I bought the Blu-rays of all three Walden films. I can’t really say that I regretted doing it because there are portions of the movies that are really well done such as Lucy meeting Aslan for the first time. Although they certainly could have been done better there is enough in them to make them worthwhile watching. I don’t think that Aslan was diminished so much as being kept in the background. I don’t remember any parts of the films that actually say that the world is saved by human intervention. If the Pevensies helped in saving it even by giving some hope that isn’t saying that Aslan didn’t save Narnia. I don’t think that the filmmakers intended deliberately to have humans save the world instead of Aslan, but they should have given the Lion a more central dominant role. This would have made the movies much better.

And because there never will be a perfect Narnia movie it is better to appreciate the good that the Walden films have to offer.  I am afraid that Greta Gerwig is not going to give us anything that is more faithful to the books so I have to be satisfied with Walden, or at least partially pleased with the films they provided us.

I quite enjoyed it at the beginning. There were a few changes I didn't like but then there were some additions I did. So I was reasonably happy with it until the scene where they met Father Christmas. In the book Father Christmas finally is able to come to Narnia because 'Aslan is on the move, the witch's magic is weakening.' In the film though it is the hope the Pevensies brought that supposedly weakened the witch's power. To me this was just outright Pelagianism, ascribing salvation to human rather than divine action and the film just went downhill from there. In particular I felt the film version of Aslan was seriously diminished compared to the way he was in the book. 

After that experience I did not bother either to see PC and VDT at the cinema or to get the DVD's. I did record both when they were finally shown on terrestrial TV, but although I still have both recordings I have never managed to watch either straight through.

For me the Walden films just deviate too much from the books to tolerate. From what we've heard about the Netflix production though, the Walden films will probably seem ultra faithful in comparison

No doubt I was comparing moments of it with the BBC series. I was never too happy with the witch, feeling she wasn't close enough to the description and illustrations of the book, or how I saw as a closer portrayal by Barbara Kellerman. Some of the CGI animals still bother me to this day, such as the designs of the beavers (a bit orange for beavers?) and Maugrim (more of a fierce husky... thing than a wolf). 

Despite some gripes, I still felt it an enjoyable enough film and clearly liked it enough to get it on DVD.

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I remember seeing Prince Caspian with a friend who was being very kind to see it with me because I don't think it was really his thing otherwise! 😆 What I can't remember now is how much I liked it that first time - whether its changes from the book and dark, battle-heavy scenes were an off-put or I just embraced it as still an enjoyable enough movie. Again, I got it on DVD, so it can't have been that terrible a first experience!

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Dawn Treader... Now this has been bothering me last night and this morning. I cannot remember seeing it at the cinema whatsoever. Not where I saw it, or who I saw it with. It's a mystery I feel I must solve... What I do know is that I did see it at the cinema, because another forum I checked said so. I don't know how much of a reflection on the film this zilch-memory is... But I did get it on DVD? 😀 !

The Narnia films did not have as large a budget as Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings movies, but at least some of the acting could have been as good.  I don’t think it would have been possible to do Narnia on an epic scale with the money that was available, but they still could have created something which was more like the original stories. I don’t think it is as important to make an expensive movie as it is to adapt the story reasonably well. Sometimes doing the story on a smaller scale can be just as respectful to the source material and may have better results.  The Walden films succeeded in making a good adaptation in parts of the films, but it didn’t always work so well throughout the entire franchise. I guess we have to be thankful for what they did get right since it isn’t likely any time soon that we will have better adaptations.

(1) Invest more time in letting each of the stories speak for themselves.

(2) stick as close to the original stories as possible, deviate as little as possible (although this does not mean they need to do word-for-word like BBC did).

(3) Keep the lovely, magical and homely elements as lovely, magical and homely as possible - as the BBC did with the meal at the beavers, the resting at the beavers hiding place and meeting Father Christmas scene - although both versions should have shown the romps in LWW & PC as well.

(4) Bigger is not always better - the huge numbers on the battle ground was IMO a weak attempt at making LWW more "epic" - it could have been epic with Aslan's side having a much smaller army - maybe 200-300 and the White Witch's side being a bit bigger than that, but not attempting to over-epic the battle scenes.

(5) Have the most focus go to Aslan - for all its weaknesses, the BBC got that part pretty well right - the Aslan death scene feels sadder to me in the BBC production because you see and hear and get to know him more before it than what you do in the Walden Media productions.  And again, his resurrection in the BBC feels more joyful to me, because of the emotion of the death scene and the familiarity with Aslan.

If you did these things and basically had the best elements of the BBC and Walden Media productions, I think we would have got "epic" films - as I wrote earlier, not in the same way as the LOTR films are "epic" but I feel they would have had their own "epicness"! {ym}:giggle:  

Compared to the BBC television offering for Prince Caspian, still sharing a recording mostly taken up with VDT, I was pleasantly surprised by Prince Caspian. But despite its length as a film, again, there was no Romp through Narnia, which I suppose must have been too difficult for the filmmakers.  

@bluestarrr Prince Caspian felt like it was just one drawn-out battle

Yes, it did seem one drawn-out battle, which involved Queen Susan, supposedly "the Gentle", too much, when Lewis, himself, had depicted both she & Lucy to be part of a Romp round Narnia whilst their brothers were fighting first the werewolf & the hag, then the single combat with King Miraz with the battle of Beruna following. 

Now, by the time VDT was filmed in 2010, I'd been entranced by the Dawn Treader, itself, more lovingly crafted than the BBC effort, especially up close. This was a movie I desperately wanted to happen, even though the BBC version hadn't been too bad. As @narnian78 pointed out, the green mist was too overdone and made a sequel Silver Chair far less likely in my opinion. Did anyone else find that what looked like a sword collecting competition, to do with the Missing Lords, also missing the point of finding what happened to those Lords?

The painting in the study and how the children enter it was one of the better parts of the Dawn Treader movie. I think it could have been a much better movie if the plot had been closer to the book. Will Poulter as Eustace was much like Lewis' character. It could not have been an epic film like The Lord of the Rings, but it could have been much better than what it was. In fact none of the three movies could have been equal to Peter Jackson's trilogy. As it was I enjoyed some parts of Dawn Treader, but other deviations such as the Green Mist kept it from being a great Narnia film. I still believe that the Walden films were at least partially successful, and they sometimes would get certain things right. And that is why I still enjoy watching them for the better portions that they offer.

Prince Caspian felt like it was just one drawn-out battle and Dawn Treader I can barely remember (though I do like how they entered the painting in the study).

I still believe that, despite lack of special effects and a lower budget, the BBC evoked the Narnia of Lewis's books. I was hoping Greta Gerwig's films might have the feel of Pauline Bayne's illustrations, though I am doubting that now and at some point will probably ignore film versions and just stick with the books. 

Throughout the production period they had really been hyping up the comparisons to Lord of the Rings, and I was therefore expecting something on the same level of Oscar-worthy all-time-greatness 

Thus it was kind of a downer to find out it was just an ok, middle-of-the-road, average studio blockbuster type of thing. 

I've maybe ever so slightly warmed to it over time.