The inner monologue is particularly interesting to me, as this has been a challenge for screen adaptation since the invention of moving pictures.

In my opinion, the success of Edmund's inner monologue will hinge directly upon the director's cues and the actor's skill, rather than reliance upon fancy cinematography or special effects. To make it feel natural, it will need to be all about the camera focus and body language. The furtive look, the cadence, and tone of speech, and what is not said, either in outright silence or in what is suggested between the lines; these will bring the inner monologue out, without the use of awkward close-ups and adding an echo to indicate an inner monologue. 

@jasmine_tarkheena 

Edmund's inner monologue. This is especially a hard one to visualize on screen.

Whilst narration and inner monologue might be perceived as being difficult to pull off on-screen, once you see it done well by a skilful director you realise how effortless the whole thing can feel.

For example:

• Terrence Malick uses inner monologues in almost all of his movies to a hauntingly beautiful effect - The Thin Red Line, The New World, and The Tree of Life in particular.

• Martin Scorsese also uses first-person character narration in a lot of his most critically acclaimed films, such as Goodfellas and Wolf of Wall Street.

Whilst the in-your-face attitude or the latter wouldn't necessarily be the best fit for Narnia, if they could aim for something even 50% as poetic as Malick achieves with his films that could work well.

Good points. I would like a new LWW film to the book closely, though it doesn’t have to 100% (I don’t think you can really do that for a movie anyways). There are things in the book I’m sure they’re going have to tweak to make it work for cinema or even cut out. 

Yes, it should be different than the previous adaptations. You mean, if you try to do exact replica of the BBC TV series (like with the “two Edmunds” or even the animated creatures) or of the Walden film (like with the big epic helicopter shot where it comes to the point of being too distracting or chase scenes or the big epic battle scene), it’s going to be problem. So the new adaptation needs to be its own take on it. 

I would love to see more attention given to the children hearing the name of Aslan for the first time and the mysteriousness and their curiosity about his name in any new version.  Although there are many weaknesses in the BBC series, I think this part is strong.  Also, draw out his death and resurrection more than what is done in the Walden movie.  I think BBC timed these scenes well and drew them out a bit better again, whilst I feel that the Walden movie rushed his resurrection - the girls had barely walked away from the dead Aslan and then the earth tremor and there he was in the sunrise.  I did like the fact that he was standing in the sunrise though.

I think there would be a good reason for a new adaptation to follow the examples set forth in the scripts of the BBC Narnia and the Focus on the Family Radio Theatre since they are much closer to the book than the Walden films. Of course they should not copy the scripts, but Greta Gerwig and the other creators of the new films can offer something similar.  Those adaptations made in the past prove that a reasonably faithful adaptation to the original story can be made even though it may not be perfect.  

The scene with Aslan’s resurrection was done beautifully with Aslan standing in the sunrise in the Walden film. Though I sure missed the line “Yes it is more magic!” So maybe in the new adaptation, we could hear Aslan say, “Yes, it is more magic!” then see him standing in the sunrise. 

I definitely like the idea of them sticking more closely to the original than the Walden film of LWW did. It didn't change anything significant in the plot, but (as I've said a few times elsewhere!) I didn't like the added hyped-up action scenes — the chase across the ice and the EPIC-scale battle near the end, in particular — and the non-canonical subplot with the fox just seemed pointless and a distraction from the main story.

If they'd chosen to expand the story of one of the existing characters, I probably would have liked that better — perhaps a future adaptation could show us a little more of Tumnus, for example, and maybe reveal why he chose to serve the Witch in the first place. Or I could imagine an extra scene showing her interrogating him after he's captured (perhaps cutting to this while the children are in the Beavers' house), and he refuses to give her any information about Lucy or the other children, even when she cynically offers him his freedom if he'll tell her and reaffirm his allegiance to her. He defies her, perhaps just shaking his head and whispering "No..." — cut to the Witch raising her wand in fury — back to close-up of Tumnus with tears in his eyes, knowing what's about to happen but not backing down — then a FLASH of magic blanks everything out and we cut straight back to the children at the Beavers' house. We don't see Tumnus again until Edmund, entering the Witch's house and walking along the hall full of statues, notices "a little Faun with a very sad expression on its face" and wonders if it's Lucy's friend, which of course it is. Maybe Edmund could flinch for a moment with a pang of conscience and then keep on walking, not letting himself think about it...

I've thought of another thing I'd like to see that isn't in the book and I don't think it was in any of the screen adaptations, although the BBC Radio version (not to be confused with the BBC TV series) made an attempt at it: how Tumnus, on being brought back to life, responds to Aslan. In the book we're just told that he and Lucy were "holding each other by the hands and dancing round and round for joy"; I'd have them do that for a few seconds, then suddenly Tumnus stops as he sees Aslan, who is standing there watching, perhaps with a slight smile and a knowing look on his face. Tumnus, realising whose presence he's in and remembering his own betrayal of Narnia by siding with the Witch, hangs his head in shame and perhaps falls to his knees; Aslan simply bends his head down to touch Tumnus's head gently, in a gesture that clearly says: you're forgiven. Absolutely no dialogue there, and no need to linger on it for more than a few moments, but I just think that would be a nice way to re-emphasise the theme of redemption with a scene that isn't in the book as such, but isn't inconsistent with anything that is in it.

