New film coming out in December

[thatcrazycajun]

Thanks to aiglet, I just checked out the suitably glitzy Flash-based website for the new film His Dark Materials: The Golden Compass. Based on the first volume of a high-fantasy trilogy by British author Philip Pullman, it stars Nicole Kidman and Sam Elliott, and also reunites current 007 Daniel Craig with his Casino Royale love interest, Eva Green.

So has anybody read this thing? Anyone read or heard about the film? Opinions? The director describes the trilogy as "leaving Tolkien in the dust" for complexity and depth of characterization and praises it as a great work of literature for the 20th century. Too fulsome? Or not enough?

Comments

[nancylebov.livejournal.com]

I've read the first book, and never managed the momentum for the rest of the series. It's a clever and imaginative story of a Victorian society with magic and lots of nasty treatment of children. I'm told that the series finishes up with gung ho anti-religious metaphysics--this is something I might well be interested in, and I'll probably take another crack at reading it.

[catalana.livejournal.com]

I enjoyed the books - they were fun. I generally don't get into "great works of literature" debates, honestly; it wasn't Joyce or Nabokov, but I'm guessing the author wasn't trying for that either. But they were fun fantasy books; I'll definitely go see the movie!

[filkertom.livejournal.com]

This is going to be a horror show.

The trilogy is marvelous -- as in, can't-put-it-down marvelous. The characters are fantastic, the situations complex and intriguing and never pointless or gratuitous, the scope epic. It compares very well to Tolkien, and you know how much I love that.

One huge frickin' problem with the movie: Apparently so as not to offend anyone's delicate sensibilities, religious themes have been reportedly removed from the script.

The book is ABOUT religious themes.

The main plot is effectively a mad scientist who intends to assault Heaven and kill God. One of the running themes is religion vs. witchcraft vs. science, and religion interacting with witchcraft interacting with science. One of the major characters and plotlines of the third book involves Father Gomez, who is a fanatical assassin employed by the Church. There are freakin' angels, or at least creatures who are called and who call themselves angels.

They're gutting it, because some goddamn terrified-of-everything Baptists might be offended.

[filkerdave.livejournal.com]

Pretty much. But I'll still see the movie and pretend it has nothing to do with those REALLY good books, because I bet it's going to be bloody gorgeous.