I think what I am getting at is a sense of tragedy that something of real value was lost. I don't think audiences took the LWW movie seriously on that level. There are several reasons for this.

This powerful sense of longing and faint hope is what gives Aslan's death such an impact in the book. FINALLY, it appears the prophecy is being fulfilled. FINALLY, after a hundred years of always winter never Christmas, Aslan is here. The sons of Adam and daughters of Eve are here. The snow has melted! Everything is in place.... and then.... all of that is shattered in an instant when Aslan is killed. The first time I read the scene, I felt like I had been kicked in the stomach. (Which made his resurrection all the more joyful of course).

...In the movie, it is the kids who are the real heroes, not Aslan. And not much time was spent creating anticipation for meeting Aslan. So when he dies, it was little more than "aww poor lion. that sucks"

I can't argue with you there glumPuddle.

I didn't notice it notice it so much in my first viewings of LWW, but the more I have seen the film the more frustrating it becomes that the Pevensies are the force to saving the world, not Aslan. True the Pevensies are meant to help bring an end to the White Witch's reign, but it almost seems like Aslan serves no purpose at all (just a bringer of reinforcements). I can understand the whole angle of the four children coming from a world where they have no power or control of what's happening to entering a world where they are enpowered. I get that appeal, especially for the younger audience. I just find an irritation in the Beaver's home with the line of "Aslan's return, Tumnus' arrest, the secet police, ... it's all happening because of you." Not to mention Father Christmas's line of "The hope you have brought you majesties has finally started to weaken the witch's power." So, not only are the Pevensies the ones who are meant to defeat the White Witch, they also brought about spring?

If we are going with the angle in Pan's Labryinth of lost hope and a sense of longing, there are other films that tread here as well... without the... hmm, how to avoid the 'D' word ... intensity of PL. I believe that Toy Story 3 covers this ground as well, with the success of appealing to a wide audience. Maybe not quite Pan's Labryinth for you glumPuddle, but I think it works on the same level- and could of worked if converted into LWW (but, then again, it would have been a different film). If there's one thing you have to credit Andrew Adamson with, is that he made LWW his vision, no one else's, and that's the best thing you can do as a director.

just find an irritation in the Beaver's home with the line of "Aslan's return, Tumnus' arrest, the secet police, ... it's all happening because of you." Not to mention Father Christmas's line of "The hope you have brought you majesties has finally started to weaken the witch's power." So, not only are the Pevensies the ones who are meant to defeat the White Witch, they also brought about spring?

Sorry, that was not my take on the LWW film last time I saw it. I agree with C.S.Lewis that he didn't write these Narnia books with movies in mind, much as I desperately would like to see a film version of all of that series. And the Walden movie really was much better than the preceeding BBC version.

Unfortunately, Aslan as a rather expensive CGI character, and an animal character to boot, is unlikely to win Oscars, according to the rules of Oscar awards. I'd like it otherwise, myself, but there it is. The big people in the industry like human faces and human characters to award gongs to, not WC Field's animals. And that is why the emphasis is on the humans in show business, however objectionable their showing off might be. Andy Serkis did famously as Gollum but everyone and anyone but him got the gongs in LOTR, didn't they?

Down Under there has been a movie called Red Dog, which, like Pan's Labyrinth, cannot be found on Box Office Mojo. The Australian film was a film version of the legend of the Pilbara Wanderer, but, unfortunately, the chief award couldn't go to the star of the show, a red kelpie who played the role with quite a bit of personality.

I'd have liked to have seen Pan's Labyrinth, myself. Did you notice the cover of the film has a sneaking resemblance to that scene in Walden's Prince Caspian where the Telmarines take their exit from Narnia? The same sort of split tree..... However, the takings were in Euros and in US dollars, and although it may have been a good movie, it seems to have occupied a distinctly niche market. I doubt that Pan's Labyrinth was ever shown in Australia outside of a few inner city art house theatres.

Pan's Labyrinth wasn't the most mainstream of movies, being Spanish and having subtitles, but it was hardly an arthouse movie either. Admittedly, I first saw the movie on DVD but it was released before the Prince Caspian movie.

Well, that explains the resemblance between the two trees. PC, released in May 2008, possibly copied that tree to some extent. LWW, of course, preceded Pan's Labyrinth which came out almost a year later.

