Needle narnia noo. It's the goon show.

http://www.northjersey.com/page.php?qstr=eXJpcnk3ZjczN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXkzNTkmZmdiZWw3Zjd2cWVlRUV5eTY4MzI5MjAmeXJpcnk3ZjcxN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXkz

Some evangelicals not tied to Disney have piggybacked
on "Narnia" to promote churchgoing and Christianity.

"Which would drive Lewis nuts," said Roy M. Anker,
author of "Catching Light: Looking for God in the
Movies."

Clearly the article writer and the book author haven't read or
are ignoring Lewis' apologetics crap. This film is just more
example of "whoring for jeezus".

I'd rather see a proper movie of Lloyd Alexander's "Chronicles
of Prydain" (a/k/a "The Black Cauldron"). John Wyndham and
Michael Moorcock (the Elric and Corum books) deserve the full
treatment more than Lewis. Hell, I'd rather see the cheesy
1980s "Thieves' World" books made into a movie....

J.K. Rowling was inspired by Tolkein and Lewis? Likely only
to the extent that no such escapist literature existed before
it, much like Verne's and Wells' popularity when they appeared
at the same time in the late 19th century. There was nothing
else as fantastic to read; I doubt she was reading them for the
religious crap. (And I mean "fantastic" as "fantasy-based",
not "wonderful".)


Bob Dog
Atheist #153 = 1^3 + 5^3 + 3^3
EAC's chief cook and brainwasher

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"Sooner or later the despairing Churches will try to get
a world-alliance with something like Fascist tyranny to
check the growth of Atheism. It is their one hope."
- Joseph McCabe

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Onward, Christian marketers

Friday, December 9, 2005

By ED BEESON
HERALD NEWS

Of the 11 materials used to make snow for "The Chronicles of
Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe," one was chopped-up
diapers.

"These were from Welsh diapers," set designer Peter Cleveland
was quoted as saying in the "Narnia" press notes. He added that
the film's production crew preferred diaper-snow because it made
it easier to "eliminate" footprints from the film's set before
each take.

Now that's movie magic.

Disney Studios, which co-produced "Narnia," isn't saying much
else about the diaper-snow it used to make this would-be fantasy
franchise.

Likewise, Disney is not saying much about its outreach to
Christian moviegoers. The company acknowledges that it is
marketing the film to those who lined up last year for Mel
Gibson's "The Passion of the Christ." They are an obvious
audience for "Narnia," which British literary critic C.S. Lewis
infused with Christian imagery and themes when he wrote the
seven-volume series a half-century ago.

But the studio has tried to lessen their significance by saying
that it doesn't want to appear to be promoting the film to one
audience at the exclusion of others. In an interview with the
Los Angeles Times, Disney Studios Chairman ***** Cook said the
company had spent less than 5 percent, or less than $6 million,
of the film's reputed $80 million marketing budget on courting
churchgoers.

Some call this approach innovative because it promotes the film
on two distinct levels: as a religious experience and as a
family-friendly fantasy adventure. "They're not hoping for an
'either/or' audience, but a 'both/and' audience," said David C.
Downing, author of several books on Lewis, including "Into the
Wardrobe: C.S. Lewis and the Narnia Chronicles."

But others say Disney is playing down, if not obscuring, the
role that Christian audiences will play in making a hit out of
"Narnia," which arrives in the shadow of the blockbuster "Harry
Potter and the Goblet of Fire."

Disney has pledged that if "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe"
is a hit, then it will roll out sequels as early as 2007.

Brandon Gray, president of Box Office Mojo, an online film
industry analyst, says Disney has said it is anticipating strong
word-of-mouth publicity among Christian audiences.

"Like 'The Passion,' Christians will do the marketing for them,"
Gray said. "They (Disney marketers) just need to plant the seed."

To that end, Disney has hired several Christian marketing firms
- including Motive Marketing, which helped "The Passion of the
Christ" gross $611 million worldwide - to sell "Narnia" to
churchgoers. Paul Lauer, Motive Marketing's president, did not
respond to phone and e-mail messages for comment, but his firm
has built a high-profile (and official) "Narnia" Web site,
www.narniaresources.com, where church leaders, parents and
schools can order free, elaborate "teaching guides" and games.

