It would not be a stretch to call Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials"" the edgiest piece of mainstream fantasy fiction ever written. The books are an incredibly insightful meditation on quantum mechanics, religious philosophy and what it means to be alive, and whenever Pullman thinks he needs preteen sex or gay angels to express his ideas, he doesn't hesitate. The series has been described as an atheist response to ""Narnia."" ""My books,"" Pullman said in a 2003 interview, ""are about killing God.""
""The Golden Compass"" is by far the least blasphemous of the three books. Still, it's quite surprising to find that its anti-religious themes are not heavily tempered in the film version, despite numerous reports that they would be. There are still some definite swipes at ""the authority"" (Pullman's term for the Big Guy).
There's been a pre-release brouhaha about all this, and the Catholic League has called for a boycott. But while this kind of debate might be unusual for a Hollywood film, the real issue here is much more universal. This is just a terrible movie.
Whether considering its theological elements or not, ""His Dark Materials"" is a fascinating work, and Pullman's blunt statements about God-killing really belie their complexity. But director Chris Weitz, whose directing credits include such other contemplative pieces as ""American Pie,"" takes a story full of grace and nuance and injects it with a megadosage of hammy acting, painful dialogue and insufferable music. This is a $150 million made-for-TV movie.
The fantastical elements of Pullman's universe, like armored polar bears and demons (a talking animal companion who is the physical representation of a human's soul) are handled adequately by CGI. But there is hardly one line in Weitz's script that is not cliché, overly expository or both. It's worth mentioning that Weitz trashed the original script - by Tom Stoppard - in order to write his own.
It also features one of the most intrusive soundtracks in recent memory. Every character, even if onscreen for just 10 seconds, seems to have their own simplistic and annoying leitmotif, like a grotesque exaggeration of ""Peter and the Wolf.""
On top of that, there is some monumentally awful acting. One who stands out especially is erstwhile Bond girl Eva Green as the witch queen Serafina Pekkala. Her portrayal is staggeringly undeveloped, like she's been playing a rapid-fire improv game for several minutes when someone yells out, ""OK, now you're a witch, you're a witch!""
There is one very big bright spot in ""The Golden Compass,"" though, and that is the 13-year-old Dakota Blue Richards as Lyra, the film's protagonist. Unlike what might be expected from, say, that certain other Dakota, there is no hint of affected cuteness in Richards' performance. She is very impressive in projecting strength while still inviting sympathy.
Perhaps it was telling when, mere weeks before ""The Golden Compass"" was put in the can, the lesser-known actor who voiced Iorek, the main bear, was replaced by Ian McKellen. Apparently, the producers were worried that it wasn't Lord of the Rings-y enough. This ironically brings up the question of why film adaptations of fantasy classics exploded after ""Lord of the Rings,"" but none of them have emulated the ""LOTR"" film trilogy's maturity.
When James M. Cain was asked if he was concerned about what a movie adaptation might do to one of his books, he replied, ""What do you mean? The book is right over there, on the shelf."" Fans of ""His Dark Materials"" would do well to think that way in relating to this wretched adaptation - the book will endure, no matter what.
But squandering such an exceptional basis on such a poor film is an artistic tragedy. If by some disastrous sequence of events Weitz is allowed to write and direct adaptations of the other two books in the series, he will probably be too timid to actually go through with killing God as the author intended. Still, he's already done a fine job killing a great cinematic possibility