Pan's Labyrinth US run made $US 37,623,143 in a handful of American movie theatres, it would seem. It was released in Spanish-speaking Mexico and in France, Germany and UK. But it seems it didn't make it into any Commonwealth country, according to IMDb's figures. That is a pity as that movie made 3 Oscars. By the way, its MPAA rating was R for graphic violence and some language. Of course subtitled movies really can't translate that sort of 'language' used.

If it had made it to Australia, it definitely didn't get far beyond George Street in Sydney. The point about 'arthouse' movie theatres, in particular, the distinctly artistic Dendy cinemas, is that, as well as adult movies like 'The Hours', they might also show Oscar-winning foreign-made films like Pan's Labyrinth, unlike the big name theatre chains like Hoyts or Greater Union, with a movie complex in every large suburban centre, and which generally cater for the hoi polloi (like me) . When Pan's Labyrinth was produced by an outfit called Estudios Picasso, the art connection is irresistible, isn't it?

Hey, used to be a member here yeard ago, forgot my password and username so registered again... hi all!

Pan's labyrinth is one of my favourite films and LWW would have been a much better film if it had gone down the same path. I loved LWW but even when watching it for the first time I felt it was a little bland and too 'hollywood', not like the books at all which are really distinctive in style and really sophisticated.

One thing about Pan labyrinth is the faun seems ambigious throughout the film, we never know, till the end, if he is good or bad. They should have played a little more with that in LWW, Mr.Tumnus does after all work for the white witch. And Aslan is supposed to be good AND terrible at the same time, and not safe... I just didn't feel that in LWW until he bit the witch's head off. That was the only moment you got to see how powerful and dangerous he really was.

Pan's labyrinth had its own style, the whole world of narnia just seemed a little too 'fairy tale'. For example it was a cool idea to have an ice palace but it literally was just... walls of ice. All the creatures, centaurs, fauns, ogres, etc, didn't really have anything that made them stand out or look different from any of the other hundreds of magical creatures that have been done before. Whereas the child eating monster in PL is really, really creepy, and all it does it walking forward with eyes in its hands. The scene where it does that is so full of suspense, and it seems that in the LWW film they were cutting out things that could have actually built up suspense in the film. For instance when the witch kills aslan and runs down the hill with her army she and all her people run right past susan and lucy, in the book Lewis describes it in detail saying they felt the earth shudder under the feet of the minotaurs, and felt the chill of specters, etc, etc, but that scene didn't even appear in the film and it could have been almost as creepy and full of suspense as the scene with the monster in Pan Labyrinth... thats the kind of film I would have wanted to see

Well, I've seen the movie now - on DVD with subtitles. Although it would have been easy enough to follow the Spanish, it would have become wearing after a while, if the viewer suffers hearing problems and has never studied any Latin language at all.

Pan's Labyrinth, unlike the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, is an "adult fairytale". As a reviewer commented, it may be movie magic at its most "visceral", but, again unlike LWW, or even LOTR or the earlier Harry Potter films, it isn't the sort of film that you would take young children to see, being categorised MA15+. It is simply too violent, too bloodthirsty.

I can understand why glumPuddle and others love this movie, being in their late teens or as young adult men. After all, the 1940's sadist of a Captain does make PC's King Miraz look something of a pussycat. And if people did not like the birth scene at the beginning of PC, the much more tragic birth of the Captain's son, plus the near miscarriage, was also 'visceral'. But frankly, I don't see how the film LWW would have been improved by a retelling, similar to Pan's Labyrinth.

Yes, this tale, written as well as directed by Guillermo del Toro, himself, does emphasize that people cannot simply obey orders, and go with the flow, leaving a murderous sort like the Captain in charge. That, in the end, they must decide between good and evil, much as Edmund had to eventually do in LWW, when he opposed the White Witch in the Battle of Beruna. Or what Nikabrik failed to see in PC.

In LWW, although Edmund was to be sacrificed by the Witch, Aslan interposes himself to save him. and yes, it is Aslan's sacrifice that is redemptive. I felt betrayed that the 'blood of an innocent' the faun said Ofelia must spill was, in the end, either the baby's blood or her own. Even though in Ofelia's fantasy she was restored to her kingdom, she still died, leaving the baby all alone. There was to be no magic healing, after all.