If you haven't read the books, you will probably enjoy this movie well enough and I'm sure children who haven't read the books will love it. But read the books and find what's almost a different story - surely even younger children will notice the differences?
The main themes are the same, but gone are the dark overtones, the serious and adult aspect of much of the story. Lord Asriel, though brilliantly played by Daniel Craig who has shown what he can really do if allowed, after the disappointing Bond effort... Lord Asriel has lost all his mystery. You are supposed to wonder until late in the third book what he's up to, whether he's good or bad or what..... And we hardly see him.
I wouldn't have cast Nicole Kidman as Mrs Coulter but she plays the part perfectly well so I am not disappointed.
The worst changes are - first, that you are told right at the start by a voice-over for heaven's sake that you are in a different universe and you are told about the familiars, when you should need to take quite some time to work out why Oxford is so strange, the people are so strange, and what these animals are. I can't for a moment believe it was necessary to give away so much of the mystery at the start and it completely ruined the early part of the story for me. And second, that the story is badly dumbed down into "just" a little kiddies' story. It is no longer a dark, very serious as well as enthralling kidult story as in the books, nor mysterious nor very threatening.
I don't call this a bad movie, nor a flop. But the film makers didn't it seems have the guts to make a movie that would reflect the book. I hope the further two movies will show more courage but my guess is they won't. The standard has been set too low in movie 1.
The main themes are the same, but gone are the dark overtones, the serious and adult aspect of much of the story. Lord Asriel, though brilliantly played by Daniel Craig who has shown what he can really do if allowed, after the disappointing Bond effort... Lord Asriel has lost all his mystery. You are supposed to wonder until late in the third book what he's up to, whether he's good or bad or what..... And we hardly see him.
I wouldn't have cast Nicole Kidman as Mrs Coulter but she plays the part perfectly well so I am not disappointed.
The worst changes are - first, that you are told right at the start by a voice-over for heaven's sake that you are in a different universe and you are told about the familiars, when you should need to take quite some time to work out why Oxford is so strange, the people are so strange, and what these animals are. I can't for a moment believe it was necessary to give away so much of the mystery at the start and it completely ruined the early part of the story for me. And second, that the story is badly dumbed down into "just" a little kiddies' story. It is no longer a dark, very serious as well as enthralling kidult story as in the books, nor mysterious nor very threatening.
I don't call this a bad movie, nor a flop. But the film makers didn't it seems have the guts to make a movie that would reflect the book. I hope the further two movies will show more courage but my guess is they won't. The standard has been set too low in movie 1.