3 reviews

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Glenn Watson July 6, 2008

Prince Caspian himself, Ben Barnes, talks to Daily Info about his big screen adventures in Narnia

Were you a fan of the original books as kid?
Yes, I found my old copy of Prince Caspian when I got the part. It was a copy that accompanied the 1989 BBC series which I loved. Inside I’d put this sticker of a bear saying ‘I can’t bear to be without my books’ and then my name in the really bad handwriting of an eight year old.

What do you make of seeing yourself on the film posters around the world?
It’s so weird. When they showed me the mock-up I said, “Is that sensible? No one knows who I am! No one will go and see it!”. Colin Firth, who I’ve just worked with, took a picture of it on his phone and sent it to me saying, “Is that a real pout?” And my brother said ‘Okay, I get it. But it’s Prince Caspian not you – look at the tan”. There are enough grounding forces in my life to keep me sane!

You manage to carry off a Spanish accent in the movie. Was that difficult?
A lot of the parts I’ve done have involved accents. I’ve done Americans, Russians, Yorkshiremen. On the night before the audition I noticed it said ‘lines to be delivered in a Spanish accent’, so I rummaged through my DVD collection for anything with Antonio Banderas! But after asking me to do a Spanish accent, the director cast two Italians, a Mexican and a Belgian and asked me to do something to assimilate them all! I gave it my best shot.

Was there any initiation to being accepted as one of the family?
I was a bit cynical beforehand. I’d watched all the DVD extras from the first film with the kids saying ‘it’s like having another family’ and I thought, that can’t be real. But the very first time I met them they were playing table tennis, eating ice cream and clambering all over each other. They were just so affectionate. It was a fantastic environment to make a film. Yes, there were a few pranks.

You were doing The History Boys at the National Theatre when this came along. Was it hard choosing whether to stay or to go?
Yes, I’d been at the National about six months when Prince Caspian came along. I’d been going to the National since I was 10 and it was always my dream to work there. We thought we’d be able to work out the timing but we couldn’t. So I gave as much notice as I could and said it was an opportunity I couldn’t pass up. I’m a loyal guy, so it was quite frustrating. Two of my dreams came true at the same time.

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Andrea Hopkins June 28, 2008

This film is absolutely superb; as with Harry Potter II, they have really hit their stride and produced a much better movie than the first one. I am so glad that it has taken until now for anyone to be able to film these books, which I am sure has saved us all from many naff and useless versions (instead we have only two – the moderately bad BBC tv series from the 80s, and the frightful US cartoon LW&W of the same period). But, now that the technical genius exists to bring us credible talking animals and magical special effects, another problem with adapting the books for film arises. Though they are wonderful books, with excellent stories, their characterization does not translate well into a dramatic medium. Everyone in the books is frightfully nice – there aren’t any hidden agendas, or much overt conflict. You could not, in fact, have had a Prince Caspian exactly as he appears in the book, i.e. as an English public schoolboy, circa 1955; and you couldn’t do much with the Pevensies either. The first film deepened the characters by adding a real dimension to the apparently motiveless treachery of Edmund (in the book he simply “started to go wrong” when he went to a bad school). This film also adds depth and twenty-first century darkness to the rather jolly portrayal of Narnia under siege in the book. With admirably minimal re-writing, it provides us with a much-needed glimpse of how hard it would actually be for the children to have to go back to being school-children in England after growing up as kings and queens in Narnia, and how hard in a different way it is for the Narnians to live in secret under a regime of tyrannical invaders. There is also an altogether un-Lewis like questioning of the ways of Aslan by the faithful Lucy.

The whole movie is ravishingly beautiful to look at; the principle actors are without exception wonderful. I’m truly sorry to think that the beautiful Peter (William Moseley) will not be appearing in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, currently in production, and I only hope that some kind film-makers will employ him in lots of other movies, because he really does have great sensitivity, vulnerability, anger and affection. Skandar Keynes as Edmund was also impressive, and Georgie Henley as Lucy again showed that quality of stillness and wonder that was so moving in the first film. Newcomer Ben Barnes was a very handsome and convincing Caspian; but triumphant top acting honours should go to Peter Dinklage as Trumpkin. First of all, his English accent was perfect (he’s actually American), but second of all, he brilliantly conveyed the weariness and pain of being on the losing side, the prickly cynicism of someone who feels themselves to have been abandoned, and the deep anger and stubbornness of a born fighter who just will not give in even against overwhelming odds. Also wonderful were the assorted Italians and Spaniards who played the Telmarine bad guys, Miraz, Glozel, and Sopespian, not forgetting the charismatic Lady Prunaprismia. The realisation of the animal characters Reepicheep and Trufflehunter was splendid, Reepicheep and his mice in particular credibly lethal fighters as they pick off enemy soldiers one by one under cover of forest undergrowth, a la Jurassic Park.

