Posted by: @rilianix

I'm not saying anyone shouldn't be hesitant or personally feel that she's right for it 100% but I do think we should keep an open mind and not try and put her into this box of "feminism" and "female perspective" because I do really believe she's capable of exploring much more than just that.

Pardon me, but has she ever given any indication that she's tired of being put in the "female perspective" box? All indications are that that is one of her general artistic goals. I think you do her a disservice to imply that she'd be ashamed of her beliefs.  

@col-klink 😀 Well I've edited that part to better convey what I meant but as I said I think focusing on just that aspect of what she does is not taking into account what I believe she's fully capable of achieving in other areas of the Narnia stories.

@rilianix I am sorry if it feels like I'm raising a strawman of Gerwig. (I agree with you that she's perfectly willing to and capable of developing male characters hence my liking your post.) But I feel like you and Icarus are kind of raising a strawman of me. 

The part of my post where I summarized Gerwig's summary of her thematic interests wasn't about her being interested in stories about women. "Women" was only one word in a long sentence. The first part was about a specific kind of story about women and the second part wasn't specifically about women at all.

Not at all @col-klink, I'm not trying to make a strawman out of anyone. My post is just a response to the general conversation I've seen going around here and on Twitter about Gerwig's feminism, and how that's shaped her work. It wasn't specific to anyone here. Just my thoughts on that aspect in particular.

Having now seen Barbie at the cinema, I'm definitely even more intrigued to see what Greta Gerwig will do with Narnia.

Barbie was very fun, visually inventive, and exceptionally well directed. The comparisons with the Lego Movie are probably not unfounded, in terms of the meta aspects, but I think it did more than enough that genuinely surprised me in terms of original creativity.

I was particularly impressed with how distinct all 3 of Greta Gerwig's movies so far have been. She's definitely not someone like, say, Wes Anderson, who has a very distinct visual identity which tracks from movie to movie, so I think she's proven herself to be more than versatile enough of a Director to adapt her style to different source material.

In terms of the things which were consistent with her other movies, this one is definitely very overt with its feminist messages, perhaps even heavy handed at times, though given it's a movie about Barbie Dolls there doesn't really seem to be any point in trying to be subtle about it.

In terms of something that @Col-Klink brought up - that her directorial focus is not just on the experiences of girlhood, but more specifically the intergenerational relationships between young girls and their mothers - yes, that is in here, though it definitely isn't the main plot, and to be honest that thread doesn't really go anywhere. Ultimately this is very much a personal story about Barbie.

Overall given that the perennial fears amongst Narnia fans is an adaptation which overly focuses on action and big battles, I think people should generally be relieved to have a director at the helm who's primary focus is on deeply personal character pieces.

Posted by: @icarus

I think people should generally be relieved to have a director at the helm who's primary focus is on deeply personal character pieces.

Yes, that would be a relief. But to be more specific, Gerwig's primary focus seems to be elevating the female characters and weakening the male characters, as her Barbie film has blatantly demonstrated. If she is set to do LWW, I think it's very likely that Peter will no longer have the title of High King and that Lucy and Susan will no longer be absent from the battle. Aslan's authority and presence will definitely need to be even more tame than in the Walden version. Why? Because if Gerwig doesn't lessen his agency, she'd be in danger of contradicting her message.

True, it's much too soon to make judgments on Gerwig's plans for Narnia, but to sit comfortably at ease would require you to ignore a lot of red flags.

@skilletdude

To be honest, when it comes to the battle in LWW, I think a director like Greta Gerwig would probably just bin it off completely, which honestly wouldn't be the end-of-the-world given that it barely covers more than a line or two of text in the original book. Even inserting the girls into the battle just doesn't seem like her thing to me.

In many ways I'd definitely see her taking the opposite approach to Andrew Adamson, who binned off "The Romp" in Prince Caspian in favour of an extended battle sequence. Therefore if Greta dials down the battles and dials up the romps, I'm all for it.

I think though when it comes to Aslan I disagree with you, since whilst yes Aslan is definitely a male Lion, he doesn't represent the human male patriarchy and the repression of women in any way.

Much like "Lady Bird" explores the central character's experience of growing up through the lense of her relationship with her Mother and (admittedly to a lesser extent) her Catholic upbringing and education, I would see the relationship between Lucy and Aslan as being something Greta Gerwig would be very keen to explore further, as a way to shape those conversations about what it means to grow up, and her changing relationship with Aslan that culminates at the end of VDT. That whole sequence feels very on-brand for her.

Admittedly yes there are several Narnia books and plot elements that I could see a director like Greta Gerwig having a problem with, but i think LWW is probably a safe bet for her to tell a more intimately focussed story about Lucy, her relationships to her siblings, and her relationship with God.

