The Republic of Heaven

I know there's responses and thoughts on the movie in the review thread and also in the also in the advance showing threads, but I thought it might be nice to take the precaution for those who don't want to be spoiled and put everything in one place.

I just got back from it and I'll put my thoughts up in a moment once I capture them, collect all the bits, and put them in an orderly fashion.

Edit: I thought I'd point out this being distinct from say the review thread as that is magazines and articles and such and there ought to be a separate place for sraffie thoughts.

REVIEW (|) THE GOLDEN COMPASS, THEATRICAL CUT
A GASS-ZZLING PICTURE, DESPITE HAVING LESS ARTISTIC FREEDOM THAN THE "LAKOTA" GUY





In short, the movie is excellent. It is a flawed picture, with the most unfortunate knife job of any film in motion picture history, but all things considered it is an promising picture nonetheless. This parallel Earth is a fount of discovery and globetrekking and storytelling despite having no ending and more surgical cuts to its artistic freedom than the Lakota commercial guy.

Based on an award-winning trilogy of novels (His Dark Materials) by English author Philip Pullman, this adaptation is helmed by a fanboy director, lead by a sharp cast and crew, and was subsequently cut up in the editing room by a team of monkeys. It's definitely not The Lord of the Rings on any level of ambition and it shouldn't have to be; it's a simpler pleasure. The Philip Pullman readership should be proud to have fanship over the most colorful and intelligent and infernal fantasy series the world has seen -- with a science fiction gloss, post-modern morality, theological jigsaws, and even quantum mechanics.





THE DIRECTION AND SCRIPT

Any misgivings I have with The Golden Compass adaptation stem from cuts made by its studio, and when I say "cuts" I mean the kind that makes art bleed internally. This was a knife job for the ages. Newcomer director Chris Weitz -- presumably with a gun to his back -- reluctantly trimmed a nearly 3-hour feature down to 2 hours. That missing hour(?) included among other things the novel's original ending: an essential final act that brings all of the book's themes in perspective, shows us acts of creation and pitiless destruction, and is easily the most morally pandemonius climax to a novel that I ever want to know. All that is missing and more. To put it simply, these scenes were snipped with scissors, served in alfredo sauce, and eaten. So given the awful circumstances in which this movie was created, it really is quite amazing what Chris Weitz managed to salvage. The Golden Compass succeeds surprisingly well for a motion picture that has suffered more physical insults to its body than Jake La Motta. It could be better, but by that same argument it also could have been a lot worse. It lacked a lot, but there was no lack of Chris Weitz's respect for the books. It's better to have a nice film that feels half-finished than a finished film that makes no sense.

The film's pacing is badly rushed due to these cuts, and you will laugh at how fast it throws the story in your face. Weitz is forced to breeze by some of the author's more interesting ideas in his rush to clock in at 2 hours, but he does it in such a way as to make you interested in reading up more about it later. He keeps your curiosity on the plate. You say: "That's an odd idea. How bizarre. I wonder what it could mean! How exciting." Pullman's mystical concepts stud this universe with mysteries that invite exploration. Given that nearly an hour of the film was cut, a lot of subtext from the novel is missing -- but that happens to all adaptations. The important point is that Weitz is a great fan of the books and he kept in more than enough of the story to make a good movie. Considering how many creative liberties died in the making of this movie, fans ought to be glad for how faithful Weitz's script turned out to be.

Director Chris Weitz is at times clumsy, being a newcomer and all, but he deserves more credit than that. This is a cast and crew that has had to survive enough studio interference to roast a ham radio on a spit, and I don't believe for a second that the filmmakers had any creative control left by the time test audiences were probed. And judging by the studio's reaction, these test audiences must have been pulled from the furthest corners of intellectual paucity. Case in point: they convinced the studio to trim the ending because they mistook "parallel worlds" with "the Christian afterlife" and assumed that characters seen journeying to other parallel Earths in different universes were in fact dead and were going to Heaven -- and this despite numerous elucidations by every single character with a speaking line as to the nature of parallel universes. Maybe these people were chitty-chatting when character no.15 was explaining the concept of parallel Earths... again. Maybe they all had their souls removed prior to the test screening, hence their attention span of absolute zero. Or maybe these test screenings took place in a remote mountain village in Nepal where no one speaks English. Viewers who are still confused by Pullman's universe despite the plot simplifications need to be medicated for attention deficits.

