(no subject)
I began pestering lorinan, the Facebook guy, on the 12th. We talked about boring things like his teaching school at Shandong Uni still, the Chinese and Japanese languages, and then things like anime cons and Star Wars. It was a little weird. He hasn't even been in the state for about seven years, plays Legend of the Five Rings (you should have seen biglazydragon's head perk up at that), and remembers some of the crazier people from high school. I'm not sure what to think now, but maybe I can get him to come to Nan Desu Kan next year when he's come back to the US.
The insanity that led to last night's LJ entry was preceded by (and probably helped by) biglazydragon taking me to see "Narnia." While I always sneer at changes from books, I was pleased to realize they left a lot of lines from the book intact. I am not Christian, but I did enjoy the majority of the series as a child. I think they treated it pretty well, minus the one very, very obvious green-screened scene, a few changes to events: was the waterfall scene really necessary? Or the window breaking? Or the bombing at the beginning? Cutting out the friendly ex-stone giant? And neglecting to mention that Aslan is a lion and not human at the proper point. Wasn't Edmund mentioned in the Father Christmas scene? And so on.
Points for using Liam Neeson as Aslan's voice (mm... sexy... except I had random flashes of Aslan as Ra's al Ghul from "Batman Begins" and I had to snicker if Aslan mentioned prophecy). Excellent CG on Aslan, the gryphons, and other beasts of the realm. The White Witch's make-up and regality was perfect; I wanted to see the movie from the moment I saw her in the preview. The lion-like headdress she wore during the battle was very cool and seemed to be a nod to Aslan's own power over her.
For any Narnia lovers who may have noticed that "Fenris Ulf," the wolf captain of the White Witch's secret police is called "Maugrim" and were annoyed at the change as I was, please read the first paragraph of this article. Now let us be annoyed at book publishers who keep changing stupid things from British to US editions of novels. (What do you mean, none of us will know what a Philosopher's Stone is? We can bloody well look it up in a dictionary! Or do something like in the Series of Unfortunate Events and explain it in a footnote or endnote for the lazy ones.) I cannot remember whether the Emperor-Over-the-Sea was ever mentioned in the first book, though I could swear he was and thus I was somewhat annoyed that it didn't pop up in the movie.
I hope they manage to make good movie versions of Prince Caspian and Voyage of the Dawn Treader and even The Magician's Nephew. I'd go see those ones. biglazydragon has said he'll re-read the books, since he didn't even remember what happened in the morning on the Stone Table--he may have stopped reading just before that point.
The insanity that led to last night's LJ entry was preceded by (and probably helped by) biglazydragon taking me to see "Narnia." While I always sneer at changes from books, I was pleased to realize they left a lot of lines from the book intact. I am not Christian, but I did enjoy the majority of the series as a child. I think they treated it pretty well, minus the one very, very obvious green-screened scene, a few changes to events: was the waterfall scene really necessary? Or the window breaking? Or the bombing at the beginning? Cutting out the friendly ex-stone giant? And neglecting to mention that Aslan is a lion and not human at the proper point. Wasn't Edmund mentioned in the Father Christmas scene? And so on.
Points for using Liam Neeson as Aslan's voice (mm... sexy... except I had random flashes of Aslan as Ra's al Ghul from "Batman Begins" and I had to snicker if Aslan mentioned prophecy). Excellent CG on Aslan, the gryphons, and other beasts of the realm. The White Witch's make-up and regality was perfect; I wanted to see the movie from the moment I saw her in the preview. The lion-like headdress she wore during the battle was very cool and seemed to be a nod to Aslan's own power over her.
For any Narnia lovers who may have noticed that "Fenris Ulf," the wolf captain of the White Witch's secret police is called "Maugrim" and were annoyed at the change as I was, please read the first paragraph of this article. Now let us be annoyed at book publishers who keep changing stupid things from British to US editions of novels. (What do you mean, none of us will know what a Philosopher's Stone is? We can bloody well look it up in a dictionary! Or do something like in the Series of Unfortunate Events and explain it in a footnote or endnote for the lazy ones.) I cannot remember whether the Emperor-Over-the-Sea was ever mentioned in the first book, though I could swear he was and thus I was somewhat annoyed that it didn't pop up in the movie.
I hope they manage to make good movie versions of Prince Caspian and Voyage of the Dawn Treader and even The Magician's Nephew. I'd go see those ones. biglazydragon has said he'll re-read the books, since he didn't even remember what happened in the morning on the Stone Table--he may have stopped reading just before that point.