One soundtrack album of the film has been released with religious music, the other with secular pop. Its director, Andrew Adamson (of Shrek fame), says the movie's Christian themes are "open to the audience to interpret". So there has been a queasy ambivalence about how to sell the Narnia film here. There are too few practising Christians in the empty pews of this most secular nation to pack cinemas.
For all the enthusiasm of the churches, Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ bombed in Britain and warehouses are stuffed with unsold DVDs of that stomach-churner.
It has aroused protests from Americans United for Separation of Church and State, which complains that "a governmental endorsement of the book's religious message is in violation of the First Amendment to the US Constitution".ĭisney may come to regret this alliance with Christians, at least on this side of the Atlantic. The owner of Walden Media is both a big Republican donor and a donor to the Florida governor's book promotion - a neat synergy of politics, religion and product placement. Walden Media, co-producer of the movie, offers a "17-week Narnia Bible study for children". The president's brother, Jeb Bush, the governor of Florida, is organising a scheme for every child in his state to read the book. The Mission America Coalition is "inviting church leaders around the country to consider the fantastic ministry opportunity presented by the release of this film". (Are the children of single mothers in special need of the word?) And a Kent parish is giving away £10,000 worth of film tickets to single-parent families. Even the Methodists have written a special Narnia-themed service. The Christian radio station Premier is urging churches to hold services on the theme of The Gospel According to Narnia. But then, that is also deeply faithful to the book's own arm-twisting emotional call to believers.ĭisney is deliberately promoting this film to the religious - it has appointed Outreach, an evangelical publisher, to promote the Christian message behind the movie in British churches. By the end, it feels profoundly manipulative, as Disney usually does. But from its opening scenes of the bombing of their Finchley home in the blitz and the tear-jerking evacuation from their mother in a (spotlessly clean) steam train, there is an emotional undertow to this film that tugs on the heart-strings from the first frames.
The four English children and their world are all authentically CS Lewis olde England. It is beautiful to look at and wonderfully acted. This new Disney film is a remarkably faithful rendition of the book - faithful in both senses.
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