Part
1 / Part
2
When I
got the call from JoBlo, in late September, asking me if I’d be
interested in flying to New Zealand to visit the set of THE
CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE,
I immediately cursed him out and promptly hung up! I’d made it
very clear to him after we saw THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF
THE KING in December of ’03 that I’d had my fill of hobbits,
enough in fact, to last me a lifetime.
Truth
be told, I like the LOTR films (the first and last one
anyway), but those hobbits were beginning to haunt me in my dreams,
and not the fun Jennifer Love Hewitt kind of “haunting” either.
However, after I hung up, I did some research and discovered that
C.S. Lewis’ seven books about the adventures in the land of Narnia
are altogether different from J.R.R. Tolkien’s hobbit trilogy. It
was an honest mistake on my part, you see, instead of growing up
reading Dr. Seuss and C.S. Lewis’ wonderful childhood tales, I was
instead enjoying a steady diet of Mad magazine and Archie comic
books (thanks for nothing mom & dad!). So I called JoBlo back to
apologize, took his chastisement for about a half hour, went to the
bookstore to buy some of Lewis’ books and then boarded a plane to
the land right under the land down under…
READ
PART 2 OF OUR SET VISIT HERE
As
I read both The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe and The
Magician’s Nephew on my flight there, I got a fairly good
grasp of the mythology and history of the many characters, human and
animal, that inhabit the land of Narnia. I read the latter only
because it comes first chronologically and I wanted to be sure I
didn’t miss anything. Well, I was surprised to discover that it
wasn’t even necessary as far as following the storyline goes. The
Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe was the first to be published
in 1950 (it comes second chronologically) and just as it didn’t do
the Star Wars franchise any harm to start mid-stream
(episodes 4, 5, 6), I seriously doubt feel it’ll hinder this
franchise-to-be either.
I found both
books to be engrossing and escapist enough for me to get my mind off
of flying, which I dread. However, what struck me most is how I’d
already begun to picture and embrace some of these larger-than-life
characters, particularly Aslan the Lion, the White Witch Jadis and
Mr. Tumnus, the faun. I’d also started to wonder how they’d
create some of the impressive and significant locales in the book:
mainly the White Witch’s Courtyard and the Stone Table sequences.
In other words, I’d begun to already feel strangely close to the
story, with its cozy, familiar feel and otherworldly inhabitants.
Had I become a
mini-fanboy already? Could it happen that fast? I had suddenly
become quite curious as to how the filmmakers planned to capture
this magical tale with it’s mythological creatures and talking
beasts on celluloid…convincingly and competently. That isn’t to
say I was skeptical per se, but like any fanboy (okay, mini-fanboy),
they would have to convince me that they’re going in all
guns a blazin’ and they were willing to go to any and all lengths
to make certain this doesn’t turn into a colossal misjudgment
and/or contamination of a beloved, world-renowned childhood book
(and yes, that was directly aimed at the people who adapted/violated
the Dr. Seuss books).
The filmmakers
would have their hands full in attempting to bring the evil,
beautiful White Witch Jadis, the Great Lion Aslan, the four brave
Pevensie children and a multitude of centaurs, giants, hags, dryads,
satyrs, goblins, beavers, wolves, fauns, eagles, cheetahs, boggles,
ogres, minobaurs, minotaurs, horses, foxes, dwarves, lions, mice,
reindeer, unicorns, Father Christmas (!), and all the other magical
creatures from the land of Narnia - to life. In fact, the only beast
not mentioned in the novel is Courtney Love.
For LOTR
fans that are suffering withdrawal symptoms due to the conclusion of
their trilogy, all is not lost as there are many similarities with
this movie.
-
Trees with
minds of their own
-
Dwarves
-
Strange lands
and worlds
-
Both
author’s first names are initialed (okay, I’m stretching)
-
Massive
battles between good & evil
-
Both
directors are native New Zealanders and shot their movies on
their home soil
It’s no
surprise both Tolkien and Lewis were good friends. Fortunately the
Narnia books are hobbit-free and even more fortunately...the movie
will be Astin-free. Coincidentally, I spotted Rudy in the hotel
lobby the next day, when we made the trip to visit the Armageddon
Pulp Convention in Wellington. Before continuing on, please read our
coverage of the panel for The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe,
at that convention, here,
as a lot of what you can expect in the movie was discussed at
length there.
