Because Lewis allegedly messed up his storyline, is it okay for the filmmakers to substantially change the books for the movie versions?

I don't think C.S.Lewis messed up his storyline. I admit that it appears that he did, but I don't think he actually did.

Her first appearance in LWW: But behind him...sat a very different person--a great lady, taller than any woman that Edmund had ever seen...Her face was white--not merely pale, but white like snow or paper or icing-sugar, except for her very red mouth. It was a beautiful face in other respects, but proud and cold and stern. LWW Edmund and the Wardrobe

Her appearance in MN:The last figure of all was the most interesting--a woman...very tall (but every figure in that room was taller than the people of our world), with a look of such fierceness and pride that it took your breath away. Yet she was beautiful too. MN The Bell and the Hammer
And later on: She was just throwing away the core of an apple which she had eaten. The juice was darker than you would expect and had made a horrid stain round her mouth. Digory...began to see that there might be some sense in that last line about getting your heart's desire and getting despair along with it. For the Witch looked stronger and prouder than ever, and even, in a way, triumphant; but her face was deadly white, white as salt. MN An Unexpected Meeting

On her origins: "That's what I don't understand, Mr. Beaver," said Peter, "I mean isn't the Witch herself human?" "She'd like us to believe it," said Mr. Beaver, "and it's on that that she bases her claim to be Queen. But she's no Daughter of Eve. She comes of your father Adam's...first wife, her they called Lilith. And she was one of the Jinn. That's what she comes from on one side. And on the other she comes of the giants. LWW What Happened After Dinner

In Charn she had been alarming enough: in London, she was terrifying...they had not realized till now how very big she was. "Hardly human" was what Digory thought when he looked at her; and he may have been right, for some say there is giantish blood in the royal family of Charn. MN The Beginning of Uncle Andrew's Troubles

Taking all of that into account, I think that C.S.Lewis did not flip-flop the White Witch's origins. The royal family of Charn is part giant, and could easily be part Jinn as well. She is not "white as snow" when we first see her in MN, but she changes after eating the apple.

I am going to give Mr. Moore the benefit of the doubt. I misquote the books on occasion too. But still..........ice giant?

These folks can have some breathing room to work with to put it to film

Certainly. I don't expect a word-for-word adaptation. But having the White Witch appear in all of the films is not breathing room (I know they didn't say she's going to be in all seven, but so far she's three for three and she's "under consideration" for SC, which would make five including MN).

*doesn't know if anyone actually read all of her ginormous post*

I'm beginning to lose hope .

What the heck is he talking about?!?!?!

I think the filmakers are just having a hard time letting go of Jadis. But they need to face it, SHE CAN'T BE IN EVERY MOVIE!!!

I know . They're using her as a moneymaker .

The news has been getting weirder and weirder. I hope the trailer makes me feel better. Right now, my main feeling is that there is something very very strange going on with this movie.

ditto. Which is why I think I might be taking a break from reading the news on here for a while. They just make me freak out and get depressed .

The lack of respect for the books displayed on the article is somewhat disturbing.

me too! I couldn't believe he said Lewis flip-flopped .

Where did the ice giants come from?! And why can't Jadis be from Charn?! None of this makes sense .

*after looking over the chocolates and picking out 2 or three dark ones sits*

It seems as though Mr. Moore has said nothing and anything he might have said to help us is easily proven has wrong, if you look at it logically. daughter of the King, you have given us a wonderful exact quoting to work with, thank you (yes, I read the whole "ginornous post").
I don't like that the WW is in the movie, I don't like that some apparently don't have much respect for the work of our beloved Jack Lewis, I don't like that there will be changes, and a hope this movie is worth watching again and again.
I think this may be the only moment I'll miss Andrew Adamson. He has respect for Lewis *suddenly remembers Suspian...* ........ He's was just severely misled in his thinking. *doesn't miss him any more*

Mod Note:
Please remember to keep ALL comments respectful. These are real people you are talking about, not just "the filmmakers." You are all perfectly welcome to disprove Mr. Moore, but if comments get too disrespectful this thread will be closed. Thanks you.

I'll always be a,
NL101

I think this may be the only moment I'll miss Andrew Adamson. He has respect for Lewis *suddenly remembers Suspian...* ........ He's was just severely misled in his thinking. *doesn't miss him any more*

I read your whole post dotK. Thank you for all the quotes too. I didn't feel like looking through the books right now .

I'm really upset though. I don't think chocolates will help .

The simple reason I don't like the White Witch being is yet ANOTHER film is because she is supposed to be dead. Firmly I believe that when C.S. Lewis said, "the witch was dead", he meant dead from the world and even almost dead from memory: her influence no longer prevailed... ever! That is the way it should be. Instead, I see the White Witch's influence pervading thousands of years after she has died. What?! Did Aslan die for nothing?! At the moment, it sure looks that way.

Please remember to keep ALL comments respectful. These are real people you are talking about, not just "the filmmakers." You are all perfectly welcome to disprove Mr. Moore, but if comments get too disrespectful this thread will be closed. Thanks you.