Disney has said that its promotional materials do not play up
the film's Christian message. But the ideological base of some
of the film's strongest supporters is easy to discern. Reviews
on Narniaresources.com come from prominent conservative and
evangelical Christians, including a film critic for the advocacy
group Focus on the Family and a pastor at the 20,000-strong
Saddleback Church of Lake Forest, Calif.

"Many churches are seeing the movie as an opportunity for
evangelism, and I understand that," wrote Alan Jacobs, author of
"The Narnian: The Life and Imagination of C.S. Lewis," in an
e-mail. "But I hope they're telling people to go to the move
because it's FUN, not because it's spiritually good for them."

Not all are. Some evangelicals not tied to Disney have
piggybacked on "Narnia" to promote churchgoing and Christianity.

"Which would drive Lewis nuts," said Roy M. Anker, author of
"Catching Light: Looking for God in the Movies." He recalls
seeing a billboard in Grand Rapids, Mich., where he is a
professor of English at Calvin College, that used the icon of
Aslan to promote a local church. "Come and see the real lion,"
the billboard read.

While Lewis became a fervent Christian later in life, the world
of "Narnia" first came to him in a series of non-religious
images: a lamppost in a forest; a gentle creature, half-man,
half-deer, carrying a parasol through the snow; an evil white
witch riding a sledge on an icy lane. Only later did Lewis
become aware of the Christian themes he wove into his fantasy.

"He said he wanted to write a story that sneaked past the
watchful dragon," Downing, the Narnian scholar, said, using
Lewis' term for the stern old theologians who believed they held
the keys of biblical interpretation.

The story is about four siblings - Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy
- who discover in the mansion where they live a portal to another
world inside a big, brown wardrobe.

The portal leads to Narnia, a magical and wintry world inhabited
by talking animals and ruled by the evil White Witch.

Aslan, the lion king who stands for Jesus Christ in the
narrative, has mounted an army to topple her. But first he waits
for a prophecy to be fulfilled: for four human children - the
"sons of Adam" and the "daughters of Eve," they are called - to
appear in Narnia and sit on its four thrones.

It was J.R.R. Tolkien, author of "The Lord of the Rings," a
contemporary of Lewis and a devout Catholic, who sparked Lewis'
conversion to Christianity. It was also Tolkien's Middle Earth,
the fantasy world where "Lord of the Rings" took place, that
influenced Lewis to create his world of Narnia.

And J.K. Rowling cited both authors' works as inspiration for
her "Harry Potter" series.

So it is both fitting and ironic that the success of the "Rings"
and "Potter" movies paved the way, both technologically and
financially, for "Narnia" to be adapted as a film.

Half of the film's reputed $180 million budget was financed by
Philip Anschutz, the communications mogul, multibillionaire and
passionate Christian behind Walden Media, which has made
wholesome family fare like the box-office hit "Holes" and misses
like the $120 million "Around the World in 80 Days." Anschutz,
who also personally financed the Oscar-winner biopic "Ray," owns
the film rights to all seven "Narnia" books.

While buzz from the Christian community has surrounded the film
from the start, some say curiosity about the film's secular
side - like its special effects - is starting to overshadow the
debate about its religious tones.

Richard Horgan, a box-office analyst for the online ticket
merchant Fandago.com, said that if "Narnia" succeeds, it would
offer proof that studio franchises have been revived. But a
triumph for Christian filmmaking? "Not yet," he said. "It's
definitely not 'The Passion of the Narnians.'"

At two hours and 20 minutes, it conceivably takes longer to
watch the movie than to read the book. While the film is
faithful to the book, it does modernize the story by adding
action sequences that were small, if nonexistent, in the text.

The film's script also echoes modern anxiety - like the one that
filmmakers must feel on the eve of a major movie's release.

Right before the film's climactic battle, Peter, the eldest
sibling, surveys a field full of the White Witch's army. He
tells a companion, a centaur, that he is worried that Aslan's
forces are hopelessly outnumbered.

"Numbers do not win a battle," the centaur assures Peter.

"No. ... But I bet they help," the boy king replies.

Reach Ed Beeson at (973) 569-7042 or beeson@northjersey.com.

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