It is frequently argued that between the two of them Peter Jackson is the superior filmmaker, and in many ways they're right: he is. But Weitz's film has a more generous heart owing to the colorful universe that author Philip Pullman paints, he uses daemons to highlight character relationships and gives flesh to his heroine Lyra. A nobody perhaps, but Weitz has sense enough to eschew melodrama and just put a heart at the center of his film. It's been argued that the battles in this movie are bereft of danger. Does that matter? I didn't pay ten dollars to watch that fight anyways, I wanted to see the beginnings of an infinitely inventive, shapeshifting, physics-spanning adventure with an atheist bent. In many ways Philip Pullman himself eschews battlefields (our AntiTolkien), preferring to consolidate psychological and intellectual wars.

The director had his hands tied with regards to adapting the book's religious bits, but he promised us that he would try to hint at as many themes as he could. Chris Weitz made good on his promise in the end -- make no mistake, we were right to have faith in him. References to the church are remarkably untouched in this film in spite of the studio's intentions to scissor them out of the movie. But theists shouldn't balk at Philip Pullman's "subversive" atheist message. After all, he attacks the misuse of science as strongly as he attacks the misuse of religion (in his novels it is the combined perversion of church and science that invites criticism). And his' is a bittersweet story about a girl who stakes her life in the name of friendship, and fights for love and long life. Call this "Luciferian" if you will, I say you're a silly person.





THE CAST

Actress Dakota Blue Richards is Lyra. It feels as if Weitz's casting directors cut a hole in the fabric of space-time, found Lyra, pulled her into our world through a window in the other universe, dressed her up in trousers and a T-shirt and passed her off as Dakota Blue Richards. Her lack of any acting experience she more than makes up for with, as she puts it, her desire to just "be" Lyra. This is a girl happy to be Lyra, happy to play make-believe with her Pantalaimon and to befriend armoured bears, and so refreshing in her grasp of the character's tics: she pouts, grimaces, sneers and all. She carries the endearing feminism-lite of His Dark Materials for nearly every single frame of this picture, plus the scenes that were snipped out (3 hours, and then some). And considering that she's mostly acting with make-believe animals in green-screened parking lots, my friend, she makes Natalie Portman look like a fool -- she buries Hayden Christensen with a spade. This 12-year-old girl makes smoked meat sandwich out of the cast of Harry Potter, makes jellied meat out of Viggo Mortensen and Orlando Bloom, cooks Elijah Wood over a spitting fire, sauces the Pevensie children in a wok. At the very least, Richards' is a far more intimate presence than any of the leads in these competing film franchises, and Weitz's camera brings out this intimacy with close-ups.

Critics who complain about Dakota Blue Richards' failure to "emote" are nit-picking at details because, frankly, she's absolutely brimming with personality in every other scene: her expressions of horror and elation during the bear fight are absolutely perfect in pitch... they cut the breath out of you with a knife. For each of her bad moments, I can name worse scenes involving Mortensen and Wood; and for each of her best moments, I can't name a single scene involving Mortensen or Wood that even compares. Fans upset with Richard's performance have clearly lost perspective: hers' is a refreshing change of direction from the "act sad and scared" mantra of the last decade, and I'd much rather watch Richards spit at scholars from rooftops than Dakota Fanning acting sad. Or scared. And I've just about had it with Abigail Breslin pulling the "I am chub and cute" card. Dakota Blue Richards nixes all these boorish stereotypes.

Weitz's casting directors have given The Golden Compass the sharpest cast of actors of any major film franchise do date. Lucy Bevan and Fiona Weir went go-for-broke in recruiting the most obscure talents in all the UK. Cast-wise, this misfortunate little picture is still ahead of the game, miles ahead of Star Wars (Harrison Ford deliberately hammed his way through The Return of the Jedi) or Harry Potter (Tem Felton's haughtiness is a poor substitute for Dakota Blue Richards). And though they are not all given proper screen time, the supporting actors do such a remarkable job in the short time that they are afforded on screen -- which, for some, amounts to a shorter cameo than Alfred Hitchcock. Even the smallest voices have a delightful screen presence and personality: Daniel Craig, Jim Carter, Sir Derek Jacobi, Hattie Morohan, Ian McShane and even Simon McBurney all steal their scenes, plotting, chiding, chewing scenery; Sam Elliot, Jack Shepard, Sir Tom Courtenay, and Eva Green all play their parts with undeniable sensitivity, speaking from the heart. You'll leave your seat wishing you'd seen more of these short-lived characters, and that's not really a bad feeling to have.

Every bit of acting seen here is absolutely respectable, and these actors do not diminish their performances simply because The Golden Compass is a family-friendly picture. Which is more than can be said for Ian Hart in The Philosopher's Stone (hamming all of his lines to the sky) or Toby Jones & Christian Coulson in The Chamber of Secrets (they made my ears bleed). Too many people take for granted that a children's movie is somehow "undeserving" of good acting acting talent, and so it's refreshing to see the one-hundred-percent casting effort made here by Lucy Bevan and Fiona Weir.