Posted by: @skilletdude

Gerwig's primary focus seems to be elevating the female characters and weakening the male characters

I'm quite willing to believe you about The Barbie Movie if no one contradicts you, but I'm not sure it's fair to say that's Greta Gerwig's goal with every movie. Her Little Women gave way more screentime and character depth to the characters of John Brooke and Mr. Laurence Sr than any others. Their roles weren't as big as those of the main female characters (it would have been untrue to the source material if they were) but I get the impression that she wanted them to be important and admirable or at least sympathetic characters. 

Posted by: @icarus

I think though when it comes to Aslan I disagree with you, since whilst yes Aslan is definitely a male Lion, he doesn't represent the human male patriarchy and the repression of women in any way.

Pardon me but...why wouldn't Gerwig interpret the character that way? She's certainly educated and intelligent enough to know that he corresponds to the Abrahamic God and feminists consider Abrahamic religions to be part of the patriarchy and repression of women, if not the cause of them. 

Of course, the average feminist-on-the-street likes, even loves the Narnia books. They're so well written that people with all kinds of different views on gender can enjoy them, especially as they're not really about gender per se. But Gerwig isn't a "normal" feminist. She's an intellectual feminist and the thing about academics, whether they're feminist or whatever, is that they see everything through the lens of their special interest and if something doesn't immediately support it, all they do is carp against it. (Are you getting the impression I did not enjoy college? ) There's no getting around the fact that intellectual feminists as a group are offended by the Narnia books and when has Gerwig ever done anything that would offend intellectual feminists or distinguish herself from them in any way? (Well, apart from agreeing to direct two Narnia movies, I guess, and we don't know much about her motives yet.) 

In the case that what I suggest is true and she does have an issue with Aslan, the best-case scenario IMO is that she makes him female. That would probably annoy me a bit but if it meant she kept his dialogue, actions and role in the story the same as the book and used all her artistry and talent to do so, I would prefer that to her keeping him male and subverting everything else about him from the book. 

Posted by: @icarus

Much like "Lady Bird" explores the central character's experience of growing up through the lense of her relationship with her Mother and (admittedly to a lesser extent) her Catholic upbringing and education, I would see the relationship between Lucy and Aslan as being something Greta Gerwig would be very keen to explore further, as a way to shape those conversations about what it means to grow up, and her changing relationship with Aslan that culminates at the end of VDT. That whole sequence feels very on-brand for her.

Admittedly yes there are several Narnia books and plot elements that I could see a director like Greta Gerwig having a problem with, but i think LWW is probably a safe bet for her to tell a more intimately focused story about Lucy, her relationships to her siblings, and her relationship with God.

I remember in another thread, you and the Rose-Tree Dryad debated about whether Prince Caspian would be an appealing story for Gerwig or not. She took the position that Lucy's plotline would be a great fit for Gerwig's interest in coming-of-age stories for young women. While you conceded her point, you felt that it was outweighed by the story's problems. Are you sure you won't come around to her POV? Because Prince Caspian is the story that would lend itself the best to what you suggest. In LWW, Lucy is either happy, sad, angry or afraid, mostly the first two. She doesn't really make any important decisions or have any complicated emotions.

That book also has what might very well be the best dialogue scene between Lucy and Aslan. We hear about Lucy growing up at the end of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe but I wouldn't say she changes much in the main body of the story. Throughout The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, she, Edmund and Caspian feel like they're already mature though that doesn't make them perfect, and Aslan implies at the end that Lucy and Edmund still have some maturing to do. Prince Caspian is the book that I would say is really about Lucy growing up.

Posted by: @skilletdude

But to be more specific, Gerwig's primary focus seems to be elevating the female characters and weakening the male characters, as her Barbie film has blatantly demonstrated. If she is set to do LWW, I think it's very likely that Peter will no longer have the title of High King and that Lucy and Susan will no longer be absent from the battle. Aslan's authority and presence will definitely need to be even more tame than in the Walden version. Why? Because if Gerwig doesn't lessen his agency, she'd be in danger of contradicting her message.

True, it's much too soon to make judgments on Gerwig's plans for Narnia, but to sit comfortably at ease would require you to ignore a lot of red flags.

 

Posted by: @col-klink

Pardon me but...why wouldn't Gerwig interpret the character that way? She's certainly educated and intelligent enough to know that he corresponds to the Abrahamic God and feminists consider Abrahamic religions to be part of the patriarchy and repression of women, if not the cause of them. 

Of course, the average feminist-on-the-street likes, even loves the Narnia books. They're so well written that people with all kinds of different views on gender can enjoy them, especially as they're not really about gender per se. But Gerwig isn't a "normal" feminist. She's an intellectual feminist and the thing about academics, whether they're feminist or whatever, is that they see everything through the lens of their special interest and if something doesn't immediately support it, all they do is carp against it. (Are you getting the impression I did not enjoy college? ) There's no getting around the fact that intellectual feminists as a group are offended by the Narnia books and when has Gerwig ever done anything that would offend intellectual feminists or distinguish herself from them in any way? (Well, apart from agreeing to direct two Narnia movies, I guess, and we don't know much about her motives yet.) 

