I personally think it would be okay to reveal who the Lady of the Kirtle is from the beginning. But, I don NOT think people should know who Rilian is. I like your idea of making him younger at the beginning Josh.

I think that you have a good idea about Rillian being much younger at the beginning. Eight or ten would be really good ages.

I think maybe the LotGK should have a veil on when she woos Rillian. Or, hey, purists won't agree, but were you saying that...oh, I get it; he's a boy and he gets kidnapped instead of woo-d? When he's eight...okay, that'd work!!

I don't think he should be 8yrs old when his mother is killed. They've aged up all the characters, for the good of the movies I feel. To age him down would seem off, he could be a teenager- near 17 or 18. By the time they come to his rescue wouldn't he be another 20yrs older or so? They'd be able to age him well.

I voted Other. Their back story shouldn't be altered. It needs to be shown, but they shouldn't reveal Rilian from the beginning. The Lady or the Green Kyrtle shouldn't be shown either actually.

This is indeed a difficult issue, which I've played over in my mind. I don't think it's that big a surprise to find out that the woman who Rilian saw was the witch. Eustace and Jill guess as much in the course of the parliament. Rilian's identity is definite the tricky thing. There are three options, as I see it:
1) Not change the book
2) Have multiple other knights in Underland who might be Rilian
3) Not reveal the who the Emerald Witch is at all and keep mum about how Rilian dissapeared.

There is something to be said for following the book. If the secret is going to be the "twist" of the movie's plot, it won't work. But if the emphasis is placed where it should be, on the theme of trusting and believing in Aslan in difficult times, then it will work. It will work because Eustace and Jill must put their faith in Aslan that the crazy, insane person in front of them is Rilian. They have to choose to free him despite their fears. That's the other thing that has to work: Rilian must be convincing as a lunatic for the audience. The filmmaker must make not just Eustace and Jill doubt, but the audience as well, despite their suspicion that he is Rilian. Also, Enchanted Rilian claims never to have heard of Rilian. "As that dull captain of the gnomes no doubt told you, "many come down, but few return to the sunlit lands,'" I can imagine the movie Rilian saying.

For the second option, you would either have other knights or men among the gnomes. It would tie-in to Enchanted Rilian's comment that I imagined above. This could work without having to actually introduce another knight as a character.

The third option is trickier. It involves not letting the audience know that Rilian was kidnapped (or prince-napped) or why he is missing: just that he IS missing. If the filmmakers went this route, the whole mystery would be pieced together as you went along, which would (theoretically) not be uninteresting. By the time we got to the point in the film where we meet Enchanted Rilian, I think the audience would still suspect, but as I said in point 1, if the emphasis is right it won't be The Main Thing.

Naturally, I've only written about three options that would not depart from the book, or at least not very much. At this point I refuse to go further down the path of speculating something Completely Different From The Book.

The backstory is very important, and I honestly believe they should show it to get the point across. At the same time, I think both Rillian and LotGK should be hidden, or at least we never get a good enough look at them. Hiding their faces, keeping them covered, or something like that sounds like the possible way of doing this. Younger Rillian might also be what works, but however they do it, they must show the back story (hopefully at the beginning of the film), and somehow hopefully hide Rillian's and even LotGK's indentity or looks.

I agree, Josh! Having Rilian younger would make things a lot easier, though, sadly, I doubt they will do so.

The backstory is very important, and I honestly believe they should show it to get the point across. At the same time, I think both Rillian and LotGK should be hidden, or at least we never get a good enough look at them. Hiding their faces, keeping them covered, or something like that sounds like the possible way of doing this. Younger Rillian might also be what works, but however they do it, they must show the back story (hopefully at the beginning of the film), and somehow hopefully hide Rillian's and even LotGK's indentity or looks.