In its 9 hours on-screen, the entirety of The Lord of the Rings saga rarely presents the kind of earnest character moments that stud this one measly less-than-2 hour installment of The Golden Compass: Lyra and Pan stealing across the dining room, or her and Roger playing on the roof, or her stroll with uncle Asriel, or her introduction to the Texan aeronaut... all of these scenes are infused with a lovely personality that's lacking from Peter Jackson's medieval epic. Not for lack of trying, after all Jackson includes many character moments in his films, to his credit, but they never perform as well as they do in Weitz's picture (again, his camera eschews style, preferring to give on-screen "intimacy" to characters). Whatever the reason, characters in The Golden Compass are given some great moments in what little time they have on-screen, and this is especially admirable considering just how many scenes were excised from the final cut.





THE CREW

Lead artist Dennis Gassner and his design team -- set decorator Anna Pinnock and prop master Barry Gibbs -- have created an entire universe from scratch. Gassner's gass-zzling art direction is delicious and utterly ravishing. Its centerpiece is the titular compass (with the image of Prague in its inner-facet), but literally everything else in this universe invites admiration: lamps made in the image of carnivorous plants; lampshades crowned with belladonnas; firearms studded with pistons; binocular brass telescopes; mechanical insects with spring-like motors; anachronistic technologies linked to abstract logic. Rows of anbaric lights hang from every ceiling, coloured drapes belie a cool Arctic bedroom, philosophical instruments clutter every desk, there are ovals and meshwork and copper on every visible apparel. Everything. All wondrous, and even the lowliest water flasks brim with personality.

Gassner's vision is brought to life with some of the most expensive visual effects ever committed to film. The huge troughs of money that paid for these effects went a long way. Effects supervisor Mike Fink obviously spared no expense to animate the shapeshifting daemon Pantalaimon. Pan is astonishingly rendered in rich detail, with lithe movements and the lushest digital hair that an actor has ever petted. He's a little masterpiece in and of himself. This make-believe figment of Mike Fink's imagination feels more "real" than Orlando Bloom. And Lyra has better chemistry with the digital bears in The Golden Compass than Luke Skywalker has with real human beings. An absurd volume of money was drizzled into the special effects budget, and it shows.

The music score by Alexandre Desplat is noticeably harmed by the film's jagged pace and last-minute edits. Despite these setbacks, the music community is extremely pleased with the results and praise is unanimous among all the major soundtrack reviewers: his' is hailed as one of the best soundtracks of the year. It has the most promising themes to develop of any major film franchise since Star Wars, it's rich and layered and intelligently-written, and has some of the most innovative arrangements of instruments that I've ever heard (all the better to emphasize this off-centre universe, at once familiar and not at all). Reviewers in every critical circle are giddy in anticipation for Desplat's next score.



A flawed movie? Absolutely, but one that deserves our respect for the strengths that it does have. And these are important strengths, strengths that are lacking in so-called "better" mainstream pictures. In allegory, this production has been cut up with scissorhands, had a poisoned martini, was tossed from a moving train, locked in a trunk and thrown into the sea -- the film not only survived these abuses, it's remarkably alive. Remember: this motion picture has no ending! The fact that The Golden Compass movie can still stand on its own two feet is testament to a solid underlying story by Philip Pullman. There's discovery, metaphysical wonder, earnest characterizations, and enough plot to stun a golden monkey in this more-faithful-than-most adaptation. Keep an open mind, there's a lot to love in this movie, and less to hate about it than you'd think...


- Namster, 08/12/07 (updated 27/02/08)

[EDITED: see above]

(I realise my anti-Jackson diatribe from last week seemed unwarranted or irrelevant to comparisons with The Golden Compass. I stick to my cojones, but my comments were not entirely relevant and I have erased most of them)
-Namster, 06/12/07

I appreciate how you like the film, but bashing the Lord of the Rings in the process doesn't do much to enhance your credibility. Nearly everything you have said about Jackson and the trilogy I have disagreed with. Not that you aren't entitled to your own opinion, but I just think it is an unnecessary comparison.

I entirely disagree with what you say about references to the church namster, the only churchy thing in the movie is the building Iorek smashes through. Coulter's line about 'our ancestors' was just as ambiguous in the moive as it was when Chris told us about it. There just wasn't much hinting towards religion, and what there was was done so that they could have been talking about anything. I doubt people who have no idea that it's meant to have religion in it will guess that at all.