 

Oh dear... I know I've said this sort of thing already, but could we all please perhaps just leave off with the stereotypes of "feminists think this, feminists hate that, Greta Gerwig is an intellectual feminist so therefore there is no way she is NOT going to weaken all the male characters (including Aslan), destroy the Christian message, and generally ruin Narnia"???

I'm speaking myself as someone with a very academic / intellectual background who probably would consider herself a feminist if only the whole concept of "feminism" wasn't so complex and diverse and problematic (except in the simplest sense of wanting a society where women and men have equal rights and women are not discriminated against in any way, which probably most people these days want, or so I would hope) — and as someone who has a degree in religion studies that focused quite a lot on women in religions, Christianity and others. (And who happens to belong to a denomination of Christianity that was founded by a woman and does give complete equality to women and men, but that may be beside the point. )

All that doesn't make me an authority on anything, but I can at least assure everyone here from experience that people who call themselves "feminists" (or who at least accept that label for themselves) are an incredibly diverse bunch. There are Christian feminists out there (yes, including even Catholic ones), and indeed Jewish feminists, many of whom are scholars of religion. And also academic feminists who don't consider themselves strictly Christian but who have a deep and genuinely sympathetic interest in Christianity. They're a diverse bunch in themselves, and some of their ideas I may personally agree with and some I may not. But they do go to show that "intellectual feminists" definitely don't ALL consider Christianity and the Abrahamic God to be inherently the tools, if not the main cause, of the oppression of women.

As one simple example — I'm sorry I can't remember who wrote this or which book it was in, as it was years ago and was something I only read in passing and didn't quote in an assignment or anything, but this bit just stuck with me — there's been at least one feminist scholar of religion who looked at Jesus' attitudes towards women and his treatment of women, as recorded in the Gospels, and remarked in conclusion (this is as nearly verbatim as I can remember): "The problem is not that Jesus is male, but that more men are not like Jesus."

Or to sum that up in short: just because someone is identified as a "feminist", doesn't mean we know anything else about her, or her attitude towards Christianity, for certain.  

The point here is... we simply don't know yet what Greta Gerwig herself may or may not think regarding the Christian basis and essence of the Narnia stories. She hasn't personally let on anything of her background knowledge of the books, her feelings about them (in any regard, let alone specifically about the Christian aspects), or how she intends to treat them in her adaptations. The most we've seen so far is that she has expressed great and deep appreciation of her education in a Catholic high school — NOT something you would expect a stereotypical Abrahamic-God-hating feminist to say at all! — and for the theological concepts she studied there, especially the idea of God's unconditional grace and love. That certainly doesn't guarantee she'll get Narnia "right" — in my estimation or anyone else's — but it at least makes me intrigued and very willing to see what she actually decides to do with Narnia before I form any final judgment.

 

@courtenay I'm sorry. I know from experience it hurts to be stereotyped. In my defense, I did say that a lot of self-identified feminists you'd meet on the street like, even love Narnia. But it's hard for me to feel bad about stereotyping "academic feminists" (which don't have to be women BTW) when I can't think of a single article or book about Narnia written by one that didn't condemn the series as misogynist. Academia is a huge field, of course, and there's probably one out there. But it's more of a stretch to assume that Gerwig would agree with that lone nonconformist feminist than to assume otherwise. 

(For the record, if I remember correctly, C. S. Lewis did advocate wifely submission in Mere Christianity and his Space Trilogy was explicitly antifeminist to an insulting degree. If feminists wanted to condemn The Space Trilogy, I would totally understand but, no, for some reason, they just want to talk about Narnia. It also should go on record that despite those views of his, C. S. Lewis seems to have been against forcing women to marry against their will. cf. The Horse and his Boy and Till We Have Faces.) 

Posted by: @courtenay

The point here is... we simply don't know yet what Greta Gerwig herself may or may not think regarding the Christian basis and essence of the Narnia stories. She hasn't personally let on anything of her background knowledge of the books, her feelings about them (in any regard, let alone specifically about the Christian aspects), or how she intends to treat them in her adaptations.

That's actually something I wanted to mention in my last post, but it ended up being ridiculously long, so I refrained. At this point, the only thing Greta Gerwig has specifically said about adapting Narnia is that she's pleasantly intimidated by the prospect, which sounds really promising to me! It's a tad disheartening though that she hasn't said anything more specific than that. I don't remember what her first comments in the media were about the book, Little Women, but I'd be shocked if the first thing she mentioned wasn't that she loved the book growing up. It's not comforting that she didn't take the first opportunity to say she loved the Narnia books growing up. But that might be reading way too much into it. (I did say a tad disheartening, not super disheartening.) As you say, we don't need to run around panicking right now. 

