By January, you should feel well and truly Narnia-ed. This is because the spirit of Christmas 2005 is being brought to you unmissably via shopping centres, Nestle cereal packets and McDonalds Happy Meals through multiple illustrations of frosty images of the White Witch and the warm magical profile of Aslan the Lion.
If you’ve gone anywhere near the children’s books during your lifetime, you will probably have a strong opinion about the fact that Disney have got hold of the series of films that will be made over the coming years. Perhaps you have misgivings, strongly influenced by the adaptations of The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter. Will they mess up the imaginations of future readers? Will they trash our own mental picture of Narnia? Are they going to alter the strong gospel allegory in favour of a Hollywoodian secular message of goo?
Influences
Let’s look at three of the big influences on the making of the movie, together with their motives and beliefs: the Director and co-writer, Andrew Adamson; C.S. Lewis’s stepson and co-writer, Douglas Gresham; and finally, the distribution and publicity machine of Disney.