Too bad we don't have a mod who watches the filmmakers and can "lock the thread" when their ideas get out of hand or "disrespectful" towards the books.

*accepts some tea and cake (provided some is chocolate free)*

I will admit that there are some inconsistency in the Chronicles (Lewis was going to make some revisions) but the Witch is not one of them! As others have said it is very easy to explain the Witch's origins. And as daughter of the King's post shows her change in appearance is explained by eating the apple. Still even if Lewis had messed up that does not give them the the right to do what they are doing. It doesn't make sense - since Lewis changed the witch's origin that means we can change anything we want to about the witch. If they bring the witch back in every single movie I am going to be very very angry. They had better not have the LotG be a reincarnation of the White Witch. They are NOT the same person! In the book the oldest owl says "Long, Long ago at the very beginning, a White Witch came out of the North and bound our land in snow and ice for a hundred years. And we think this may be one of the same crew." emphasis mine. They don't say we know this is the same white or even that we know this is the same kind of witch. It was speculation! *breaths deeply*

The witch needs to die! We only have the hag's word that witches never really die. (And I wouldn't call a hag an reliable source). Caspian calls the witch "an accursed spirit" which makes me think something less than solid. We don't even know if it would have worked to call the witch up because it never gets that far in the book.

I hope my post isn't disrespectful I don't mean it to be. I just really needed to let of a little steam. (well, maybe a lot of steam ). Mods, if I need to edit just let me know I don't want the thread to be closed on my account. I realize that making a movie is hard work that they will never please everyone. I even realize some changes are necessary. But, um, a little better explanation would be nice. Maybe it wouldn't seem like a big thing after I see the movie. I guess the problem is that the filmmakers see care over chatacters as a strenght and I see one of the main strengths of the Chronicles being that each book is different and has a different cast of characters. I like that Aslan is the only character to appear in all seven books. Jadis has her two books. Except for being mentioned, all the other villains only have one.

I will admit that there are some inconsistency in the Chronicles (Lewis was going to make some revisions) but the Witch is not one of them! As others have said it is very easy to explain the Witch's origins.

Whatever mix-up they made of the witch's origins is irrelevant to their argument, which is that the Witch's evil presence (in their opinion) should be a running theme through the films (from a cinematic perspective). Of course she is dead, but her memory lives on. That cinematic decision is a good one, I think.

There's not necessarily any inconsistency in the story of the White Witch. But there are inconsistencies in Lewis' thinking of the series as a whole, and one of them is this: she's a massive part of a couple of books, and then disappears. Other stories suffer, cinematically, with no real physical enemy threat (especially VoDT). So to carry her through as a metaphor for evil, if not a living character, is a good idea in my opinion. It gives the stories (which are otherwise entirely different and have virtually no continuity between them, other than the Pevensies) a thread in common.

And as daughter of the King's post shows her change in appearance is explained by eating the apple.

Yes, but eating an apple isn't cinematically very interesting is it? The book 'explains' the eating of the apple, and that's the problem. A description of someone eating an apple can be exciting and beautiful. Watching it on screen is dull. That's just an example of a cinematic decision they might make for good reason.

Still even if Lewis had messed up that does not give them the the right to do what they are doing. It doesn't make sense - since Lewis changed the witch's origin that means we can change anything we want to about the witch. If they bring the witch back in every single movie I am going to be very very angry.

They haven't changed the White Witch in every way possible. They've changed or played around with ideas when they've seen the change as necessary to the written story becoming a visually interesting film.

I hope that Jadis being the LOGK is never brought up or even thought about from the crew. The two are completely different.

*The Witch has melted twice there fore 'Ding, Dong! The witch is Dead!!*

I hope her scene in VDT is just a figment. After this please do not show Jadis again until The Magician's Nephew is made!!

Could they possibly be doing this because since Aslan resembles God and he's in every story. And that they think Jadis should be in every movie now because she resembles the Devil?

... having the White Witch appear in all of the films is not breathing room ...

*doesn't know if anyone actually read all of her ginormous post*

Of course I read your ginormous post.

• We know the White Witch shows up in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.

• She nearly shows up in PC. Consistent with the book, the evil Narnians were going to bring her back. The movie built upon that premise a little bit. Edmund made sure they had it sorted; fitting that he did what he did. Thought that was cool.

• I don't have a problem with her showing up in a nightmare of Edmund's - pure speculation on my part from what information I have is that is likely what will happen. She is not really back; just a very nasty dream.

• We don't know about Silver Chair. Fortunately, the argument that LotGK is the White Witch is a HOTLY debated subject amongst C.S. Lewis fans (a topic banned on NWeb). While we may not like it, she "Jadis" could show up there. No, I don't like it either; but other fans would applaud that.

• We know she is in Magician's Nephew.

Whew! That is the explanation of "breathing room."

More in a bit. Going back out on a flare up of a structure fire. Ugh.