P.S.

I'd like to thank Icarus for specifically mentioning not one but two things I mentioned earlier in his Barbie Movie review. (One of them, that I didn't think the movie was as creative as its would-be fans are giving it credit for being, was something I figured most people would forget by now since it didn't actually have to do with Narnia at all.) I thought of liking his post in gratitude, but I refrained since I haven't seen The Barbie Movie and it might look like I was endorsing it. (Though I like it in the broad sense that I like to hear about other people have fun watching it since people having fun at the movies is generally nice to hear.) I also didn't like Skilletdude's post even though I broadly agreed with him that it'd be naive to "sit calmly at ease" because I didn't want to give anyone the impression that I was condemning the film which, again, I haven't seen. 

If this issue of feminism is only going to continue with Greta Gerwig's two Narnia films, I'm not sure how I would feel about it.

I don't believe that CS Lewis meant Narnia to be sexist, much like he never intended it to be racist. Lucy participated in the Battle of Anvard (a young queen among the archers fighting the Calormenes) in HHB or Jill participating at the Battle of Stable Hill (a young girl killing who knows how many young and grown Calormene men) in LB. Though I don't think CS Lewis would have intended Lucy to be a warrior-queen or Jill to be an action girl. In the case of Lucy, Edmund thought it was best to have her to be among the archers. For Jill, there's a moment where Tirian tells her to use her arrows at the White Rock, and shoot the Calormenes before they got close to her. It was most likely for her protection, so she wouldn't be at the most intense spot in the battle field itself.

Any adaptation of the Narniad is going to "fail" in the sense that CSL wrote what he wrote.  The series lends itself to movie making because it is fantastic and visual - although CSL was not a big fan of the medium. Greta Gerwig's movies - based on what I can tell - are simply products of their time.  Not even that really - if you consider that the feminist messaging in Barbie is your standard Murphy Brown stuff - which has been around for 40+ years. The upside to this - and I think it is a HUGE upside - is that the movie should point people to the books.  

Posted by: @col-klink

But it's hard for me to feel bad about stereotyping "academic feminists" (which don't have to be women BTW) when I can't think of a single article or book about Narnia written by one that didn't condemn the series as misogynist.

You are not reading widely enough. There's an article on A Pilgrim in Narnia blog, How Do You Solve a Problem Like Susan Pevensie, written by a guest author who is an academic feminist. I remember it specifically because it's an article I would share with people who have totally misread what happened to Susan in The Last Battle.

But to be frank, as someone who has spent a lot of time volunteering for NarniaWeb over the years for the main purpose of encouraging people to read the books, I really don't like seeing implications that certain people can't be fans of Narnia because of any labels that they identify with, or that other people identify them with. I want people to read and enjoy these stories, regardless of where they come from or what they believe.

And people do! I ran the NarniaWeb Twitter account for a while, and I think many people would be shocked at the variety of people (based on their bios) that were all liking the same Aslan quote tweets. I was definitely surprised, and it changed my perception of the fandom. And I think it's a beautiful thing and a very good thing, because these stories are so spiritually, emotionally, and philosophically nourishing for people to read. I would never want to discourage that.

Posted by: @lindsaydoering

The upside to this - and I think it is a HUGE upside - is that the movie should point people to the books.  

Yes to this! Even with a bad adaptation, we still get a huge increase in people reading the books. I'm not the biggest fan of the Walden film trilogy, but it caused so many people to read the stories, and that's so important. I'm tentatively excited about Greta Gerwig, but perhaps the thing that I'm most excited about is that her films will inspire some people to read Narnia who otherwise wouldn't.

@rose Yup - the fact that movies are - still - being made about Narnia is an indication that the stories are imbedded in our culture. Whoever is re-telling the stories is always going to use them to advance their own agenda - that goes with the territory. But they have to point back to the original books - 

 

Posted by: @col-klink

when has Gerwig ever done anything that would offend intellectual feminists or distinguish herself from them in any way?

Posted by: @lindsaydoering

Greta Gerwig's movies - based on what I can tell - are simply products of their time.  Not even that really - if you consider that the feminist messaging in Barbie is your standard Murphy Brown stuff - which has been around for 40+ years.

Thank you for backing up my point while ostensibly disagreeing with it.  

And, Rose, thanks for sharing that article! I actually think I have read it before, come to think of it. However, a glance at the article itself shows that the writer is in the minority, and they're frustrated by this. The burden of proof is really on Gerwig to show that she is in the same minority. 

I mentioned this before but since Kat Coffin (the article's author) says the same thing, I'll repeat it. It's so weird how people view Susan as the single most important female character C. S. Lewis created! Even if the goal is to accuse him of his misogyny, there are other characters he wrote who lend themselves to that critique so much better!