted to make her come find him) and if all the death could have been avoided if she'd done what he wanted, and Aslan gives this non-answer that pretty much means "Well, yeah." Then at the end Aslan terrifies/humiliates one of the dwarves for the crime of pointing out earlier that, while the kids might have faith in Aslan showing up because he helped them out way back then, Aslan hasn't ever shown up to help while they've been slaughtered for the last few hundred years, and hasn't been seen in living memory. You may recognize the Jesus metaphor, only instead of actually addressing it, they defaulted to the "Well, when he does show up won't you all be sorry!!" argument.
Really, it's all very blame-the-victim. Lucy's the one Aslan initially appears to, so she's always the one who expects to see him, so he shows up for her. Other people are told that they just didn't want to see Aslan enough. Even when it's clear he flat out hasn't been showing up for generations even to those who have an almost cultlike trust in him despite never seeing him at all. Aslan-as-limited-spirit has the excuse he wasn't able to, and so people's trust that he wanted to help them but couldn't ends up being validated. Aslan-as-Jesus-Metaphor just begs the question of why Jesus is such a jerk to us the way Aslan is to the Narnians.
Other interesting things were that correctness at any given point can be mapped out as Susan - Peter&Edmund - Lucy. If Susan agrees, it's a terrible idea. Peter's suggestions will be good, but fail because of the lack of Jesus. Lucy will be right. (Despite the fact Lucy is always right, the other kids tend to forget. It's one of those heavy-handed metaphors that doesn't make sense if you've already changed the world so the main characters are tripping over miracles and chatting with God whenever they feel like it.) I want to see the earlier movie now because I'm really curious how they're handling Susan (especially as my pet theory is that the whole Last Battle stuff was never intended in the early books, and so Susan's characterization is supposed to be her led to Jesus, not foreshadowing her missing out on Narnian Heaven, but anyone working now is aware of the whole series of books including the end.)
Also! The gryphon's design was awesome. See, they have tufted tails, only instead of fur it's feathers they spread out like a rudder. They also made some female centaurs who looked cool, and Susan got to slaughter people with arrows even if Caspian got all the credit for taking out the last guy one time. Caspian really sucked, frankly.
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Date: 2008-05-28 04:11 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-05-28 02:58 pm (UTC)And that battle in the castle––The Two Towers vibe much?
The CGI guys worked for months on the programs and the LotR didn't show every possible angle. You need to see every angle to properly appreciate all the work they did! Dammit get back here we need to show you the cinematic scene in the new Harry Potter movie where they fly down-up-down-down-sideways this time!
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Date: 2008-05-29 12:23 am (UTC)I kind of want to see the movie just for Susan actually being useful and the female centaurs. *is probably a furry* Also, I heard Reepicheep was le jus d'awesome.
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Date: 2008-06-03 02:32 pm (UTC)