Found the original post Thanks Mods:

Hi, I'm new here, although I've been lurking since about a year before the first film came out.

Personally, I'm fine with a lot of changes which have been made in this film. I was unhappy with a few of the changes in the last two films (quite happy with others), but where I was unhappy, it was down to Andrew Adamson's lack of experience with this kind of film.

Onto Dawn Treader: so far, I haven't read an argument for a change that I haven't agreed with, or accepted as necessary for adapting a book into a film.

We're all big Narnia fans here, and I think we're allowing our love for the books to over-ride the truth of the matter. That is that actually, from a writing perspective, the Narnia books (as well as all of Lewis' fiction) contain a fair few consistency issues, and a fair few rules for fiction-writing are clumsily (not intelligently) broken by Lewis.

It's helpful to remember that Lewis is most famous, in the literary world at least, for his scholarship, and what he gave to Christian apologetics. He's a well-regarded essayist and academic. Interestingly, he's not remembered as one of our great fiction writers. A good one, but not great.

As far as fiction goes, his strengths were firmly in story-telling and imagination. Not in novel structure, pacing, writing technique. The Narnia stories largely exist as great allegories for Christian principals, not as great fiction novels. That's not to say they're not great stories, but there is a gulf of difference between an entertaining story and a well-constructed novel.

Anyway, I've waffled. But all of this is why I agree with the director/producer here, when they say Lewis was flawed, and certain changes are necessary to really drive his story forward in the context of cinema.

Hi, I'm new here, although I've been lurking since about a year before the first film came out.

Welcome aboard the community forum Mark! Taking a moment to stray from the topic in adding that I too started looking in on the forum about that time; only lurked for a year though.

Thanks for your input on this sensitive matter.

*lays out a resupply in a vast selection of chocolate and biscuits ... feels it is going to be needed*

the interveiw didn't bother me; I never would have thought that Perry was saying that Lewis screwed up if you hadn't mentioned it! think he's just trying to make sense of what the books are saying and I can't wait to see WW in the movie! yay!

Yes, but eating an apple isn't cinematically very interesting is it? The book 'explains' the eating of the apple, and that's the problem. A description of someone eating an apple can be exciting and beautiful. Watching it on screen is dull.

I respectfully disagree. With a little imagination, the eating of the apple could be very cinematic. For example, they could show her taking a bite out of the apple and immediately the color starts washing away from her cheeks, and drains out of her face, and then, out of her body completely. It could be a very creepy moment in the Magician's Nephew film.

I also disagree when you say C. S. Lewis isn't known as a great fiction writer, but primarily for his scholarship. I think if you took a poll, most people would know Lewis from his fiction, not his scholarly articles. Also, the Chronicles are studied in universities around the world as great fantasy stories. To deny that Lewis was a great fantasy writer is downright silly. Besides, if you agree that he was a great scholar (and expert) in his field, (which was literature) then he just might know a thing or two about novel structure, pacing, and writing technique that you don't. Yes, Lewis may have made some blunders while writing the Narniad, but since he's the Cambridge Proffesor and bestselling author and I'm not, I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Frankly, I'm tired of people saying the chronicles have "inconsistencies." Back when Tolkien read LWW he seems to have thought that having Father Christmas and fauns in the same book was an inconsistency.

I think people are taking too much license when they hear that Lewis was able to remember everything he read except his own works. That doesn't mean he couldn't remember what he wrote from one day to the next. It just meant that his exceptional (genious-level) memory skills didn't stretch to include what he wrote. No matter, as someone already pointed out, he had a copy of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. He could reference it whenever he needed to. Honestly, who can remember everything they ever wrote?

Also, before anyone tells me of Lewis' supposed planned "changes" I'll say that any alleged changes he was going to make to the books were doubtlessly inconsequential, so I'm tired of people using the excuse "Well, Lewis was going to change the books" as fuel for their own arguments. The fact is, we don't know what Lewis was going to change, so let us just drop that subject. Just accept that the Chronicles were written as Lewis originally intended them to be.

It's time that people stopped trying to "fix" the books and started trying to understand what Lewis was going after.

On to the topic at hand: The White Witch simply doesn't need to be in every movie. With the exception of Dawn Treader, every other book has a villian. By putting Jadis into the rest of the movies you make the other villians seem less threatening. Besides the only way that I can easily see the White Witch in all of the Narnia movies is if they decide to make her the LotGK in Silver Chair, and Tash in the remaining two. I'm not sure I want to see Jadis reincarnated as Tash.

Believe me when I say that I really respect the filmmakers of this Narnia series, but I think it is time that all of them read the books again. In fact, why don't we all read the books again?

PS: Sorry if that got a little heavy. Here's a hug to anyone I might have offended, (including the filmmakers). I didn't mean to.

PPS: Mods, I know this topic was banned by the old Narniaweb, but I think the time has come to discuss it again. What was the final word from the C. S. Lewis estate when Narniaweb asked them if Jadis was the same person as the Lady of the Green Kirtle?