I appreciate how you like the film, but bashing the Lord of the Rings in the process doesn't do much to enhance your credibility. Nearly everything you have said about Jackson and the trilogy I have disagreed with. Not that you aren't entitled to your own opinion, but I just think it is an unnecessary comparison.

Thanks for the input. That's a resonable comment.

I entirely disagree with what you say about references to the church namster, the only churchy thing in the movie is the building Iorek smashes through. Coulter's line about 'our ancestors' was just as ambiguous in the moive as it was when Chris told us about it. There just wasn't much hinting towards religion, and what there was was done so that they could have been talking about anything. I doubt people who have no idea that it's meant to have religion in it will guess that at all.

Good point Blossom, but I feel that they've hinted at church themes more times than I've ever though possible for a censored scissor-cut Hollywood movie.

I entirely disagree with what you say about references to the church namster, the only churchy thing in the movie is the building Iorek smashes through. Coulter's line about 'our ancestors' was just as ambiguous in the moive as it was when Chris told us about it. There just wasn't much hinting towards religion, and what there was was done so that they could have been talking about anything. I doubt people who have no idea that it's meant to have religion in it will guess that at all.

But is it not more poetic to be more subtle? People will understand that the magisterium is a religious organization simply from their costumes (obviously church garb, somewhat monastic or priestly), let alone the numberous subtle religious tendencies of Magisterium characters (the oppressive controlling Coulter, The censoring Fra Pavel, etc.). The message gets across without a doubt.

I entirely disagree with what you say about references to the church namster, the only churchy thing in the movie is the building Iorek smashes through. Coulter's line about 'our ancestors' was just as ambiguous in the moive as it was when Chris told us about it. There just wasn't much hinting towards religion, and what there was was done so that they could have been talking about anything. I doubt people who have no idea that it's meant to have religion in it will guess that at all.

But is it not more poetic to be more subtle? People will understand that the magisterium is a religious organization simply from their costumes (obviously church garb, somewhat monastic or priestly), let alone the numberous subtle religious tendencies of Magisterium characters (the oppressive controlling Coulter, The censoring Fra Pavel, etc.). The message gets across without a doubt.

Their costumes are more military than churchy. I really wouldn't have got the references if i hadn't known the story of genesis, and don't forget that many children these days don't. whether or not the references should be stronger or not isn't what I was saying, my point was for people who don't know about religion, they'll be oblivious to what it's hinting at. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, I can see it opening the film up to a lot more people to whom the religious aspects would be of no interest at all.

I entirely disagree with what you say about references to the church namster, the only churchy thing in the movie is the building Iorek smashes through. Coulter's line about 'our ancestors' was just as ambiguous in the moive as it was when Chris told us about it. There just wasn't much hinting towards religion, and what there was was done so that they could have been talking about anything. I doubt people who have no idea that it's meant to have religion in it will guess that at all.

Really? Other than small children, I thought that nearly everyone would realize that the Magisterium reflects the Church. The story Coulter told was clearly the story of Adam and Eve and original sin. There were so many hints throughout the whole film (including, like Joe said, the costumes) that you'd have to be pretty dense to not make the connection.* Plus, with all the anti-church attention, most people will likely be searching for Church references...

*(Supposing you're somewhat familiar with the Church...)

----------------------------

The film was much better than I expected. My main beef is that it seemed very rushed, and characters jump to [the right] conclusions way too fast. Nicole Kidman played Coulter perfectly. Dakota had a few flat lines, but was overall very good. The acting was great in general.

The CGI was very impressive, though the vehicles were just as ridiculous as they were in the concept art. The daemons weren't cheesy after all, but I really didn't like how went out in a bright poof of Dust when their humans died.

As far as the ending... meh. It could have been much worse, and if the general audience genuinely believed that Lyra died in the end, I suppose it's in the best interest of the sequels to change it around. The best moment of the movie for me (tied with Ragnar's jaw getting swatted off) was Lyra's line to Roger about bringing Lord Asriel what he needs. You could instantly tell who in the theater had read the book because we all made sad noises.

An overall great movie.

The film was much better than I expected. My main beef is that it seemed very rushed, and characters jump to [the right] conclusions way too fast.

Indeed. Ma Costa instantly knowing that Billy had no daemon really irked me.

Mine is at my livejournal, skywaterblue. I'd post the link but I had to recreate my login since I'm never here.

It seems more negative than I actually feel about the film. I didn't hate it, there are parts that are quite lovely, the casting is perfection, but overall the studio interference made it pretty unwatchable for me since I know the book backwards and forwards.

I eagerly await the director's cut edition.

The film was much better than I expected. My main beef is that it seemed very rushed, and characters jump to [the right] conclusions way too fast.