I agree about hiding the witch's identity. I've been trying to decide in my mind whether the Rilian backstory should be presented whole, or in parts. In the best version that my mind can cook up, we see Rilian's mother die from the snakebite, and Rilian chasing after it. That way, we establish Rilian into the film, and the fact of his mother's death and the reason for his search. At that point we would cut to a different part of the story, keeping the witch's presence and identity a secret until a further point. As for Rilian's age, I think he would be in his upper-teens by the time of his dissapearance. 17 at the youngest. That way he would be 27 by the time the travelers find him. Not too old or too young.

The real difficulty is Old Caspian's age. Liliandil, I can believe her never getting truly old and unable to bear children, since she's a star. But if we're to believe that Rilian is 27 and Caspian 80 or upper 70s near the end of the book, that means Caspian was beggettin' kids when he was upper 50s or lower 60s. That doesn't seem right.

This is a very interesting roadblock. I think we should still show the backstory, and voted as such, but as many of you have pointed out, there are several ways of revealing the backstory without revealing the characters while keeping thing aesthetically pleasing. I know that there are ways of filming with certain camera angles and such so as to not show faces. You can blur the faces, going for the whole dream effect. You could go for the shaky camera effect, where heads or faces aren't shown, giving it a nightmare sort of feel. A creative director knows that there are plenty of options out there. I wouldn't worry about it too much.

Here are my thoughts, maybe at the beginning of the movie they should show an old, ornate storybook, in the book the narrator, or maybe the owls, will tell the story of how Rilian was abducted and Lilliandil's murder, while on the page to the right will have illustrations drawn out, that way you couldn't really tell the identities of the two, another thing that could happen that you would notice both in LWW and PC, that Lucy sees these "images" of Aslan and Mr. Tumness that are created from blossom petals. They could try something like this to mask the faces of the figures, that way the story is presented in an interesting way without revealing too much. That way when we finally meet, Rilian and LotGK we wouldn't recognize them.

I think that for most movie-goers over the age of 10, it'll be pretty easy to put the pieces together about the LOTGK, and the witch/snake. But if the movie is charming enough it shouldn't make a difference if they figured it out or not.

I think one thing that could be done is that when we see the LOTGK first, when she is meeting with Rilian--she is meant to be ultra-seductive here, so she should be in full makeup, and very in-your-face, but maybe with a cloak over her head. Wardrobe is key here, her clothes should be darker colors.

The second time we see her, is when she meets Puddleglum, Jill, and Eustace. Here she's meant to be charming and sweet and lovely. She's traveling, so she can't be dressed too frivilously, but her dress should be a very pale, pretty shade of green, with a few frills and things, and with her hair loose and wavy, maybe with the flowers strewn about it. And absolutly no makeup, glowing complexion. This will help her appear sweet and friendly, as opposed to seductive and evil.

The third time is right before she turns into a snake, so she should be wearing dark colors again. Her dress should be fairly tight fitting to imitate the snake-look, and maybe a shimmery effect like snake scales (without getting too obvious). And hair and makeup dark and intense...

Using the same actress, it'll be most likly audiences will piece it together...but with the different hair, makeup, and costume, it'll be more of a "you aren't supposed to know this, but we're letting you in on a secret" instead of it being completely not obvious (totally obscuring the faces), or completely obvious (no obvious wardrobe changes etc)...

There's my two cence.

... it'll be more of a "you aren't supposed to know this, but we're letting you in on a secret" instead of it being completely not obvious (totally obscuring the faces), or completely obvious (no obvious wardrobe changes etc)...

There's my two cence.

Great idea!! Hadn't thought of that! You're right; people will know who she is, anyway; don't try to hide it completely.

I voted for "other", since I agree with Valiant_Lucy. The biggest way that they're going to keep from revealing EVERYTHING about LotGK is by utilizing her costumes and various "looks." Another person, Lucy of Narnia, said that she could have a veil on when she kidnaps Rilian. That would contribute to the "wooing", sort of seductive look. Or a dark cloak would work as well. It's likely the audience will pick up on it (especially major book fans) but at least like Valiant_Lucy was saying, it won't be in your face.