I think that's my general standard for "what changes or additions are acceptable" (I know we've got a discussion going on that as well). I don't really have a problem with added scenes that aren't in the book — or are perhaps implied somewhere but not described directly — as long as they're consistent with what we know from the book and therefore could have happened in the story and we just weren't told by the narrator. I remember suggesting somewhere else recently that we could do with having a brief scene showing Aslan freeing the party of creatures who were turned to stone by the Witch when she found out Father Christmas had given them their feast; Lewis himself, I believe, remarked somewhere that he assumed children would know that Aslan would put them all right again, but he got so many letters from readers asking about them that he realised he should have put it explicitly in the book. Again, that can be done as just a quick scene (during Aslan's march to Beruna along with the two girls and all the freed ex-statues from the Witch's house), without the need for any dialogue.

Talking of dialogue, though, that's probably the biggest thing I felt the Walden version got wrong and that I would really like to see done better in the next adaptation. Lewis in general writes really good dialogue, and often uses it to carry the story along and/or to show us more of what particular characters are like and what the relationships between them are like. The BBC TV series and the Focus on the Family radio adaptations lifted a lot of the dialogue from the book verbatim, only making a few changes here and there. The Walden movie changed nearly every line of dialogue and made up a lot of it wholesale, to the point where it changed the entire feel of the story at times, especially at some crucial points. Like, for example (I know I've quoted this a couple of times recently), Mr Beaver declaring of Aslan — the High King above all kings — "He's the top geezer!" Or Aslan himself, when he sees the two girls following him in the night, turning around and saying, with all the cynical exasperation of a grumpy parent who's just been interrupted by two naughty kids: "Shouldn't you be in bed??" (Compared with his deeply moving line in the actual book — "Oh, children, children, why are you following me?"... I just always remember THAT as the point where I lost any last hopes of finding anything good in that movie. )

@courtenay 

As I had said before, the line where Mr. Beaver refers to Aslan as “top geezer” is rather offensive, and you can certainly agree with me on that one, but the rest of the movie did have some good points such as the beautiful special effects and the actors playing the Pevensies were quite good. And if they had come up with a script that was closer to the book it would have been a much better film. The same was true of the other two films. They were attractive to watch, and the animals looked very realistic, although the voices for some of the animals could have been better in the first movie (especially Mr. and Mrs. Beaver). But I don’t think there is much point in hating the Walden films now that almost twenty years have passed since the making of the first one. In fact I really like parts of them such as Lucy’s introduction to Mr. Tumnus and the farewell at the end of the Dawn Treader movie. And the special effects were generally well done, which makes me continue to rewatch and enjoy them even years later.  I can’t say that they are all bad even though they could have been much better.   🙂

@narnian78 I actually kind of agree with you. I was actually 12 at the time when the Walden film was released and I had no idea what "top geezer meant". So I was kind of like, "What does that even mean?"

You're right, it's a well done film that could have been better. There are some things that are well done, like Edmund in the dungeon, realizing the consequences of his actions. Even when Lucy first steps into Narnia, she had the wide-eyed child like wonder, that was really spot on!

The battle scene is kind of almost a mixed bag. I reckon at the time, it was something people expected from fantasy (with Lord of the Rings trilogy having just being done and the Harry Potter franchise was still a big thing). It's done well, and even when Edmund breaks the White Witch's wand (which I believe is done in every screen adaptation I've seen) in a way brings out his character arc. Though I'll admit that the as far as the eye can see landscape battle field is a bit too distracting. And not just on the battlefield, but the landscape of Narnia as a whole. While the landscape is beautiful to look at, it does get too distracting.

Who knows? Most likely things have changed between now and then. I think there was a time when fantasy has kind of fallen out of favor. Maybe if the new LWW adaptation could be simple though there might be some tension on occasions, maybe fantasy will start making a comeback.

The decision to make Mr Beaver a cockney was probably unwise, given that half the world doesn't know the sort of slang and expressions used in East London. 

A geezer is a man, a bloke, a chap. It isn't disrespectful or rude, unless you add an adjective such as 'old'. 

@coracle 

But should Aslan be called a “bloke”?  It does seem somewhat less respectful than his real name . It is like in American English calling Jesus a “guy”. I don’t see where “geezer” is much different from that. Aslan is the Lord of the woods and deserved the Beavers’ respect. Here in Michigan a man is often called a “guy”, which just means an ordinary person.

@narnian78

It was the path the (American) script writers made for themselves after deciding Mr Beaver would be cockney: he had to use some cockney expressions. Calling someone 'the top bloke' doesn't seem disrespectful to me, but then I have an English viewpoint. I don't like to be called a guy myself, being a lady of a certain age.
As for calling Aslan by his actual name, at this point in the story the children are quite unfamiliar with his name. Beaver is trying to give them some idea of who he is.

Clearly there will continue to be some different understandings of word use between the Americans and the English. I grin every time some of my US friends refer to the Professor's house as a 'mansion'. Nope, it is not opulent enough, just a large house in the country.

I actually kind of of like the characterisation of the Beavers with working class accents. It is an easy way to signify to the audience that these are the honest, hard-working, everyday animals of the woodlands. It immediately frames the social dynamic of an oppressed Narnia within relatable class struggles of the real world, and therefore does a lot of heavy lifting on exposition, with such a simple bit of casting.

@icarus and Walden's writers and casting people decided to make Mrs Beaver a more middle class character, nicely spoken and with high social expectations.  She has married beneath her, and is forever trying to bring him up to decent standards.