Movie Review: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe.

I saw this film last week and have deliberately avoided writing a review, to see how I would feel about it, seven days on. I couldn't make up my mind about whether I liked it or not, or indeed, whether it is cracked up to the great movie that everybody's talking about.

A week on and I'm sorry, but "The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe" is a bit of a disappointment. True, I haven't read the book, so I didn't know what to expect, but then again, I haven't read Harry Potter and I really liked the last two movies.

On the positive side, the special effects are fantastic and the talking animals do merit highly on the "wow" quotient. The scenery is stunning and the final battle scene pretty exciting. In fact, the cinematography reminded me quite a bit of Lord of The Rings (not surprising since this was also partly filmed in New Zealand) and therein lies the problem. The said movie reminded me too much of the Rings trilogy and as a result led to my feeling disappointed with the final result. I am a huge fan of the Lord Of The Rings movies and to be frank, it's probably not a good idea to invoke memories of the glory inherent in LOTR if this new movie isn't going to hit the same emotional targets.

The actress who played Lucy reminded me so much of Shira that I forgot most of the what was going on, marvelling at her resemblance for most of the running time (although Shira's prettier). I actually fell asleep during the first or second reel, which I found incredibly slow-moving. I did perk up when the children met Aslan, so that's a plus.

All in all, maybe I expected too much and should have just enjoyed the ride for what it was. In short I wasn't impressed. Maybe, I'll feel different if I see the movie on TV, once the hype has died down.

Go and see the movie but take a child along. You might get more out of it that way.

The Teacher's Rating

3 (out of 5)