I dislike gushing, swooning fans as much as I do overly critical people, to opposite sides that are both the wrong way of looking at things do not make right. You should not just focus on the problems and rant a rave about them, while totally ignoring the awesome parts and you shouldn't totally ignore all the bad parts and only focus on the good ones. The individual should be balanced.

I don't think it's a realistic expectation to expect someone to be balanced. Fans do tend to gush and swoon, and overly critical people do tend to be overly critical. However, usually the entire community will be balanced. Take a look, for instance, at the reviews for VDT. Some of them are quite positive, some are quite negative. But combined, they are balanced.

I stated pretty clearly that i had not researched the movie the antichrist and therefore it could mean nothing. However, i still believe that many of these reviewers have a bias toward alot of the religious themes in these movies. Tell me how Alan appearing as a lamb is subtle. One could argue that some of the books have more of a very subtle biblical theme. Like Horse and His Boy. However Dawn Treader is more obvious. I think they might have been more true to the source materials religious themes in this one. at any rate i'm hoping this one can climb back into the 70s. The reviews are mostly from australia. So they are trickling in so slow that everyone has a big effect.

I don't expect everyone to be balanced, but that doesn't make me like them.

I wouldn't complain about the movie being too Christian though, because I agree with rjefvh andTarquin that the books are very Christian as well.

I think Lewis' works have both obvious and subtle Christian messages in them. I think its the same with the movies. There are plenty of people who think Lewis was being "too" Christian in his books. Philip Pullman is an example just off the top of me head.

I'll have to see for myself how the film conveys these religious themes. However, if they are as obvious (or as subtle) as the book is, then I most likely won't have a problem with it.
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well, with 14 reviews it has it a lower 57%, currently not fresh. I expect this to change to the better though as it gets more reviews and begins to balance out.

many of the reviews are from Australia, prolly because it already premiers there. They don't seem to like it much

Yeah, those Australian critics! Hopefully the average person likes it more than they do.

It is important to remember that this movie was not made for critics, it was made so that families would have a good movie to enjoy this holiday season.

Some of the most fun on Rotten Tomatoes right now are the people in the comments getting after the negative reviewers for being so negative.

Fun? Personally I don't find watching members of a fandom I'm a part of attacking critics and acting like hateful little toddlers to be fun. Many of these people would probably claim to be Christian, yet I've seen hate-filled comments all over the internet.The disgusting comments on our news report of the Ain't It Cool review also come to mind.

The fact of the matter is that if you're going to attack and discredit as biased the negative reviews by people who express a dislike of the Christian themes, you have to do the same to the Christian reviewers who have gushed over the film. They're every bit as likely to be biased in favor of the film as non-Christians are to be biased against it.

Bookwyrm, I'm not condoning the behavior… I just find it funny that the one review where the reviewer complained about everything (3D, Will Poulter, all other actors, Aslan/Jesus parallel, temptation theme, Michael Apted, etc.) had so many comments telling him he was just bashing the movie to sound cool.

And I'd say the same thing about people telling Christian reviewers they're being too nice.

I stated pretty clearly that i had not researched the movie the antichrist and therefore it could mean nothing. However, i still believe that many of these reviewers have a bias toward alot of the religious themes in these movies.

I acknowledged that, hence why I said to leave speculation out and advise avoiding jumping to a belief that the critics is possibly biased because of unwarranted speculation on the movies he watches and likes. I recommend that we acknowledge the flaws and criticism pointed out rather than shoving it aside and claim the review as biased because it's negative to a Narnia film. Rereading the negative reviews on RT shows the criticism mostly lies with the problem of the film itself. Religious themes are briefly acknowledged before the critics focused on the real problem, which they believe is bad acting, incoherent story, and bland effects. Do we have to agree and believe they're right? No. To each his or her own opinion. But the fact that almost half of the critics (6 out of 14) currently think this way should indicate the problem is more than just a supposed anti-Christian/Lewis bias.

Savber, let me go on record as saying I appreciate your posts. They are always respectful, clear and well thought out. Thank you.

The 7 swords, mist, overall storytelling, etc. are all fair game. I think we all can agree with that. The only contention I have is that to complain about Christian themes makes it seem like the reviewer did not do any homework or understand the subject matter. It is like criticizing the Golden Compass for being anti-Church. Well, look at the source of the material. One might criticize the source, but the film should be faithful to that source and people should not criticize that work of film on that basis. Though I wonder if bias makes an impact on the overall reviews we have seen, I am willing to give the benefit of the doubt.

That said, even though I would not automatically chalk up bad reviews to anti-Christian bias, that bias does exist. For instance, I am amazed at how many reviewers lambasted Passion of the Christ for being violent and bloodthirsty, yet championed movies such as Pulp Fiction, Saving Private Ryan and Gladiator, among others. One would hope for at least some consistency there.

Yikes, the VDT is being torn apart, it only has a 57% approval rating and is considered rotten . I hope this doesn't affect the box-office

Yikes, the VDT is being torn apart . I hope this doesn't affect the box-office

New Moon had 27% and did well!
The Last Airbender had 6% and did decent enough.
Transformers 2 had 20% had an impressive run.
(speaking grosses, quality of movies aside- I don't expect Narnia to land in with these. I trust it'll be fresh)

Like I posted before, it should balance out still. It's only got 14 reviews so far. Keep positive, until proven otherwise. RT can hurt Box Office for many movies, but not all movies are affected by it. Hopefully VDT doesn't get affected.

the VDT does at least have the advantage of diehard fans like us who would see it no matter how bad the reviews were, that will help a bit I'm sure

This looks like a good place to put this: IMDB has first ratings votes for VDT. A solid 7.5 average with 305 votes so far.

Actual average is 8.3 so the 7.5 is a weighted average which they explain. A very high percentage of 10 votes also (59.3% of total).

Still early but encouraging nevertheless.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0980970/

Note: IMDB = Internet Movie Database