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His Dark Materials: The Golden Compass
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Celes Tilly

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PostPosted: Thu Nov 29, 2007 3:43 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

I get a lot of concerned parents coming in and asking about Golden Compass/His Dark Materials stuff. I think that the brouhaha about it is because, yes, it is a child's book. Everyone who's ever heard of Narnia already knows it's religious. The dude wrote it for Christian/Catholic children, from what I hear. Not so with Golden Compass, AFAIK. I read it because I heard it was good. I didn't know jack about the religious stuff in it until I finished the trilogy.

What's silly about it is the author's statement:

Quote:
The author of the book on which the new film The Golden Compass is based has hit back at critics who accuse him of peddling "candy-coated atheism".

Philip Pullman dismissed as "absolute rubbish" accusations by the US-based Catholic League that the film promotes atheism and denigrates Christianity.

"I am a story teller," he said. " If I wanted to send a message I would have written a sermon."

Seems like a blatant lie to me. That article can be found here.
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PostPosted: Thu Nov 29, 2007 4:47 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

From what I could tell from reading the books it's more anti-religion on the basis that the established religion the way it is now has abused its authority and power over its followers. If he was an atheist then he wouldn't even acknowledge the existence of God and/or anything to suggest a God.
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Celes Tilly

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PostPosted: Fri Nov 30, 2007 3:40 am    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

Ideally, yes, but most atheists go out of their way to prove god doesn't exist. But you make a good point; I didn't consider that.
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PostPosted: Sat Dec 08, 2007 4:40 am    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

Saw the movie tonight. I was actually excited for once to see a movie, but I was sorely disappointed. I won't go into specifics, but I'll give a short general impression. The acting was not bad by any means. The animation was excellent and so was the voice acting involved. However, the meat of the story and all of the important concepts and inter-character relationships were glanced over with brief scenes and tidbits meant to replace actual plot and character development. Not only were the subtexts that everyone was concerned about gone, but so was most of the story. They didn't develop mystery (they revealed secrets almost as soon as they introduced the questions), intrigue, or make you want to know about what was going on.

It was a very disjointed, choppy movie now that I sit back, away from it and the books, and think about it. Just a disappointment.
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PostPosted: Sat Dec 08, 2007 2:02 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

Sage wrote:
Saw the movie tonight. I was actually excited for once to see a movie, but I was sorely disappointed. I won't go into specifics, but I'll give a short general impression. The acting was not bad by any means. The animation was excellent and so was the voice acting involved. However, the meat of the story and all of the important concepts and inter-character relationships were glanced over with brief scenes and tidbits meant to replace actual plot and character development. Not only were the subtexts that everyone was concerned about gone, but so was most of the story. They didn't develop mystery (they revealed secrets almost as soon as they introduced the questions), intrigue, or make you want to know about what was going on.

It was a very disjointed, choppy movie now that I sit back, away from it and the books, and think about it. Just a disappointment.


I saw it last night as well and I couldn't agree more. I didn't read the books, but from watching the movie I felt much of the races and cultures didn't get enough description. I didn't really get any anti-religion out of it as well.
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PostPosted: Sat Dec 08, 2007 5:08 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

I have not even read the books and I agree. And I think "choppy" is a good word. Although on a good note, now I am thinking about reading the books because I like the story, but the movie did not really cut it.
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PostPosted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 8:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

This is part of a series correct? Are they already making the next movie(s)?

A lot of people (like myself) will give the first movie the benefit of the doubt and go along to see how it is for ourselves, however if most people are left uninspired then the sequels will have to really pick up the ball or they'll fall flat.
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PostPosted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 9:14 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

I saw it. Let me start off with the positive, I like being positive. The concept is really awesome! That actually carries a lot of the enjoyment of the movie along. The setting is absolutely gorgeous. It reminds of sort of a fantasy steam-punk world with neo-romantic architecture. It's absolutely stunning, If there's one thing I fell in love with the movie, it is definitely the setting. The effects were pretty neat as well, but that's to be expected these days.

Now to the negative... I have not read the books, and I found it pretty difficult to follow the choppy flow of the story. Things seemed to happen sort of randomly. I suppose if I had read the story it would have made more sense. This pretty much kills the movie. I think they just tried to fit too much into the movie. They should have done a few less scenes, and given the most important ones much more depth and explanation-- instead of just rushing on to the next scene leaving me (and all others who haven't read the book) scratching my (their) head. Also, the climax was pretty much just glanced over. I mean seriously-- it was a bit exciting, but really now, it was hardly the end of a movie. I have no idea how the book ended, but I hope it wasn't the disappointment the ending of the movie had.