For those of you
who aren’t familiar with the book and/or need a refresher course
on the plot, here is a basic summary of the movie’s plotline
straight from its production notes:
Lewis’
timeless adventure follows the exploits of the four Pevensie
siblings – Lucy, Edmund, Susan and Peter – in World War II
England who enter the world of Narnia through a magical wardrobe
while playing a game of ‘hide-and-seek’ in the rural country
home of an elderly professor. Once there, the children discover a
charming, peaceful land inhabited by talking beasts, dwarfs, fauns,
centaurs and giants that has become a world cursed to eternal winter
by the evil White Witch, Jadis. Under the guidance of a noble and
mystical ruler, the lion Aslan, the children fight to overcome the
White Witch’s powerful hold over Narnia in a spectacular battle
that will free Narnia from Jadis’ icy spell forever.
So, let’s
begin…
Things got
started pretty quickly, as we (I was accompanied by four other
web-journalists) were whisked off to the soundstages and production
offices of the film soon after checking into our hotel rooms in the
city of Aukland. Ernie Malik, the film’s location publicist
was the one who showed us around for most of our 5-day tour and
coordinated the cast & crew interviews that we did - we’ll be
posting those in the coming weeks/months. As far as the sets go, we
were asked not to take photographs so I’ll describe, as best I
can, what I saw.
THE
WHITE WITCH’S COURTYARD
The White
Witch’s Courtyard was the first one we were taken to and it was
easily the one that impressed me most. We saw close to two dozen
life-size creatures (meaning there weren’t any miniatures), frozen
in statuesque form and in mid-animation; all very eerie, precise and
realistic. 90+ creatures, we were told, had been constructed in this
form. The other statues will be used in the lengthy final battle
between good & evil at the tail end of the film. The gray and
stony centaurs (male & female), hedgehogs, lions, boars, bears,
rhinos and the rest all looked truly extraordinary but nothing was
more awing and magnificent than Rumblebuffin the giant, frozen in
space with his weapon raised above his head (in mid-battle) with
that horrific, fierce look on his face. Close to three times my
height, it was odd to see the giant that I had read about for the
first time on the plane just a few hours ago, in front of me and
among all the rest of Aslan’s virtuous “soldiers” – dead,
for the time being.
One other
“statue” that stood out for me and brought a smile to my face
was one I spotted in a corner further away from the rest. It was of
an extremely detailed dwarf couple, man and wife, holding one
another and pointing upwards, presumably just as they got
‘zapped’ by the witch’s wand. It was the one time I was truly
tempted to sneak my camera out, had I brought it along…
The
courtyard itself is completely surrounded by ice, which will look
even grander in scale when the CG-techies are done with it. There is
a scattering of ghostly, leafless trees as well in the area. On
another visit there we got to meet the director, Andrew Adamson (Shrek,
Shrek 2), who kindly introduced himself to us and took a
fiver away from behind the camera. A long, blond-haired hippie
looking type (and that’s a good thing), he was pleased to see and
hear our reactions about the majestic set. This was the first time I
spotted Aslan’s head as well; it was probably there for lighting
purposes. I’m not certain if it was attached to its body or not,
as it was behind a lot of camera equipment, trees and statues but it
stood out mainly because it was the only thing of color and life in
the otherwise dank, colorless and graveyard-like surroundings. If
this set, which comes into play at a key point in the movie, was any
indication of the effort they’re putting into this film, then we
were sure not to be disappointed with the rest…
Before leaving
that set, we were escorted to a gigantic Mac computer that the
director of photography, Don McAlpine, fiddles with. On it,
we were shown movie stills from the opening 20 minutes of the film,
from the children’s evacuation from war-torn London up to and
including the famed magical wardrobe, which had a variety of trees
encrusted on it; undoubtedly there to symbolize the Narnian apple
tree it was built out of and which gave it its power. The period
look of the Pevensie kids, rubble-riddled London, railway stations
and the professor’s country house blew all of our minds. The
thought and care put into every detail of the costumes and
production design, was enough to rival any from a Merchant/Ivory
picture. It was really that good…
READ
PART 2 OF OUR SET VISIT HERE
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