Review: The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

Twentieth Century Fox

The 'Chronicles of Narnia' is a sad tale of the woes of poor-box office showings. 'The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe', the first of the C.S. Lewis series, had an opening weekend of $65.5 million and a total gross of nearly $292 million in the US. It was an impressive opening and seemed to be the beginning of better things to come and received mostly positive reviews, earning a 76% on Rotten Tomatoes. 'Prince Caspian', the second in the series, made $55 million opening weekend and a total gross of $141.6 million in the US while the total budget was $225 million. It was a fairly major upset, to say the least, and the 67% on RT didn't help either. It was at this point, when things were getting ready to go on 'Dawn Treader' that Disney dropped the series. For a while, it seemed Narnia could be lost forever. Then Fox picked it back up and fans breathed easy once again.

However, 'Dawn Treader' only made $24 million opening weekend. That's less than half of what 'Prince Caspian' made opening weekend, the movie that started the trouble for the franchise in the first place. To top it all off, 'Dawn Treader' has 49% on RT. It really is a very sad state of affairs, especially for me and families like mine who grew up reading the series and I for one think 'The Silver Chair', the next book, is the best of the lot. So what happened to Narnia? Why can't a PG rated, fantasy-action, family friendly movie draw an audience during a time of year when people are willing to see any movie for an excuse to get out and do something?

Twentieth Century Fox

I must say, I wasn't a very big fan of the first two films. 'Wardrobe' started out OK and the world of Narnia really came to life at points but it never quite cut it for me. I thought 'Caspian' was a bit of an improvement even though it took more liberties with the story, but it showed more of an attempt to become its own thing. Each of these films (including 'Dawn Treader', sadly) seems like nothing more than a conglomeration of prior fantasy-action flicks. 'Lord of the Rings' really achieved something incredible when it gave us a world with peoples, scenery, and culture that were breathtaking and fascinating. Nothing in Narnia has done that for me, and it should. That's the only way it's ever going to work.

What I see instead are very limited characters that aren't given much definition, mostly thanks to the poor script and preoccupation with flashy costumes, effects, and sets. 'Dawn Treader' tries to give things more life beyond the material, but it still felt very 2-dimensional. The main problem is that 'Dawn Treader' doesn't work well as a movie. The story of a ship sailing off into the unknown and adventure works well for a book because , from chapter to chapter, you are taken from one adventure to another, and you're fine with that because that's usually how a book works. What the movie 'Dawn Treader' tries to do is to give the story a focus. It tries to give the voyage a goal and a reason beyond discovering what has become of the 7 lost lords. It's a good idea and absolutely what you need to do for a movie, but it does not come off well.

Twentieth Century Fox

An attempt is made to give every main character their own struggle. The problem is this 'struggle' is not going to be compelling or believe-able when the characters we have don't go beyond much else than a few flimsy lines. The 'goal' created for the end is for them to conquer this evil power that is 'pure evil', as someone says in the movie. Really? A bodiless, green fog is 'pure evil'? But of course, the Dawn Treader and its crew has to get to all these islands first. Although I'd say it's definitely a better film, 'Dawn Treader' still slightly reminded me of 'Clash of the Titans' and how it simply jumps from action scene to action scene and avoids acting and dialog because we know that doesn't matter when you have giant Krakens. It's as if they believe the spectacle of the scenery and a thin plot is going to keep the audience totally engaged.

Well, I found myself getting pretty bored by the end. It's really too bad because I love the books and really want to see strong movies. But something tells me these books, made up of pretty independent stories and characters, can't hold up as an ongoing series of movies like 'Lord of the Rings' and 'Harry Potter'. The 'Rings' trilogy and the 'Potter' saga all have a primary focus and struggle that grows stronger and stronger; especially with 'Rings'. Narnia does not have that. It is definitely a problem that none of the movies so far have had something very special about them, but the lack of drive and focus is probably the most important.