December 5, 2007
Ah Nicole, lovely Nicole. Who would have thought in 1983 that the co-star of a small Australian film about BMX enthusiasts (BMX Bandits) would one day grow up into the goddess that we now see before us, and have us falling at her feet? As the sinister anti-heroine of The Golden Compass, she is the chief draw of this slick Christmas film.
Based on the first part of Philip Pullman’s esteemed His Dark Materials trilogy, The Golden Compass (Northern Lights is the title of the source novel) takes us through the early stages of Lyra Belacqua’s (Dakota Blue Richards) journey out of her closed Oxford world and into something altogether more different. I have difficulty believing that there is anyone left on the planet who doesn’t know the story, so I’m not going to waste much time talking about it. The film is a well-crafted and watchable experience, and it puts all the necessary elements of Pullman’s worlds on screen. It's also relatively short and very light on its feet, and the better for it I think: Chris Weitz is an efficient and skilled director who knows how to adapt a long novel economically.
By far the best of it are the early stages, set in and around Oxford university and featuring what is almost a cameo by Daniel Craig as Lyra’s “Uncle”, Lord Asriel. Craig proves, as he did in Casino Royale, that he really is a very good actor and highly charismatic screen presence, not good looking exactly, but unquestionably attractive in a bizarre kind of way. Our beautiful city too has rarely looked better, infused as it is with the subtle surreal tinge that marks it out as a semi-parallel world. Richards’ performance as Lyra is competent but unremarkable – she doesn’t so much carry the film as wander casually through it, and her accent varies wildly between guttersnipe and Head Girl.
The Golden Compass is Kidman’s show though, and doesn’t she know it. Like Madonna when she played Eva Peron, she sails through the film with an air of glamorous self-importance that makes one go weak at the knees. Although her screen time is relatively limited, the movie hums with the feel of her even when she’s off-screen. Her best moments are those when she comes close to losing that mask of congeniality and revealing the wicked witch within (eg. the shoulder bag incident and the time she issues a shocking bitch slap to her daemon). Like most trilogy openers, this film ends on a bit of a cliffhanger, and I must say I’m quite looking forward to seeing what happens next, and what I hope will be revealed in the next instalments: Asriel and Marisa Coulter’s backstory and the early life of Lyra, more Daniel Craig, and the first on screen meeting between Craig and Kidman. It’s a tantalising prospect…
Based on the first part of Philip Pullman’s esteemed His Dark Materials trilogy, The Golden Compass (Northern Lights is the title of the source novel) takes us through the early stages of Lyra Belacqua’s (Dakota Blue Richards) journey out of her closed Oxford world and into something altogether more different. I have difficulty believing that there is anyone left on the planet who doesn’t know the story, so I’m not going to waste much time talking about it. The film is a well-crafted and watchable experience, and it puts all the necessary elements of Pullman’s worlds on screen. It's also relatively short and very light on its feet, and the better for it I think: Chris Weitz is an efficient and skilled director who knows how to adapt a long novel economically.
By far the best of it are the early stages, set in and around Oxford university and featuring what is almost a cameo by Daniel Craig as Lyra’s “Uncle”, Lord Asriel. Craig proves, as he did in Casino Royale, that he really is a very good actor and highly charismatic screen presence, not good looking exactly, but unquestionably attractive in a bizarre kind of way. Our beautiful city too has rarely looked better, infused as it is with the subtle surreal tinge that marks it out as a semi-parallel world. Richards’ performance as Lyra is competent but unremarkable – she doesn’t so much carry the film as wander casually through it, and her accent varies wildly between guttersnipe and Head Girl.
The Golden Compass is Kidman’s show though, and doesn’t she know it. Like Madonna when she played Eva Peron, she sails through the film with an air of glamorous self-importance that makes one go weak at the knees. Although her screen time is relatively limited, the movie hums with the feel of her even when she’s off-screen. Her best moments are those when she comes close to losing that mask of congeniality and revealing the wicked witch within (eg. the shoulder bag incident and the time she issues a shocking bitch slap to her daemon). Like most trilogy openers, this film ends on a bit of a cliffhanger, and I must say I’m quite looking forward to seeing what happens next, and what I hope will be revealed in the next instalments: Asriel and Marisa Coulter’s backstory and the early life of Lyra, more Daniel Craig, and the first on screen meeting between Craig and Kidman. It’s a tantalising prospect…