Narnia Tunes at Disney's Night of Joy

This September's edition of the annual Night of Joy celebration at the Magic Kingdom in Orlando will feature some of the new tunes "inspired by" the upcoming Narnia movie. If you're planning a trip to Disney World the first week in September, you might enjoy the event.

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MagicalMountain.net, 30.07.05

New Comments from WETA's Taylor

SciFi Wire is running a short article that includes comments from WETA head Richard Taylor regarding the contrast of Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings project and Andrew Adamson's shot at Narnia.

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SciFi Wire, 30.07.05

Words of Caution and Self-Promotion

Movie Guide's Ted Baehr has published an article over at WorldNetDaily urging restraint in Christian circles when it comes to jumping into the high-stakes world of film publicity. It's a decent article, but our colleague Mr. Baehr is also promoting his new book, Narnia Beckons. Readers also might take into account that Baehr is himself a paid publicist, in addition to being a reviewer, having assisted with the marketing of movies such as Gods and Generals, among others.

So it's a good read, and he has good things to say, but take it all with a grain of salt—which Baehr himself would recommend, I'm sure.

MORE HERE
WorldNetDaily, 30.07.05

Walden's Educational Resources

Walden Media has finally launched their own website to support the release of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. As expected, it's mostly geared toward educators and education resources, though it does duplicate some of the content on the "official" site.

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Walden Media, 23.07.05

New Promotional Featurette

"The Story," a promotional featurette that debuted at ComicCon, and the fourth of a series, is now available online at NarniaWeb, among other places. What's really puzzling is that these don't show up on the official site first. Hmph.

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NarniaWeb, 21.07.05

Adapting Narnia for the Screen

The Hollywood Jesus "books" section includes a fairly detailed article about the general problem of adapting books into films—using The Chronicles of Narnia as a specific example. It's a good read. I should know. I (Greg) wrote it.

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Hollywood Jesus, 20.07.05

Neeson Wins

Well, at least it appears that way. Word on the street from ComicCon attendees in San Diego this week is that Disney has confirmed that Liam Neeson has been selected to voice Aslan. When I see a press release from Disney or Walden Media, I'll pass that along, too—but these Convention 'announcements' are usually pretty reliable.

Update, 18.07.05: And it's official. The announcment at ComicCon came directly from Andrew Adamson himself, via satellite from the UK. ComingSoon.net has a very nice report on the Narnia panel at ComicCon.

Russell Crowe as Aslan?

I just knew the Liam Neeson rumor would spawn others! Now the Daily Telegraph is running a story on Crowe in which he is "reportedly in talks to provide the voice of Aslan, in Disney's movie adaptation of The Chronicles Of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe."

The Neeson rumor seems much more likely. This one seems like a calculated effort by Crowe's publicists to rebuild his image after the actor's disastrous cell-phone throwing, arrest-inducing episode the opening weekend of Cinderella Man.

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Source, 14.07.05

Narnia Everywhere

This summer and fall, The Chronicles of Narnia will be fairly inescapable, particularly if you hang out in Christian circles. Both paid and grass-roots promotional efforts will be focusing heavily on Christian music festivals and the like, staffing booths with information about this winter's movie from Disney and Walden Media. I don't anticpate reporting on every one of these events, but the latest to be added to the roster is Kingdom Bound 2005 at Six Flags Darien Lake, NY, July 31st through August 3rd. Check it out if you're so inclined.

New "Resources" Website Up

Paul Lauer's Motive Entertainment has created a website called Narnia Resources to serve as a clearing house for Narnia promotions. The site is pretty bare-bones at this point, with the majority of it "Under Construction." But it might be a good one to bookmark now and check back as things ramp up. To date, there's nothing on the site that you couldn't get from the official site, but I do know that Motive Marketing has been contracted with Disney and Walden Media for some time; so the site will undoubtedly have some good stuff on it eventually.

MORE HERE

Liam Neeson as Aslan?

A web rumor is circulating that Liam Neeson has voiced Aslan for The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. And some critics don't like the choice. If the rumor is true, and I do say "if," the choice would make some sense. I'd always thought that Brian Cox, the actor orginally tabbed as Aslan, was an odd choice; but if the idea was to get a decent Celtic-sounding voice, it makes more sense. And Neeson would be a good replacement from that standpoint. Recommendations like James Earl Jones would make far less sense—but Sean Bean would still be a good pick, too!

My personal choice would be Ron Glass, who played Shepherd Book in the Firefly TV series and reprises the role in the upcoming movie Serenity.

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Ain't It Cool, 12.07.05

Sibley Interview Transcript

NarniaWeb has posted a transcript of a recent radio interview with Brian Sibley, Lewis and Tolkien scholar. The subject of the interview is the forthcoming "adult" edition of the Chronicles from Harper Collins. If you're interested in the publishing business, you might find something there worth the read.

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NarniaWeb, 07.08.05

July Narnia Feature at Hollywood Jesus

“The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

“One criticism of C.S. Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia that would be almost impossible to defend is that he repeats himself. Each of the seven books has its own character, its own unique flavor and style. In one sense, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader ‘picks up’ the story line of Prince Caspian, giving us a glimpse of Caspian’s reign as King of Narnia. And while it’s also true that Caspian’s character is only here fully realized, Dawn Treader is still no retread of the earlier books. In this story, we go to sea and are entertained in the fashion of classic tales like The Odyssey and Gulliver’s Travels. We haven’t seen the likes of this in Narnia before.

“Paul McCusker, writer and director of the Chronicles of Narnia Radio Theatre production, has pointed out the problems of adapting the books in a different order than that in which they were published. To a certain extent, he says, Dawn Treader works best when taken as the third book in the series, as originally published. But McCusker also points out that Dawn Treader has the advantage of being the most literarily ‘mature’ of the original three stories—and that Lewis further invested the story with a certain narrative weight since he conceived it as the ‘final’ book in the series.

“So in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, we find Lewis at the peak of his story-telling game, and we also find compelling and moving themes. This month, George Rosok brings us our story synopsis, and Kathy Bledsoe entertains us with a review of the literary themes of the story in an imaginative fashion consistent with the creativity of Lewis’ tale. Finally, Jenn Wright uses Lewis’ imagery of the episode at the Dark Island as a jumping-off point for a meditation on how the spirituality of the novel has interlaced with her own life.

“Enjoy!”

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Hollywood Jesus, 08.07.05

Narnia at Comic-Con, San Diego

At next week's Comic-Con in San Diego, Narnia will have a significant presence. I've included links to the full schedule and a summary of Narnia-related events posted at Narnia Fans. Included is a session with director Andrew Adamson.

MORE HERE and HERE
Narnia Fans, 04.07.05

Merchandise News: Narnia Calendars

NarniaWeb has got some pretty nice scans of the movie-based 2006 Chronicles of Narnia calendars, with links to the sites where they can be purchased. If buying stuff is your thing, or even if you want to just check out the pictures, take a look!

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NarniaWeb, 02.07.05

Narnia Radio Series Review

Hollywood Jesus has posted a review of Focus on the Family's radio broadcasts of The Chronicles of Narnia, a series dicussed here previously ("Narnia on the Radio"). Greg gives it a good review!

MORE HERE
Hollywood Jesus, 01.07.05