As for Rilian, it could work to make him a little younger. What if they did him at the age of 12 or 14, maybe a young adolescent? That could work, but I can see a few book purists who would be none too happy.

I don't think they should make him younger. LotGK is supposed to woo Rilian. To my understanding, she uses her beauty much like the White Witch uses Turkish Delight. It's enchanting, but it isn't all controling. We never actually see Rilian's kidnapping in the book, but I suspect, given phrases like "he stared at her like a man out of his wits" and things of that nature, that Rilian left of his own free will. Granted, her beauty was enchanting and he was under a spell. But my point is that she didn't take him by total force.

As is proven by the book's ending, it is possible to resist the enchantment, but quite obviously Rilian didn't try until he was in it too deep to overcome it alone. It was only by the help of those whom Aslan sent that he was able to be free from it and finally destroy the witch that held him captive for so long. This is a wonderful illustration of sin and what happens when you let it control your life for so long. Think about it. For all but one hour of every day, no one was forcing Rilian to stay. For all but one hour of every day, he could've run if only he'd fought the enchantment.

I feel there's a very important lesson in that. If they make Rilian a child then the witch can't woo him, she has to take him by force. That would make Rilian her victim. In the book, Rilian is more his own victim than the witch's. If Rilian is just a helpless victim rather than a man who is held captive because of his own foolishness that kind of kills the illustration.

Also, the witch and Rilian are planning to marry when the travelers find him. Call me crazy, but I think it would just be really gross to kidnap a child and wait around for them to get older so you can marry them. That would just be too for a Narnia movie IMO. I agree with Clive Staples Sibelius in that he should be somewhere in his upper teens when he's taken. I think the witch should at least appear to be around the same age. It should be believable that Rilian would be attracted to her beauty.

As for how to do the backstory, hmm I've thought about this a good deal. It's quite an interesting thing to have to adapt. I trust the filmmakers will do a good job with this though.

The only characters we have returning this time will be Eustace, Caspian and Aslan. Will Poulter is wonderful as Eustace and has been pretty well received by viewers which is a good thing. I think, for familiarity, they should use Caspian wherever they can fit him in (within context of the book ) I hope, for continuity and familiarity, they can find some way to make Ben Barnes look old so he can return as Old Caspian.

I think maybe at the beginning, perhaps we could see Caspian having nightmares about what happened. Maybe we see a little bit of Caspian while he's on his final voyage. Maybe he was there when Lilliandil was killed and has flashbacks of that day. Maybe he remembers telling Rilian to give up his searches for the snake (which wouldn't be in keeping with the book but it would make sense) or maybe he remembers Drinian telling him about LotGK. Maybe Drinian has flashback of the last day he saw Rilian.

At any rate, clearly stating what I have to say, I think they should show flashbacks, particularly flashbacks of Caspian's. I think they should avoid showing faces. I think the flashbacks should be sort of (a) random dream-like sequence(s) and perhaps in no particular order. The viewer should only get a vague idea of what happened to Rilian until the very end when Rilian is disenchanted and able to say what happened. Until that point we should only have clues. Like piecing together a mystery. That's how it is in my mind anyway

I think they could make Rilian look different, perhaps even unrecognizable. He would've aged 10 years. He may have grown a beard. His hair may be longer or shorter. He may be quite a bit paler, I mean the poor guy hasn't seen the sun in ten years. His demeanor and wardrobe would be different. All this added to the fact that (hopefully) we won't get a good look at his face in the flashbacks. If we only get little glimpses in said flashbacks, perhaps we won't even hear Rilian's voice.

I don't know what should be done about LotGK's identity. I like Valiant_Lucy's idea.

There are ways of doing this. I'm sure the filmmakers can handle it

I voted "other", I think they should keep their backstory the way it was in the book but just skip the long story in the parliment of owls. It can just come out through over time through the dialogue of characters.