@FC: Yes, this is a trilogy-- however the next movie's fate hinges on the reception ($$$$) of this movie. So depending on how the movie fares at the box office, there may or may not be another movie made. The concept is really awesome, however, so I hope they learn from a few of their mistakes and improve on them in time for The Amber Spyglass.

The best thing here is that seeing this movie, despite how meh it was, it inspired me to read the trilogy, because of how much I fell in love with the setting, and how cool the concept is.
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PostPosted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 9:50 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

Quote:
I mean seriously-- it was a bit exciting, but really now, it was hardly the end of a movie.


The movie ended several chapters before the book, but *spoiler for those who have not seen/read either* part of the last chapters of the book is the time Lyra spent among the Pjanserbjorne and the Iorek / Iofur (Ragnar in the movie) fight. They put that part in the wrong place in the movie so they could have a polar bear fight I suppose. *spoiler* So there was quite a bit of the book left where the movie ended.
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Gil-galad

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PostPosted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 10:23 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

I managed to keep myself from reading the spoiler, because I plan to read the books soon, but it is good to know that that isn't the true "ending" of the novel. Weird that they would just leave a good portion of the book out of the movie. I know Lord of the Rings did it, however that was done to improve the climax of each movie-- it doesn't quite work as well here.
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PostPosted: Sun Dec 09, 2007 11:07 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

Quote:

I managed to keep myself from reading the spoiler, because I plan to read the books soon, but it is good to know that that isn't the true "ending" of the novel. Weird that they would just leave a good portion of the book out of the movie. I know Lord of the Rings did it, however that was done to improve the climax of each movie-- it doesn't quite work as well here.


They probably did it to shorten the run time of the movie to make it more watchable to the average viewer. After all His Dark Materials is no LOTR--they probably thought a 3 hour movie wouldn't do as well as a 2 hour movie. I would expect them to make subsequent films longer than this one, which by my watch had less than a 2 hour run time.

I went and saw the movie and actually enjoyed the film quite a bit. I will concede that the story went along at a pretty fast pace, but I never felt left in the dark about things or confused about what was going on. It seemed pretty straightforward to me--granted, it didn't delve much into the backstory of things, but films simply don't have time for that. If you're looking to learn more about the backstory of everything, than you shouldn't be watching the movie--you should be reading the book. There were things that the viewer was left unexplained (like the dust), but I assume that we'll learn more about that in the sequels since the movie made a big to-do about how mysterious it was.

I could see the overall story arc, and while I figured the book probably spent more time on each event in the story, I wasn't really left guessing on what was going on.

Overall, good movie, in my opinion.
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PostPosted: Tue Dec 11, 2007 2:04 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

I just started to read the books and are through the first third. I like it so far. It is not the best thing I have ever read and some things are strangely disturbiung without being able to point at it, but it is fun to read.

By the way, my daemon is a ladybug... stupid test... :)
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PostPosted: Tue Dec 11, 2007 3:44 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

So I saw the movie and i must say I actually enjoyed it. Keep in mind i went into the movie except a huge load of crap.While yes several of the chapters in the middle and end of the book were missing from the movie i realize they could not have a 3 hour movie. Unlike Narnia, this movie managed to keep it's violent bloody scenes and still keep it's PG13 (or whatever) rating. I'm sorry to rant but having Aslan tell Peter to clean his sword after battle is pointless if there is no blood on the sword. Anyway, I did some research and found that "His Dark Material" has been turned into a play which has been on boardway. I wonder if they might have based it off that? Has anyone seen the play or ever heard of it?
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Celes Tilly

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PostPosted: Fri Dec 14, 2007 9:10 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

I saw it today. I thought it was pretty bad. It had some absolutely terrible dialogue.
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PostPosted: Sun Dec 23, 2007 11:03 am    Post subject: Reply with quote Add User to Ignore List

Saw the movie yesterday. Here are my thoughts:

Acting: The acting was pretty solid. Although Lord Asriel didn't seem nearly as imposing as how he's described in the books, I'd say that almost everyone looks quite convincing as the people they're supposed to portray.
Cinematics etc: Absolutely perfect. The CGI is top notch (I like the touch where you actually see people's daemons dying as soon as their masters die), the animations are very fluid and I could blab a lot about how magnificent the landscaping is but I'll cut it by saying that it looks like what I imagined it to be.
Plotting: This is one of my great disappointments. Even with my fuzzy memory of the story, I could see that a lot of the events were cut and some didn't even make sense. I was also disappointed at how the first movie ended because it's far from the end of the first book.
Accuracy?: I've heard about how the movie had to be toned down because of protests, but I found it pretty ridiculous how the story managed to turn from something so deep into what looks more like a regular story about good versus evil.

I did enjoy it though, so it's no great loss.
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