Indeed. Ma Costa instantly knowing that Billy had no dæmon really irked me.

That whole scene wasn't done very well. The build up of Lyra walking to the hut and Pan freaking out was done well, but it was so anticlimactic. His daemon had been forcefully removed from him, and he just sat there looking a bit ill. And everyone acted that once he got his daemon back everything would be just peachy. It could have been a very powerful scene...

The film was much better than I expected. My main beef is that it seemed very rushed, and characters jump to [the right] conclusions way too fast.

Indeed. Ma Costa instantly knowing that Billy had no dæmon really irked me.

That whole scene wasn't done very well. The build up of Lyra walking to the hut and Pan freaking out was done well, but it was so anticlimactic. His dæmon had been forcefully removed from him, and he just sat there looking a bit ill. And everyone acted that once he got his dæmon back everything would be just peachy. It could have been a very powerful scene...

I agree. It definitely had the makings of a really good scene. Building up to it and as Lyra and Pan went through the shack... I got chills when she first said intercission but it was more because I remembered the emotion in the book and less that the movie scene had the emotion. Also, I thought the reasoning behind it being Billy in the shack and not Tony was because there would be a more emotional impact with Ma Costa and all. Instead, there were two seconds of emotion and then FIGHT SCENE!

My main problem with the film is how the film never makes as much out of intercision and the human-daemon bond as it should to be effective. They cut out all the scenes with Kaisa and you never see anyone freak out about missing a daemon. The adults at Bolvanger are not particularly portrayed as intercised either.

Worse is that they cut out Pan hopping through the gate and /forcing/ Lyra to talk to Iorek, so we never get a major scene about how awful it feels for your daemon to be even a few feet away from you. I find it odd, because I consider that to be an integral scene to the trilogy as a whole.

It was so stupid that Billy didn't die, it totally undermines the impact of the whole process. Ma Costa said he would be alright, so then what's the big deal about having your soul cut away?

They also seemed to imply that when your daemon is removed it disapears since Billy's wasn't with him and we never saw the room with the daemons locked away. I thought that was a bit weird..

I assumed Billy died, but turns out both my parents (one of whom has actually read the book) thought he lived.

I felt like there were a lot of times where someone who hadn't read the book wouldn't really understand what was going on.

It was so stupid that Billy didn't die, it totally undermines the impact of the whole process. Ma Costa said he would be alright, so then what's the big deal about having your soul cut away?

They also seemed to imply that when your dæmon is removed it disapears since Billy's wasn't with him and we never saw the room with the daemons locked away. I thought that was a bit weird..

Exactly. Billy dying in his mother's arms would have been very emotional and gotten the point across quite effectively.

Maybe the director's cut on DVD will show us more about the incised daemons?

tied with Ragnar's jaw getting swatted off

Cheers, laughs, applause throughout the theater. It was the only scene I wanted to see. And I was satisfied.

Jumping to conclusions too fast? Yeah. I didn't like how readily Iorek offered up all of his lamentations to Lyra when she first meets him. He should have been more difficult to open up. I think his character lost complexity because of that.

Some of the tension was lost with all the bouncing so quickly from scene to scene. We're introduced to the crazy mechanical bug thingies, and then not 2 minutes later they're attacking Lyra's ship. Things like that disappointed me a little. I wish there was more time for these types of things to stew, to give the audience a chance to anticipate something big. Instead of just thrusting it upon us.

I didn't expect so many events from the book to actually be in the movie, and honestly I wouldn't have minded if some were taken out just to add more time to other scenes. Like if some scene somewhere were taken out just so I can get more of Serafina's introduction, or 3 more minutes of Lyra's escape from Bolvangar. Sometimes it seemed too jam packed with big moments that there was no time to really care.

Nicole Kidman is a very poor tea pourer. I don't know how bumpy that dirigible was but it looked like she was nearly pouring tea into the tray.

Positives:

I loved the daemons. I thought they did so well with it. I thought it was an idea that would not have translated well on screen without being ham fisted about it, but it worked. The golden monkey's hand gets slammed under a window sill and there's a moment when Mrs. Coulter grabs her hand and winces. I liked that.

The acting was fantastic. Dakota was very impressive. I really did believe that she could melt Iorek's heart a little. Lee and Hester were perfect. The only source of comic relief and a very successful one, too. The special affects didn't look cartoonish or overdone.

To me, it was pretty, and well acted, but kind of... clunky. Better than I had anticipated.

The woman next to me "loved it!".

The adults at Bolvanger are not particularly portrayed as intercised either.

I did notice one of them had a particularly mangy dog that didn't look too well..