This is a very much more violent film than LW&W, with absolutely first-class battle-scenes, easily the match of Lord of the Rings III; I wouldn’t take any younger or more sensitive children to see it. Still the darkness is leavened with pleasing humour, the special effects are divine, the swash-buckling heroics of all four children are brilliantly choreographed – I particularly liked the imprint of chain mail left on Susan’s cheek after one bruising encounter. A budding connection between Susan and Caspian is deftly handled. Devotees of the book will be pleased by the faithfulness to even unscripted minor characters – I noticed the Bulgy Bear sucking his paws in the background of Peter’s climactic duel with Miraz – but will not be displeased by the changes – lady centaurs, fauns and dwarves have been added to Lewis’s dismayingly masculine Narnian population.
I’ve been to see this twice since Thursday and I will have to go again. It’s one of those movies – must-see, and then must-see some more. It’ll two years until the release of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader – I just can’t wait.

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Glenn Watson June 22, 2008

A thousand years have passed in Narnia waiting for Prince Caspian. Only three for us - since the first Chronicle of Narnia became an unexpected smash. Yet things have changed. Gone is the magical aura of the first instalment. Prince Caspian is an altogether more brooding and violent affair.

Prince Caspian (Ben Barnes) is a telmarine – a human race that believes Narnia long-dead, even mythical. His evil uncle Miraz knows the truth: the telmarine extermination of Narnians a thousand years ago. But when Caspian’s professor warns the prince of the truth and of his uncle’s plans to kill him, Caspian flees. Tracked and trapped, he blows a magical horn that sums Peter, Edmund, Susan and Lucy to the rescue.

Dealing with darker matters than its predecessor, or the adolescent Harry Potters, this is about growing up into an adult world of deception and responsibility. Happily, Shrek director Andrew Adamson is behind the camera again and injects a degree of humour to ensure there’s light amid the darkness.

Beginning below ground – in Caspian’s castle-depths and in the war-time tube-stations of London – there’s a sense of crisis from the off. The fight against fascism isn’t just taking place in our world. Telmarines and Narnians are racially divided: talking beasts, subjugated for so long, are now just beasts: “if you’re treated like a dumb animal for long enough, that’s what you become”.

Therein lies the success or failure of this franchise: if you’re hoping to find the first film’s magical moments and revel in a world of cute, amusing animals, you’ll be disappointed. Caspian is both too strong and too slow for tinier audiences. And given Walden Media’s reputation for family-friendly fare, there’s a seriously high body count.

Two epic battle scenes, thrillingly done, are bruisingly violent by PG standards. And Peter’s stand-out duel is only a few shades lighter than Brad Pitt’s visceral face-off with Eric Bana in Troy. It’s brilliantly choreographed, edge-of-seat stuff, certainly not child’s play.

Not quite treading water before Voyage of the Dawn Treader, Caspian still knows it’s part of a franchise: we’re told up front that some characters won’t be back and are introduced to those who will - including Eddie Izzard’s soldier-mouse Reepicheep, a rodent redolent of Shrek 2’s Puss in Boots.

Caspian’s cast do a creditable job. Barnes is believably good as the eponymous prince, a lilting Spanish accent effectively carried-off. Relying less on Georgie Henley’s Lucy (who so enlivened Wardrobe), Caspian rides on Anna Popplewell’s arrow-shooting Susan and the sword-wielding heroics of Peter (William Moseley) and Edmund (Skander Keynes).

Less witty than the first, Caspian is nevertheless wordy – especially at the start. But the Pevensie family’s break-through to Narnia is breathtakingly done and the action scenes are boisterous and imaginative. Aslan’s non-appearance for most of the film poses the dilemmas of faith and doubt which C S Lewis intended.

In short, Caspian is a blockbuster with brains. Heroics aplenty, there’s still an edginess to the action that’s as unsettling. Peter’s storming of the castle is a case in point and Adamson wrenches every emotion from it. He can’t, though, resist the Shrek-like moments: watch out for the cat-and-mouse sight gag as Reepicheep handles the castle cat.

A resonant film, Caspian is Adamson’s most mature movie to date and more than matches the Potters and the Rings. But with Caspian his last as director (Michael Apted takes over for Dawn Treader) he’s taking a risk by not replaying the first film’s formula. For all the badgers and mice, it’s men and their menace that feature the most.